EL 591 Critical Theory I

EL 591 Critical Theory I Tuesdays 13-16:00 TB 480 Office Hours (TB 440): By appointment (T, 10-11:00; Th, 10-11:00, 14-16:00) Instructor: Jameson Kısmet Bell Email: [email protected]

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

The first semester of this two-semester survey of the history of Western literary theory and criticism offers the advanced student of literature an introduction to literary theory and criticism from classical antiquity to the beginning of the 20th century, from Plato to Freud. This historical context provides the foundations for key questions that will be revisited though contemporary theory and criticism (second semester). Each week we will pay particular attention to various theories and practical methods used to produce, frame, and reflect on individual literary works, authors, genres, and literary traditions.

TEXTS & ADDITIONAL READINGS

Most of the required readings for EL 591 are in The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism (NA). The most recent 2nd ed. of NA is available at Pandora Bookstore. The 1st ed. is available on-line and on reserve at the library. Either edition is fine; readings not in NA will be provided on the course website (web).

GRADING:

Participation and Attendance 10% Response Papers 30% Close Reading Presentation 20% Final Paper 40%

Please see supplemental guidelines for grading details.

Academic Integrity:

I expect all submitted work to be solely your own. In the case that you use someone else’s ideas or information, or if you use wording that is not your own, you MUST provide a citation using a consistent style (MLA, etc.). Representing someone else’s work as your own is plagiarism and is a breach of academic integrity. (When in doubt, cite!) Plagiarism will result in failure of assignment, the course, and referral to the department and faculty disciplinary committees.

READING SCHEDULE:

Framing text for semester: Turner, Frame, Flow, and Reflection: Ritual and Drama as Public Liminality (web)

Week 1 Tues, Sept. 19 Classical Greek Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Plato, Republic (Books 3, 10) (NA); Plato, Ion (NA/web); Plato, Phaedrus (NA); Plato, Cratylus (web)

Week 2 Tues, Sept. 26 Classical Greek Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Aristotle, On Interpretation (web); Aristotle, Rhetoric (NA); Aristotle, Poetics (NA); Gorgias, Encomium of Helen (NA)

Week 3 Tues, Oct. 3 Hellenistic/Roman Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Horace, Ars Poetica (NA); Longinus, On Sublimity (NA); Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria (NA/web); Anonymous, Ad Herennium (web); Paul, 1 Corinthians, 13-15 (web); 2 Corinthians, 3-5 (web)

1 Week 4 Tues, Oct. 10 Late Roman, Medieval Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Augustine, On Christian Doctrine (NA), The Trinity (NA/web), Confessions, Book 10 (web); Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio (NA/web); Alcuin, Rhetoric (web)

Week 5 Tues, Oct. 17 Medieval Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (NA); Hugh of St. Victor, Didascalicon (NA/web); Geoffrey of Vinsauf, Poetria Nova (NA/Web); Dante Alighieri, Il Convivio (NA), Letter to Can Grande Scala (NA); Boccaccio, Genealogy of the Gentle Gods (NA); Petrarch, Preface to Familiar Letters (web)

Week 6 Tues, Oct. 24 Early Modern Theory & Criticism

Primary Text(s): Joachim du Bellay, The Defense and Illustration of the French Language (NA); Rabelais, Pantagruel (web); Sidney, Defence of Poesy (NA); Bacon, Advancement of Learning (web)

Week 7 Tues, Oct. 31 Neoclassical Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): Dryden, An Essay of Dramatic Poesy (NA); Pope, An Essay on Criticism (NA); Johnson, The Lives of the English Poets (NA); Johnson, Preface to Shakespeare (NA); Vico, The New Science (NA)

****Final Paper proposals due****

Week 8 Tues, Nov. 7 Enlightenment (Aesthetic) Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): Lessing Laocoön (NA); Hume, Of the Standard of Taste (NA); Burke, Enquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful (NA); Kant, Critique of Judgment (NA)

Week 9 Tues, Nov. 14 Romantic Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): Wordsworth, Preface to the Second Edition of "Lyrical Ballads" (NA); Coleridge, Biographia Literaria (NA); Shelley, Defense of Poetry (NA); Schiller, On the Aesthetic Education of Man (NA); Hegel, Lectures on Fine Art (NA)

Week 10 Tues, Nov. 21 Victorian Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): Poe, The Philosophy of Composition (NA); Poe, Marginalia (web); Arnold, The Function of Criticism at the Present Time (NA); Arnold, Culture and Anarchy (NA); Arnold, The Study of Poetry (web); Wilde, The Critic As Artist (NA); Baudelaire, The Painter of Modern Life (NA)

Week 11 Tues, Nov. 28 Marx, Marxist Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 (NA); The German Ideology (NA); The Communist Manifesto (NA); Grundrisse (NA); Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (NA); Capital (NA)

Week 12 Tues, Dec. 5 Nietzsche’s Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): On Truth and Lying in a non-Moral Sense (NA); The Birth of Tragedy (NA); From the Souls of Artists and Writers (web)

Week 13 Tues, Dec. 12 Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory and Criticism

Primary Text(s): selections from The Interpretation of Dreams (NA); Formulations on the Two Principles of Mental Functioning (web); A Note upon the “Mystic Writing Pad” (web); The Uncanny (NA/web) Final papers due: Friday, December 22nd