Universität Wien

123226 SE Literature Seminar / BA-Paper / MA American/North American Lit./Studies (2017W)

Classic American Fiction from the 1920s and 1930s

11.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 12 - Anglistik
Continuous assessment of course work

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 18 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

Opening session on Wednesday, 11 October 2017

Wednesday 11.10. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 18.10. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 25.10. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 08.11. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 15.11. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 22.11. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 29.11. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 06.12. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 13.12. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 10.01. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 17.01. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 24.01. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Wednesday 31.01. 14:00 - 16:00 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

The aftermath of World War One saw the emergence of many significant authors in the realm of American literature, which had seen major changes in the preceding years in poetry and fiction. Writers, often from the Mid-West, moved beyond naturalism in their representation of commercial middle America. The country, which had become a world power, appeared divided, both inward-looking in that era of Prohibition, and exhibiting new life styles in the glamorous Jazz Age, and manifested in the exodus of many expatriates. The diversity of social, regional, and ethnic cultures with their specific challenges and problems, especially after the end of the boom years with the Great Crash, is also reflected in a number of remarkable texts showing the trend towards modernism in fictional art. A number of these texts, which began to attract the attention of European readers, will be studied in their historical, biographical, and cultural contexts.

Assessment and permitted materials

Participants will have to submit a written seminar paper of 20-22 pages and offer an oral presentation. Regular attendance, active class participation, and two written reports on seminar sessions of up to two pages will be expected. There will also be a final written essay test.
If you are qualified to attend the seminar and would like to sign up early for this seminar, please, choose an early presentation topic from the list below and contact me via e-mail. In order to discuss your presentation, please see me in my office hour.
1. Aspects of Small Town Life in the Mid-West in Some Stories in Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio (1919) (“Paper Pills”, “Mother” and “Death”).
2. Narrative Art in Sherwood Anderson’s Initiation Story “I Want to Know Why” (1919) in the Context of the Productive Literary Sub-Genre.
3. The Representation of Urban Culture in the Mid-West in Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt(1922) (esp. chapters 1-3). Documentation of Middle Class Life and the Satiric Impulse.
4. The Representation of the Expatriate Experience of Members of the ‘Lost Generation’ in Paris in Ernest Hemingway, Fiesta: The Sun Also Rises (1926)
5. The Rendition of Urban and Rural Settings in Spain and the Role of the Narrator in Hemingway, Fiesta: The Sun Also Rises.

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

Students will have to become familiar with the chosen texts, which increasingly captured the imagination of readers outside the United States and made them aware both of the potential and the specific social problems in urban and rural America as well as of the significant literary trends there.

Examination topics

Student presentations of research papers on the topics chosen, general discussion of the texts contained in a Reader, including excerpts from one novel by the first US American Nobel Prize laureate, Sinclair Lewis, and short fiction by several authors, as well as three widely read novels by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and William Faulkner.

Reading list

The excerpts from one novel and some stories to be considered in class are contained in a Reader to be acquired at Copy Studio. A number of copies of the three popular novels by Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby) , Hemingway (Fiesta : The Sun Also Rises), and Faulkner (As I Lay Dying) are to be purchased. The bookstore on Campus Facultas has promised to supply enough copies.
A reserved shelf (Handapparat) with the novels and pertinent collections of stories as well as some relevant studies, including biographies of the writers and some background material, will be accessible on the upper floor of the departmental library. A list of topics for seminar papers will be announced on my departmental homepage, and volunteers for the first presentations are invited to contact me for confirmation that the topics have not yet been reserved for other participants.

Association in the course directory

Studium: UF 344, BA 612, MA 844;
Code/Modul: UF 4.2.4-322, BA 10.2, MA5, MA7;
Lehrinhalt: 12-0264

Last modified: Mo 07.09.2020 15:33