Department of English

The following list reflects the 2006/2007 faculty.

Chairman James A. Winn

Faculty

Laurence A. Breiner Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Boston College; MPhil, PhD, Yale University

Julia P. Brown Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Barnard College; MA, PhD, Columbia University

William C. Carroll Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Oberlin College; MPhil, PhD, Yale University

Robert Chodat Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, McGill University; PhD, Stanford University

Bonnie Costello Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Bennington College; PhD, Cornell University

Leslie Epstein Director, Creative Writing Program, Department of English; Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, DFA, Yale University; MA, University of California, Los Angeles

Aaron Fogel Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, University of Cambridge (England); BA, PhD, Columbia University

Eugene Green Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, Ohio State University; PhD, University of Michigan

Ha Jin Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Heilongjiang University, Harbin (China); MA, Shandong University (China); MA, PhD, Brandeis University

Laura Korobkin Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Williams College; MA, Brandeis University; JD, Harvard Law School; PhD, Harvard University

Maurice Lee Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Stanford University; MA, PhD, University of California, Los Angeles

Robert Levine Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, City University of New York, City College; MA, Columbia University; PhD, University of California, Berkeley

Christopher Martin Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, St. Joseph’s University; MA, PhD, University of Virginia

John T. Matthews Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, University of Pennsylvania; MA, PhD, Johns Hopkins University

Susan Mizruchi Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Washington University; PhD, Princeton University

Leland Monk Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, University of California, Santa Cruz; MA, PhD, University of California, Berkeley

Erin Murphy Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Vassar College; MA, PhD, Rutgers University

Thomas Otten Visiting Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, Lawrence University; PhD, University of California, Los Angeles

Anita Patterson Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Harvard College; MA, PhD, Harvard University

Robert Pinsky Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Rutgers University; MA, PhD, Stanford University; DHL (hon.), Kenyon College

Carrie Preston Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Michigan State University; MA, PhD, Rutgers University

Michael Prince Assistant Dean, Writing Program; Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Stanford University; PhD, University of Virginia

Bruce Redford University Professor; Professor of English and Art History, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Brown University; BA, University of Cambridge (England); PhD, Princeton University

John Paul Riquelme Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Rice University; MPhil, PhD, Yale University

Charles J. Rzepka Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, University of Michigan; MA, PhD, University of California, Berkeley

James Siemon Associate Chairman, Department of English; Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Washington University; MA, PhD, State University of New York, Buffalo

Matthew Smith Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Brown University; MA, University of Chicago; MA, PhD, Columbia University

Andrew Stauffer Associate Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, University of Pennsylvania; PhD, University of Virginia

Sandra F. Tropp Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, Bucknell University; PhD, Boston University

Kevin Van Anglen Instructor in English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Princeton University; BA, MA, University of Cambridge (England); MA, PhD, Harvard University

David A. Wagenknecht Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, Boston University; DPhil, University of Sussex (England)

Derek Walcott Professor of English and Creative Writing, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, University of the West Indies; LittD (hon.), Boston University; LittD (hon.), Dartmouth College; LittD (hon.), University of Oxford (England); LittD (hon.), University of Urbino (Italy)

Rosanna Warren University Professor; Emma Ann MacLachlan Metcalf Professor of Humanities; Professor of English and French, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Yale University; MA, Johns Hopkins University

Jean L. Wilson Adjunct Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, PhD, University of Cambridge (England)

James A. Winn Chairman, Department of English; Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Princeton University; PhD, Yale University

Maria Zlateva Assistant Professor of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, MA, PhD, Sofia University (Bulgaria)

Affiliated Faculty

Archie Burnett Professor of English and Codirector, Editorial Institute, College of Arts and Sciences. MA, University of Edinburgh; DPhil, University of Oxford

Emeriti

Samuel Allen Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Fisk University; LLB, Harvard University

Millicent Bell Professor Emerita of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, New York University; MA, PhD, Brown University

Morton Berman Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, University of Illinois; AM, PhD, Harvard University

Burton L. Cooper Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Boston University; AM, PhD, University of Michigan

Emily K. Dalgarno Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, William Smith College; AM, PhD, Brown University

Gerald P. Fitzgerald University Professor Emeritus and Professor Emeritus of English and Italian. AB, AM, PhD, Harvard University

William G. Riggs Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, University of Rochester; MA, PhD, University of California, Berkeley

Robert Ryan Associate Professor Emeritus of English, BA, Western Michigan University; MA, University of Connecticut; PhD, Northwestern University

Robert L. Saitz Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BA, Boston University; MA, University of Iowa; PhD, University of Wisconsin

William L. Vance Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. AB, Oberlin College; AM, PhD, University of Michigan; LittD (hon.), University of South Dakota

Donald J. Winslow Professor Emeritus of English, College of Arts and Sciences. BS, MA, Tufts University; PhD, Boston University

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The Graduate Program

Students in the Graduate Program in English enjoy the advantages of a large faculty but do not suffer the disadvantages of a large program. The result is a student-centered program with a wide selection of graduate courses and teachers. A substantial number of University fellowships are open to MA students on a competitive basis. Students who continue into the PhD program are normally awarded teaching fellowships renewable for several years, contingent upon satisfactory performance in the program. We offer a strong faculty representation in every literary period, and students in nineteenth- and twentieth-century literature profit from the presence of the distinguished writers of the Creative Writing Program and from departmental sponsorship of Studies in Romanticism and association with AGNI.

Further information is available from the department, 236 Bay State Road, Boston, MA 02215; 617-353-2506; web: Department of English.

Admissions Applicants for admission must submit results of the Graduate Record Examination General Test and the Subject Test in Literature.

MA in English

Prerequisites Applicants must submit a writing sample of scholarly work. The student is normally expected to have completed an undergraduate concentration in English. No transfer of credit is allowed toward fulfillment of the eight semester courses required for the degree.

Course Requirements Eight semester courses (32 credits) are required for the degree, normally completed within one year. Candidates for the MA are required to take at least one course that focuses primarily on critical theory, critical method, or the history of criticism.

To fulfill the linguistics/philology requirement, the candidate must complete satisfactorily at least one semester course from the following: CAS EN 511 Introduction to Linguistics; CAS EN 513 Modern English Grammar; CAS EN 514 Medieval Languages; CAS EN 515, 516 History of the English Language; CAS EN 561 Chaucer; GRS EN 815 Old English; GRS EN 816 Beowulf; or GRS EN 721, 722, 822 Studies in Medieval Literature. The linguistics/philology requirement may be waived for the candidate who has had an equivalent course as an undergraduate.

All courses are chosen in consultation with the candidate’s advisor. The candidate must demonstrate, by a proposed program of courses together with a completed undergraduate program of courses, a reasonably comprehensive coverage of American literature and of English literature from the Middle Ages through the nineteenth century.

Course Credit in Related Fields As part of the total program of eight semester courses required for the degree, candidates may, with the approval of their advisor, elect a one-semester graduate-level course in a related area.

Foreign Language Requirement The candidate must arrange to satisfy the departmental foreign language requirement by demonstrating intermediate-level proficiency in one classical or modern foreign language. Candidates wishing to demonstrate proficiency in French, German, Spanish, Italian, or Latin may do so by achieving an appropriate designated score on the SAT II Language test during their first semester of matriculation. Arrangements for testing in other languages must be made with the department. The requirement may also be satisfied by the student earning at least a B in a specifically designated foreign-language course at the advanced intermediate level. The candidate is not to elect such a course as a fifth course in any semester, nor does this course count toward the eight semester courses required for the degree.

MFA in Creative Writing

Prerequisites To be accepted for the MFA degree in creative writing, a student must, at the time of application, furnish a creative writing sample. To have the writing sample returned, applicants must send a stamped, self-addressed manila envelope.

Course Requirements Eight semester courses (32 credits) are required for the degree; these are usually completed within one year, though they may be completed in two. At least four of the eight courses are normally taken in fiction, poetry, or drama, or a combination thereof. Thus, the four remaining courses normally are graduate-level courses not in creative writing. These must constitute a coherent program of study that includes at least three graduate literature courses. It is possible to pursue a course in another discipline when such study is demonstrably essential to the student’s creative work. The candidate must work out a specific program in consultation with the writing faculty.

Foreign Language Requirement Each student who has not previously completed at least two years of study in one foreign language at the undergraduate level or the equivalent shall make up the deficiency. The academic advisor may approve one of the following options: (1) Satisfactory completion of UNI HU 540: Literary Translation: Practice and Theory (students electing this option will be interviewed by the course instructor; if selected, the student will work with a mentor from the appropriate language department); (2) any course in a foreign language (or a 500-level reading course in a foreign language) which the director of the Creative Writing Program approves; (3) an appropriate designated score on the SAT II language test; or (4) a project, such as a translation of poetry or prose, or scholarly research involving the use of a foreign language. (The project must be approved by the director of the Creative Writing Program.)

Thesis A substantial master’s thesis in fiction, poetry, drama, or a combination thereof is required.

PhD in English

Prerequisites Applicants must submit a writing sample of scholarly work. The student must have an MA degree in English or the equivalent. No transfer of credit is granted toward fulfillment of the eight semester courses required for the degree.

Course Requirements Eight semester courses (32 credits) are required for the degree. Upon petition to the Committee on Graduate Studies, one directed study course may be elected. Candidates for the PhD are required to take at least one course that focuses primarily on critical theory, critical method, or the history of criticism. To fulfill the linguistics/philology requirement, the student must complete satisfactorily at least two semester courses from the following: CAS EN 511 Introduction to Linguistics; CAS EN 513 Modern English Grammar; CAS EN 514 Medieval Languages; CAS EN 515, 516 History of the English Language; GRS EN 561 Chaucer; GRS EN 815 Old English; GRS EN 816 Beowulf; GRS EN 721, 722, 822 Studies in Medieval Literature. Students need complete only one semester course of the linguistics/philology requirement if they have taken any one of these semester courses or the equivalent during their undergraduate or MA degree program; the linguistics/philology requirement may be waived entirely for students who have taken any two of these semester courses or the equivalent in a degree program. Doctoral students who have had neither an undergraduate nor a graduate course reading Chaucer in the original language must take a graduate-level course in Chaucer as part of their doctoral program. Supervised practice in the teaching of English language and literature is expected of all PhD candidates.

Course Credit in Related Fields As part of the total program of eight semester courses required for the degree, doctoral students may, with the approval of their advisor, elect two semester courses at the graduate level in related areas. A course elected to fulfill the foreign language requirement may be counted as a related course.

Foreign Language Requirement The doctoral student shall fulfill the following foreign language requirement in two languages that have relevance to literary studies in English. The Director of Graduate Studies determines which languages are appropriate to fulfill the requirement.

One language shall be at the level of advanced proficiency. This requirement can be fulfilled in the following ways:

• by taking a translation test administered by the Department
• by achieving an appropriate designated score on the SAT II language test currently offered in French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Latin
• by completing with a grade of B or better one literature course at the graduate level (courses numbered 500 or higher) in an approved language

One language shall be at the level of intermediate proficiency. This requirement can be fulfilled in the following ways:

• by achieving an appropriate designated score on the SAT II language test
• by completing with a grade of B or better (after gaining admission to the graduate program) the fourth semester of college-level language study in an approved language, or GRS LG 621, GRS LS 621, GRS CL 621, GRS LF 621, or another 621-level course in an approved language.

A student wishing to fulfill the requirement with a language for which there is no available examination (for example, Hebrew or Greek) may ask first to have the language approved and then to take a written translation examination. Requests should be discussed with the student’s faculty advisor, then forwarded in writing to the Director of Graduate Studies.

Note: A student who successfully completes a graduate-level literature course in a foreign language can count the course toward the eight-course requirement for the PhD; only one such course will be accepted toward fulfilling the eight-course requirement.

The Department strongly recommends that students achieve proficiency in a modern foreign language and in a classical language. During the first semester of their doctoral program, all students are expected to discuss the language options with their faculty advisors and to submit to the Director of Graduate Studies a plan for achieving language proficiency. The plan should include a brief justification for the languages chosen. In the case of students for whom English is not the native language, the student’s mastery of the native language will be accepted as fulfilling the requirement for advanced proficiency in one foreign language.

The language requirement must be fulfilled before the qualifying examination is scheduled, that is, before the student proceeds to the dissertation.

Qualifying Examinations To be admitted to doctoral candidacy, the student must pass the Qualifying Oral Examinations.

Residency Requirement The student must be in residence for at least one continuous academic year, i.e., enrolled as a full-time student.

Dissertation Prospectus See the General Requirements for the PhD section in this site.

Dissertation Doctoral candidates write their dissertations under the supervision of two readers, normally professors of the department.

Final Oral Examination Upon completion of the dissertation, but before its final approval, candidates present themselves for the final oral examination, which is based principally on the dissertation and related problems in the area of the candidate’s specialization. The primary purpose of the final oral examination is to allow candidates to demonstrate the ability to discuss clearly, objectively, and critically their methods and conclusions, as well as their knowledge of the related material.

For further information about the department, students should write to the Director of Graduate Studies, Department of English, 236 Bay State Road, Boston, MA 02215.

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Courses

Courses are listed in three categories: creative writing, language and linguistics, and literature.

Creative Writing

CAS EN 503, 504 Fiction Workshop

CAS EN 505, 506 Poetry Workshop

Prereq: consent of instructor, to whom a selection of poems must be submitted during the period just before classes begin. A workshop in the writing of poetry. Manuscripts are read and discussed in class. Individual conferences. Limited enrollment. Pinsky. 4 cr, either sem.

CAS EN 507 Seminar in Creative Writing: Fiction

Prereq: consent of instructor, to whom two or three stories or chapters from a novel must be submitted during the period just before classes begin. Individual conferences. Limited enrollment. Epstein. 4 cr, either sem.

CAS EN 508 Seminar in Creative Writing: Poetry

Prereq: consent of instructor, to whom a selection of poems must be submitted during the period just before classes begin. Individual conferences. Limited enrollment. Walcott. 4 cr, 1st sem. Warren. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 509, 510 Exercises in Dramaturgy

Prereq: consent of instructor, to whom a short play or scene from a play must be submitted just before classes begin. A seminar in the writing of original plays, emphasizing a dramaturgical approach to structure, language, and theme. Exercises in imitation of the masters of modern drama to be assigned, beginning with Ibsen (fall semester) and ending with Mamet. Snodgrass. 4 cr, 1st sem. Schotter. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 706 Writing Plays

Prereq: consent of instructor, to whom a one-act or full-length play must be submitted during the period just before classes begin. A workshop in the writing of plays. Manuscripts are read and discussed in class. Individual conferences. Limited enrollment. Walcott. 4 cr, 1st sem. Snodgrass. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

Language and Linguistics

CAS EN 511 Introduction to Linguistics

CAS EN 513 Modern English Grammar

A systematic analysis of English, applied to the reading of literature and the writing of essays. Pearce. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 515 History of the English Language I

How do the experiences of young adults contribute to the development of the English language? From early American English to current times, we examine how they learned and changed their native tongue at home, in schools, and neighborhoods. Green. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 516 History of the English Language II

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 518 Linguistic Problems in the Teaching of English as a Foreign Language

Prereq: consent of instructor. Application of linguistic concepts to the teaching of English as a foreign language. Includes description of contemporary English grammatical structures that pose problems for learners and teachers. Saitz. 4 cr, 1st sem. Zlateva. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 815 Old English

Poems such as “The Seafarer,” “The Wanderer,” and “The Wife’s Lament.” Riddles from the Exeter Book, King Alfred’s prose; all in the original, all well-glossed and made available by a concise, clear grammar and by discussion of Anglo-Saxon culture. Green. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 816 Beowulf

Not offered 2007/2008

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Literature

CAS EN 521, 522 Literature of the Middle Ages

CAS EN 523 Literature of the Renaissance I

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 524 Literature of the Renaissance II

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 526 Literature of the Seventeenth Century

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 527 Literature of the Eighteenth Century I

Dryden, Behn, Swift, Pope, Astell, Defoe, Haywood, and others, read in their historical contexts. Literary structures understood in conjunction with social, political, institutional, and intellectual structures of the age. Battigelli. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 528 Literature of the Eighteenth Century II: The Age of Johnson

The great critic and lexicographer Samuel Johnson dominated late eighteenth-century London intellectual life. We will explore Johnson’s multi-faceted achievements and those of his principal colleagues—Boswell, Goldsmith, Reynolds, and Burney. Redford. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 529, 530 The Romantic Age

Studies in British literature from 1789 to 1832. Romanticism considered in light of social, aesthetic, historical, and/or philosophical issues. Authors may include Blake, Burke, Wollstonecraft, William and Dorothy Wordsworth, Coleridge, Godwin, Byron, Cobbett, Scott, Clare, Mary and Percy Shelley, Keats, De Quincey, and Hazlitt. Wagenknecht. 4 cr, 1st sem. Rzepka. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 531, 532 Victorian Literature

First semester (1830–50): Carlyle, Mill, Tennyson, Browning, Ruskin, Newman, Charlotte Bronte, and others. Second semester (1850–1900): Ruskin, the Rossettis, Arnold, Mill, Tennyson, Browning, Swinburne, Wilde, Hopkins, George Eliot, and others. TBA. 4 cr, 1st and 2nd sem.

CAS EN 533 American Literature: Beginnings to 1855

American literature from the beginnings to the brink of the Civil War. Puritan origins, print culture, American poetic taste, entertainment, and the debate over slavery. Works by Bradstreet, Jefferson, Franklin, Poe, Emerson, Hawthorne, Stowe, Jacobs, and Melville. Otten. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 534 American Literature: 1855 to 1918

American literature from the Civil War to WWI. Realism and naturalism, race, class and urbanization, marriage and the new woman. Alger, Twain, James, Harper, Howells, Crane, Norris, Dreiser, Wharton, Dickinson, Frost. Korobkin. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 535 Twentieth-Century British and Irish Poetry

Exploration of major poets of the long twentieth century from Thomas Hardy and W. B. Yeats through the War Poets, Lawrence, Eliot, and Auden to Seamus Heaney and Eavan Boland. Riquelme. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 536 Twentieth-Century American Poetry

Study of five or six poets from the following: Pound, Eliot, Stevens, Williams, Moore, Frost, Lowell, Bishop, Berryman, Ammons, Ashbery, Plath, Ginsberg, or Merrill. Costello. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 542 The Rise of the Novel

The development of prose fiction in England through the eighteenth century. Major themes and genres in works by Behn, Defoe, Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, Lennox, Austen, and Sterne. Prince. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 543 Nineteenth-Century English Novel

The development of the novel form in its social-historical context. Authors may include Austen, Thackeray, the Brontës, Dickens, George Eliot, Hardy, and others. Fogel. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 544 The Modern British Novel

Conrad, Woolf, Lawrence, Ford, Forster, Beckett, and other novelists of the period 1895–1956. Preston. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 545 The Nineteenth-Century American Novel

From its beginnings through the nineteenth century. Works by Brown, Cooper, Hawthorne, Melville, Twain, James, Howells, and others. Van Anglen. 4 cr, 1st sem. Otten. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

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CAS EN 546 The Modern American Novel

From 1900 to 1950. Works by Dreiser, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, and others. Matthews, Mizruchi, Patterson. 4 cr, either sem.

CAS EN 547 Contemporary American Fiction

Fall 2007: Examination of a range of American fiction (stories, novellas, novels) written since WW II. Authors include Bellow, Roth, Ozick, Pynchon, DeLillo, Morrison; topics include modern disenchantment, faith and science, “world-making,” and the fate of character. Chodat. 4 cr, 1st sem. Spring 2008: Major American novels since 1980, by De Lillo, Morrison, O’Brien, Oates, Alexie, and others. Topics include conspiracy theory, multiculturalism, trauma and memory, postmodern spiritualities. Mizruchi. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 551 English Drama to 1590

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 552 English Drama from 1590 to 1642

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 553 Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Drama

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 561 Chaucer

Studied as literary exploration of old hierarchies and new economies. Chaucer’s poetic sense of personal engagements, social disruptions, and spiritual challenges. Levine. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 565 Spenser

An extended study of The Faerie Queene, exploring Spenser’s deep admiration for and profound criticism of Elizabeth’s political and cultural regime. Martin. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 566 Milton

Not offered 2007/2008

CAS EN 574 Studies in Literary Genres: The Horror Film

Intensive study of the horror film, from its silent origins to the present, considered in relation to Gothic literature. We will be examining how cinematic monsters embody cultural fears, anxieties, and a sense of evil. Weekly screenings. Monk. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 579 Studies in American Writers: American Renaissance Poetry

Poetry by Whitman, Dickinson, Emerson, Poe, Melville, and others from 1820 to 1875. Van Anglen. 4 cr, either sem.

CAS EN 584 Studies in Literature and Ethnicity: Literature of the Migrant

Primary focus on the experiences of immigration and exile, with reading also of fiction on other kinds of human migrations. Works by Willa Cather, O. E. Rölvaag, Nabokov, V. S. Naipaul, Shusaku Endo, and contemporary authors. Jin. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 586 Studies in Anglophone Literature: Caribbean Poetry

Study of twentieth-century Caribbean poetry written in English(es). Anthologies and major figures (Walcott, Brathwaite, Goodison, Roach). Consideration of poetry in small societies, creole vs. standard language, oral vs. literate norms, relation to literary traditions African and European. Breiner. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 587 Literacy and African American Literature

Focuses on classical themes of literacy in African American literature, with an emphasis on stories of black physical and intellectual freedom, socio-cultural awareness, and political empowerment. Authors include Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, Booker T. Washington, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, and Audre Lorde. Jarrett. 4 cr, 1st sem.

CAS EN 592 Studies in Literature and Society: Fictions of Empire

British novels of the imperial twilight (1880s to WWI); emphasis on colonial Africa (including Egypt): romance, racism, adventure, exploitation, conquest, discovery, sexism, heroism, horror. Authors include Kipling, Haggard, Henty, Kingsley, and Conrad. Stauffer. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 594 Studies in Literature and the Arts: Modern Poetry and the Visual Arts

Shared movements, theories and techniques; international modernism and the New York avant-garde; collaborations and exchanges; poems and poets on painting; word/image rivalries and distinctions; Williams, Moore, Stevens, Stein, O’Hara, Ashbery, Graham, others; lots of slides. Costello. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

CAS EN 596 Studies in Literary Topics: Wilde and Joyce

Two topics are offered Spring 2008. Students may take either or both for credit. Section A1: Coming of Age in Fiction and Film. The theme of coming-of-age in fiction by Austen, Balzac, James, Joyce, Lawrence, Bellow, and Ozick and in films directed by Richardson, Ray, Cacoyannis, Olmi, Wyler, Schlesinger, and others. Brown. 4 cr, 2nd sem. Section B1: Wilde and Joyce. Selected drama and prose by Wilde, Joyce’s primary precurser, then Ulysses as central text. Emphasis on Wilde’s iconoclasm, wit, and aesthetic politics in his dialogues, on art, on Irish responses to British culture; and on Joyce’s styles. Riquelme. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 604 Literary Criticism I

Survey of works forming a tradition in literary criticism and theory, from the classical period to the late nineteenth century, emphasizing such themes as the defense of literature and criticism; representation; interpretation; taste; aesthetics; and uses of the vernacular. Patterson. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 606 Literary Criticism II

Survey of literary critical perspectives and trends in humanistic theory relevant to literary interpretation from the middle of the twentieth century onward, including formalism, structuralism, post-structuralism, gender studies, new historicism, and post-colonial studies. Frequent writing assignments of varying length. Riquelme. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 665 Critical Studies in Literature and Society: Money and Marriage

Marriage as literary plot, legal contract, market commodity, gendered constraint in the American novel 1796–1913. Readings in law, economics, history, criticism. Authors include Veblen, Gilman, Foster, Southworth, Howells, Norris, Wharton, James. Korobkin. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 666 Critical Studies in Literature and Society: Census and Anti-Census

The love-hate relationship between literature and demography in fiction, poetry, history, and visual art. Works by Defoe, Swift, Hume, Bruegel, Gogol, Frost, Atwood, Olson, Ariès, Foucault, others. “Unofficial” witty counts studied alongside official population history. Fogel. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 676 Critical Studies in Literature and Gender: Feminist Theories and Movements

Modes of feminist thought, including radical, psychoanalytic, materialist, global, performance, and queer theories, and their relationship to literary studies and political movements. Theoretical readings are paired with poetic, dramatic, novelistic, and cultural texts, Victorian to contemporary. Preston. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 696 Critical Studies in Literary Topics

Two topics are offered in 2007–2008. Students may take either or both for credit. Models of Mind in Theory and Literature. Examination of literary and scientific efforts to model human cognition and understanding. Philosophical readings on language, interpretation, and cognitive science will be placed alongside works by Woolf, Beckett, Ashbery, Powers, and others. Chodat. 4 cr, 1st sem. Freud and Lacan. Not the application to literature of psychoanalysis as an alien technology, but discovery that Freud’s and Lacan’s texts themselves are “in the loop.” How literature is connected to psychoanalysis and philosophy; various theoretical and literary texts. Wagenknecht. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 699 Teaching College English

The goals, contents, and methods of instruction in English. General teaching-learning issues. Required of all teaching fellows. TBA. 2 cr, 1st & 2nd sem. (Does not carry degree credit.)

GRS EN 725 The Sonnet

Origin and development of the form; close study of examples from the Renaissance to the present. Emphasis on the relation to music and the interaction of tradition and originality in the history of the preeminent brief lyric. Breiner. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 729 Blake

Complete works, but emphasis on how to read them evolves in relation to evolution of contemporary literary theory. Milton a special concern vis-à-vis tradition, allusion, psychoanalysis. Wagenknecht. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 744 Joseph Conrad

Major and minor works by Conrad, including Nostromo, The Secret Agent, Under Western Eyes, A Personal Record, stories, and essays. Controversies about him, influences on him, and his magical and remote influences on twentieth-century writing and criticism. Fogel. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 746 Faulkner and the Global South

Faulkner within and against relevant global histories: New World colonialism and hemispheric plantation society; US imperialism; anti-colonial independence; Cold War; post-colonialism; contemporary globalization. Major novels; principal scholarship; Faulkner’s global influence. Matthews. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 766 Milton

This course will explore the prose and poetry of John Milton in the context of both the seventeenth century and our current critical moment. Issues will include Milton’s God, gender, republicanism, genre, literary approaches to the English civil wars, and colonialism. Murphy. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 772 Nietzsche and Modern Drama

An examination of the influence of Nietzsche’s work, particularly The Birth of Tragedy, on the development of modern theatre. Artists we may consider include Wagner, Ibsen, Strindberg, Shaw, Yeats, Artaud, Craig, Duncan, Brecht, O’Neill, Williams, Soyinka. Smith. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 773 Pre-detection: Crime Narratives: 1760–1845

English, American, and French crime literature leading up to the emergence of the modern detective story, 1760–1845. Attention to models of narrative reconstruction and notions of evidence, induction, and investigation in emergent historical and criminological sciences. Rzepka. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 781 Native American Literature and the Canon

Examines how Native American cultures figured in the development of canonical literature in the U.S. and, in turn, how modernism influenced Native American poetry and prose. Readings by Emerson, Thoreau, Child, Longfellow, Whitman, Eliot, Moore, Momaday, Silko, Erdrich, and others. Patterson. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 782 Contemporary Novel

Genesis of the Contemporary American novel. Topics include ethnicity, urban apartheid, radical feminism, the new immigration, and religious fundamentalism. Emphasis on historical approaches to the novel, drawn from literature, history, anthropology, and religion. Mizruchi. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 784 Religion, Literature and Interpretation

Examination of the close historical and conceptual affinities between interpreting literary texts and interpreting sacred texts. Close readings of literary, philosophical, religious, and critical texts, focused on questions of truth, language, meaning, and history. Chodat. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 785 Queer Theory

Intensive study of various lesbian, gay, and queer theories, with consideration of how they emerged from gender studies. Readings include works by Barthes, Foucault, Sedgwick, Butler, Edelman, D.A. Miller, and Halberstam. Monk. 4 cr, 1st sem.

GRS EN 791 Before Class: Early Modern Distinctions

The Elizabethan World Picture’s dark flip-side—the symbolic violence of social distinctions (gender, religion, race, occupation, learning, birth, accent, etc.). Major and minor Tudor-Stuart works, high and low genres from Shakespearean drama to graffiti. Siemon. 4 cr, 2nd sem.

GRS EN 792 Introduction to Recent Critical Theory and Method

A selective study of recent literary theory and criticism, with emphasis on comparison of critical frameworks and methodologies. Fulfills the graduate requirement in literary theory. Matthews. 4 cr, 1st sem.

Directed Study 

GRS EN 993, 994 Directed Study in English

Variable cr, 1st & 2nd sem.

Metropolitan College Courses

A number of courses are offered in Metropolitan College under the auspices of the Department of English and are approved for graduate credit for students enrolled in the MA and PhD program. For further information, see the Metropolitan College Bulletin.

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31 October 2007
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