Postmodernist Fiction

English 5321.252      Spring 2007

Professor Paul Cohen                 Office: FH358

Phone: 245-7685                     E-mail: pc06@swt.edu

  Office hours: M & W 2:00-3:30, Th 5:30-6:30, and by appointment

Course Web site:   http://www.english.swt.edu/cohen_p/postmodern/1.html

DESCRIPTION : This seminar will provide an introduction to some of the most extraordinary and exciting types of innovative fiction of the past forty years, culminating in two 21st-century novels exhibiting the latest developments. Since postmodernism is an interdisciplinary phenomenon, we will sometimes look at the fiction in the context of contemporary poetry, art, music, film, and hypermedia. Much supplementary material will be available through an extensive course Web site.

TEXTBOOKS :            

Patricia Waugh, ed.:                         Postmodernism: A Reader

Jorge Luis Borges:                           Labyrinths

Thomas Pynchon:                            The Crying of Lot 49

Vladimir Nabokov:                          Pale Fire

Italo Calvino:                          If on a winter's night a traveler

Christine Brooke-Rose:                  Textermination

Nathaniel Mackey:                         Atet A.D.

David Mitchell:                              Cloud Atlas

REQUIREMENTS :   You will write two papers on postmodern writing:   a shorter one on an assigned topic, due on February 15, and one on a topic of your choice, due on April 19. You will submit the papers electronically. You will take a final essay examination due on May 3. The first paper and the exam will each count as 25% of your course grade, and the long paper will count as 50%.

CALENDAR :

This schedule will definitely change as the course moves on. I will announce upcoming changes in class, and you are responsible for knowing about them and coming to class prepared.

January 18             Modernism and Postmodernism

               25           Theory

                                     Leslie Fiedler: "Cross the Border--Close the Gap" (Waugh 31)

                                     Susan Sontag:   "Against Interpretation" (W48)

                                     William Spanos: "The Detective and the Boundary" (W78)

                                     Jean-François Lyotard: "Answering the Question: What is Postmodernism?" (W117)

                                     Jean Baudrillard: from Simulations (W186)

                                     Patricia Waugh: "Modernism, Postmodernism, Feminism: Gender and Autonomy Theory" (W189)

                                     Brian McHale: from Postmodernist Fiction (W211)

February 1             James Joyce: Finnegans Wake (excerpt)

                                              John Cage: Roaratorio            

               8             Jorge Luis Borges:   "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote"

                                              "Funes the Memorious"

                                              "The Secret Miracle"

                                              "Kafka and His Precursors"

                15             Vladimir Nabokov: Pale Fire

                22             Thomas Pynchon: The Crying of Lot 49

March       1              Italo Calvino: If on a winter's night a traveler

                 8              Hypertext: Jorge Luis Borges: "The Garden of Forking Paths"

               22             Christine Brooke-Rose: Textermination

               29             Nathaniel Mackey: Atet A.D.

April         5             Postmodern literature and art

               12             The Postmodern book

               19             David Mitchell: Cloud Atlas

               26             Current developments and Postpostmodernism

May          3             Final examination