Major Authors and Texts (312-0-1)

Topic

Kafka & his 'Readers'

Instructors

Peter D Fenves
847/467-2966
1880 Campus Drive, Kresge 3329
Office Hours: Mon, 12 - 1:30 PM and by appointment

Meeting Info

Harris Hall L04: Tues, Thurs 11:00AM - 12:20PM

Overview of class

Writers and their Readers: Kafka

A century after his untimely death in 1924 Franz Kafka's literary, cultural, and political significance continues to
speak with renewed urgency to readers across the globe. In the first three weeks we read a sample of Kafka's
shorter writings, including "The Judgment," "The Transformation [Metamorphosis]," "The Stoker," and "The
Hunger Gracchus." In the fourth week, we turn to Walter Benjamin's commemoration of Kafka on the tenth
anniversary of his death. In the following five weeks we consider three further responses to Kafka's work from
around the world, specifically those of Ingeborg Bachmann, J. M. Coetzee, and Han Kang. Readings are in
English, and so, too, the discussion; but the class welcomes students who can read the texts in the original
languages (German, English, and Korean).

Learning Objectives

1) Acquire a familiarity with one of the most important and influential forms of literary modernity across the globe.
2) Practice a form of rigorous literary analysis in and across single works.
3) Produce critical analysis of one or several literary works through a process of stage-wise revision

Teaching Method

Seminar

Evaluation Method

Paper, final
Papers
Project, final

Class Materials (Required)

Franz Kafka, A Hunger Artist and Other Stories, trans. Joyce Crick (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2012). ISBN 978-0-19-960092-2
__________, The Metamorphosis and Other Stories, trans. Joyce Crick (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). ISBN 978-0-19-923855-2
J. M. Coetzee, Life and Times of Michael K (New York: Penguin, 1983). ISBN 978-0-14007-4482
Han Kang, The Vegetarian, trans. Deborah Smith (New York: Random House, 2016) ISBN: 978-1101906118

Class Attributes

Advanced Expression
Literature and Arts Foundational Discipline
Literature & Fine Arts Distro Area