Writers' Studies in Literature (403-0-20)
Instructors
Juan M Martinez
Meeting Info
University Hall 018 English: Tues 2:00PM - 4:50PM
Overview of class
Plot is easy to define and difficult to execute. We know that narratives require some form of animating force, and we know that this force hinges on a series of causally-linked events, sometimes. Not always. In this seminar we'll work through two disparate novel genres---autofiction and the campus novel---to tease out what makes for compelling story-telling energy: a political or cultural or personal crisis, a disconnect between public and private behavior, subgenres and their expectations (there's a hilarious epistolary novel in our list, but there are also striking examples of science fiction, horror, the fantastical, and the crime novel), hunger, desire, hypocrisy, satire (academic and otherwise), setting, ticking clocks and timetables, and our direct lived experience. The latter is crucial: we find our most interesting plots in life. We'll also be sure to connect these elements beyond the novel and into each of our genres: we'll discover how these same narrative engines animate poetry and creative nonfiction.
Our reading list will include Sofia Samatar's The Practice, The Horizon, and the Chain, Annie Ernaux's Simple Passion, Claire Louise Bennett's Pond, W.G. Sebald's The Emigrants, Lisa Tuttle's My Death, Amy Gentry's Bad Habits, Mary McCarthy's The Groves of Academe, Vladimir Nabokov's Pnin, Julie Schumacher's Dear Committee Members, James Hynes's The Lecturer's Tale, and Lucy Ives's Loudermilk.
We'll work through a considerable deal of material together, and we'll help each other find ways to explore the possibilities of that material. But I'll also ask each of you to bring in a short published piece that you love that we'll all read; it should be a piece in your primary genre---a short story or a poem or an essay---that you feel best exploits one of the topics discussed.
Every week, we will all (1) read a novel, (2) respond, (3), read the short piece chosen by one of our classmates. In addition, one of us will be responsible for a presentation on the chosen short piece.
Teaching Method
Discussion, critical and creative responses, presentations.
Evaluation Method
Discussion, critical and creative responses, presentations.
Class Materials (Required)
Sofia Samatar's The Practice, The Horizon, and the Chain, Annie Ernaux's Simple Passion, Claire Louise Bennett's Pond, W.G. Sebald's The Emigrants, Lisa Tuttle's My Death, Amy Gentry's Bad Habits, Mary McCarthy's The Groves of Academe, Vladimir Nabokov's Pnin, Julie Schumacher's Dear Committee Members, James Hynes's The Lecturer's Tale, and Lucy Ives's Loudermilk.
Class Materials (Suggested)
Campus bookstore & library reserves.