ENGL 501: HISTORY OF LITERARY AND CULTURAL THEORY

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UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH SPRING 2013 COURSE DESCRIPTIONS ENGL 695: GRADUATE FICTION FORM AND THEORY David Treuer, Thursday, 2:00-4:20 p.m. Course Number 32802D This course will resemble more a gathering of detectives than a workshop. That is, it will be our job to peel back the different layers of Pale Fire – from the initial reading of “plot” and “character” to deeper levels that include a host of literary references. Step 1: Our first task is to read the novel as it was given—from beginning to end and from cover to cover. This reading is our first pass. On this pass we will collect as many of the literary references and clues we recognize immediately and make a master list as we discuss the plot and characters and story. We will then retreat from Pale Fire in order to read everything on that master list of obvious references (like Boswell’s Life of Johnson mentioned in the epigraph, the title Pale Fire drawn from both Hamlet and Timon of Athens, for example). Then we reread Pale Fire. Step 2: go back to the book and make a second list of texts/references that might not be so obvious (“The Adventure of the Empty House” and “Murders at the Rue Morgue” and “Four Quartets”). Step 3 repeat steps 1 and 2: Pale Fire and make a final list of buried, obscure, cleverly-hidden references (Egil’s Saga, The Kalevala, Song of Igor’s Campaign). Our final step will be to reread Pale Fire and reassemble the text using all the texts, clues, and traditions we’ve collected and collated. In doing so we will come into contact with a rich literary tradition from which Nabokov has cobbled his novel. Students will be expected to make regular presentations, engage in creative assignments (map-making, seating charts, etc), and to write critically. 6
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH SPRING 2013 COURSE DESCRIPTIONS ENGL 697: GRADUATE FICTION WRITING WORKSHOP Dana Johnson, Wednesday, 4:30-6:50 p.m. Course Number 32804D This course is an intense practicum in advanced-level fiction writing and a traditional graduate fiction workshop. Writers will be required to hand in two to three submissions of 20-30 pages (novel or short story) during the semester. In addition, there will be revisions of a scene or scenes from one of each writer’s workshopped submissions at the end of the semester. We will also be reading a novel, Veronica, by Mary Gaitskill and a short story collection, Whose Song?, by Thomas Glave 7
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ENGL 501: HISTORY OF LITERARY AND CULTURAL THEORY

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