123042 PS Literary Studies / Proseminar Literature (2018W)

This class explores the literatures of U.S. American modernism, with a particular focus on texts written between the First and Second World Wars. We will look at selected novels, drama, and poetry of this period and trace how literary texts negotiated the challenges posed by technological modernization and consumer capitalism; urbanization, regionalism and internationalism; shifting concepts of race, gender, and sexuality; as well as by the (spiritual) wounds of wartime experiences. We will put a special focus on changing conceptions of time and space, as well as history, and explore such ideas as time-space compression, nostalgia, simultaneity, teleology, or progress. We will explore how writers such as Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, Nella Larsen, or William Faulkner (and others) challenged established literary form and experimented with new modes of writing; a particular focus will be on literary cultures such as the African American Harlem Renaissance or the interwar expat scene in Paris.

Throughout the course, we will also be concerned with questions of literary theory and method, as well as paper writing skills.