| |
|
Abstract/Syllabus:
|
|
Brouillette, Sarah, 21L.488 Contemporary Literature: British Novels Now, Spring 2007. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology: MIT OpenCourseWare), http://ocw.mit.edu (Accessed 10 Jul, 2010). License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA
Contemporary Literature: British Novels Now
Spring 2007
Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, and Westminster Abbey in London, England, United Kingdom. (Image courtesy of Kol Tregaskes.)
Course Description
What is Britain now? Its metropolises are increasingly multicultural. Its hold over its distant colonies is a thing of the past. Its sway within the global political arena is weak. Its command over Northern Ireland, Wales, and Scotland is broken or threatened. What have novelists made of all this? What are they writing as the old empire fades away and as new social and political formations emerge? These are the questions that will concern us in this course.
Recommended Citation
For any use or distribution of these materials, please cite as follows:
Sarah Brouillette, course materials for 21L.488 Contemporary Literature: British Novels Now, Spring 2007. MIT OpenCourseWare (http://ocw.mit.edu/), Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Downloaded on [DD Month YYYY].
Syllabus
Course Description
What is Britain now? Its metropolises are increasingly multicultural. Its hold over its distant colonies is a thing of the past. Its sway within the global political arena is weak. Its command over Northern Ireland, Wales, and Scotland is broken or threatened. What have novelists made of all this? What are they writing as the old empire fades away and as new social and political formations emerge? These are the questions that will concern us in this course. Our material will come from the Guardian newspaper's recent list of the best British, Irish, and commonwealth novels of the past 25 years, and will include JM Coetzee, Kazuo Ishiguro, Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Yann Martel, and Zadie Smith. Major contexts will be immigration and the multicultural metropolis, political devolution, post-industrialism and the EU, and the New American Empire.
Course Objectives
This is a seminar, which means that much of our time will be spent speaking to one another about our common experience of reading fiction and wondering about how to make the best sense of it. My own goal is not to teach you some absolute and predetermined facts, but to figure out what knowledge you already have and to help you develop that in order to create more. To this end, I want you to view yourselves as active readers and seminar participants, and as people committed to improving their skills as readers and as writers. I will provide you with a set of tools (really, mental equipment) that will help make this all happen. Since much of our time will be spent in active debate and conversation, I will expect each student to behave professionally and respectfully in this setting, as well as in all communications that stem from your involvement in this course (i.e. online forums, emails, or study group activities).
Grading and Assignments
Grading criteria.
| REQUIREMENTS |
PERCENTAGES |
| Three argument-based essays (20% each) |
60% |
| Two presentations (10% each) |
20% |
| Mini-conference paper |
10% |
| Active participation |
10% |
Three Argument-Based Essays
- Essay 1: 3 pages
- Essay 2: 4-5 pages
- Final paper: 8-10 pages
Please see assignments for criteria and guidelines for your papers. The assignment will be broad enough to allow you to explore your specific ideas and interests, but will demand close analysis of short passages from the readings.
On the assigned due date bring one paper copy to class or to my mailbox by 5pm. I can only provide extensive commentary on your writing and argument - and I will - if I receive your materials on time. Late papers will also lose 1% (of the course total 100%) each working day; they should be brought to the main Literature office, during working hours, and dated by the administrative assistant.
Please read and understand the following policy statement: "Plagiarism - use of another's intellectual work without acknowledgement - is a serious offense." It is the policy of the Literature Faculty that students who plagiarize will receive an F in the subject, and that the instructor will forward the case to the Committee on Discipline. Full acknowledgement for all information obtained from sources outside the classroom must be clearly stated in all written work submitted. All ideas, arguments, and direct phrasings taken from someone else's work must be identified and properly footnoted. Quotations from other sources must be clearly marked as distinct from the student's own work. F For further guidance on the proper forms of attribution, consult the style guides available at MIT Writing and Communication Center and the MIT Academic Integrity.
Two Presentations
- One on a critical reading (see readings)
- One leading our discussion of a novel
Mini-Conference Paper
- Between 5 and 10 minutes, telling the class about your final paper
Attendance
Attendance in this class is mandatory. If you are going to be absent you must alert me, in advance, via email. Provided I have been alerted, each student will be allowed two absences. As the third absence is reached the student will lose 1% (of the course total 100%) for each incident. Being late is a form of absence, and I will use my discretion to decide when a sufficient number of late arrivals becomes equivalent to one day of absence.
Please do not bring food, cell phones, or laptops to class. I will make an exception for your laptop if its use is class-related.
Recommended Citation
For any use or distribution of these materials, please cite as follows:
Sarah Brouillette, course materials for 21L.488 Contemporary Literature: British Novels Now, Spring 2007. MIT OpenCourseWare (http://ocw.mit.edu/), Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Downloaded on [DD Month YYYY].
Calendar
| SES # |
TOPICS |
KEY DATES |
| 1 |
Introduction |
|
| 2 |
Disgrace, chapters 1-6 |
|
| 3 |
Disgrace (cont.), chapters 7-18 |
|
| 4 |
Disgrace (cont.), chapters 19-end |
|
| 5 |
The Remains of the Day, pp. 3-44 |
|
| 6 |
The Remains of the Day (cont.), pp. 47-201 |
Essay workshop |
| 7 |
The Remains of the Day (cont.), pp. 201-end |
First paper due |
| 8 |
Money, to page 136 |
|
| 9 |
Money (cont.), to page 215 |
|
| 10 |
Money (cont.), the rest |
|
| 11 |
Money (cont.) / The Comfort of Strangers, to page 53 |
|
| 12 |
The Comfort of Strangers, (cont.) |
Essay workshop |
| 13 |
The Comfort of Strangers (cont.), the rest |
|
| 14 |
The Life of Pi, part 1 (to page 117) |
Second paper due |
| 15 |
The Life of Pi (cont.), to page 271 |
|
| 16 |
The Life of Pi (cont.) |
|
| 17 |
The Life of Pi (cont.), the rest
Paddy Clarke, to page 155
|
|
| 18 |
Paddy Clarke (cont.) |
|
| 19 |
Paddy Clarke (cont.), the rest |
|
| 20 |
The Handmaid's Tale, to page 99 |
|
| 21 |
The Handmaid's Tale (cont.), to page 223 |
Essay brainstorming workshop |
| 22 |
The Handmaid's Tale (cont.), the rest |
|
| 23-25 |
Final paper presentations |
Final paper due in Ses #25 |
|
|
|
|
Further Reading:
|
Readings
This section contains a list of the texts read in this class. For a more detailed breakdown of which texts are read for which sessions, please consult the calendar.
Required Texts
Coetzee, J. M. Disgrace. Reprint ed. New York, NY: Penguin Essential Editions, 2005. ISBN: 9780143036371.
Ishiguro, Kazuo. The Remains of the Day. New York, NY: Vintage, 1990. ISBN: 9780679731726.
Amis, Martin. Money: A Suicide Note. New York, NY: Penguin Modern Classics, 1986. ISBN: 9780140077155.
McEwan, Ian. The Comfort of Strangers. New York, NY: Vintage International, 1997. ISBN: 9780099754916.
Martel, Yann. The Life of Pi. New York, NY: Harvest Books, 2003. ISBN: 9780156027328.
Doyle, Roddy. Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha. New York, NY: Penguin, 1995. ISBN: 9780140233902.
Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid's Tale. New York, NY: Anchor Books, 1998. ISBN: 9780385490818.
Smith, Zadie. White Teeth. New York, NY: Vintage, 2001. ISBN: 9780375703867.
Readings to Consider
Begley, Jon. "Satirizing the Carnival of Postmodern Capitalism: The Transatlantic and Dialogic Structure of Martin Amis's Money." Contemporary Literature 45, no. 1 (2004): 79-105.
Bényei, Tamás. "The Passion of John Self: Allegory, Economy, and Expenditure in Martin Amis's Money." In Martin Amis: Postmodernism and Beyond. Edited by Gavin Keulks. New York, NY: Palgrave, 2006, pp. 36-54. ISBN: 9780230008304.
Bethlehem, Louise. "'A Primary Need as Strong as Hunger': The Rhetoric of Urgency in South African Literary Culture under Apartheid." Poetics Today 22, no. 2 (2001): 365-89.
Childs, Peter. "Zadie Smith: Searching for the Inescapable." In Contemporary Novelists: British Fiction since 1970. London, UK: Palgrave, 2004. ISBN: 9781403911209.
Cole, Stewart. "Believing in Tigers: Anthropomorphism and Incredulity in Yann Martel's Life of Pi." Studies in Canadian Literature 29, no. 2 (2004): 22-36.
Cosgrove, Brian. "Roddy Doyle's Backward Look: Tradition and Modernity in Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha." Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review 85, no. 339 (Autumn 1996): 231-42.
Deer, Glenn. "Rhetorical Strategies in The Handmaid's Tale: Dystopia and the Paradoxes of Power." English Studies in Canada 18, no. 2 (June 1992): 215-33.
Dwyer, June. "Yann Martel's Life of Pi and the Evolution of the Shipwreck Narrative." Modern Language Studies 35, no. 2 (Fall 2005): 9-21.
Forceville, Charles. "The Conspiracy in The Comfort of Strangers: Narration in the Novel and the Film." Language and Literature 11, no. 2 (May 2002): 119-35.
Gardiner, Juliet. "Recuperating the Author: Consuming Fictions in the 1990s." Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 94 (2000): 255-74. [On Martin Amis.]
Hammer, Stephanie Barbé. "The World as It Will Be? Female Satire and the Technology of Power in The Handmaid's Tale." Modern Language Studies 20, no. 2 (Spring 1990): 39-49.
Herron, Tom. "The Dog Man: Becoming Animal in Coetzee's Disgrace." Twentieth Century Literature 51, no. 4 (2005): 467-90.
Jolly, Rosemary. "Going to the Dogs: Humanity in J. M. Coetzee's Disgrace, The Lives of Animals, and South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission." In J. M. Coetzee and the Idea of the Public Intellectual. Edited by Jane Poyner. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2006, pp. 148-71. ISBN: 9780821416877.
McDonald, Peter D. "The Writer, the Critic, and the Censor: J. M. Coetzee and the Question of Literature." Book History 7 (2004): 285-302.
McElroy, Ruth. "Whose Body, Whose Nation? Surrogate Motherhood and Its Representation." European Journal of Cultural Studies 5.3 (2002): 325-42. [On The Handmaid's Tale.]
McGlynn, Mary. "'But I Keep on Thinking and I'll Never Come to a Tidy Ending': Roddy Doyle's Useful Nostalgia." Lit: Literature Interpretation Theory 10, no. 1 (1999): 87-105.
Miner, Madonne. "'Trust Me': Reading the Romance Plot in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale." Twentieth Century Literature 37, no. 2 (Summer 1991): 148-68.
Parker, Emma. "Money Makes the Man: Gender and Sexuality in Martin Amis's Money." In Martin Amis: Postmodernism and Beyond. Edited by Gavin Keulks. New York, NY: Palgrave, 2006, pp. 55-70. ISBN: 9780230008304.
Phelan, James, and Mary Patricia Martin. "The Lessons of 'Weymouth': Homodiegesis, Unreliability, Ethics, and The Remains of the Day." In Narratologies: New Perspectives on Narrative Analysis. Edited by David Herman. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 1999, pp. 88-109. ISBN: 9780814250242.
Ryan, Kiernan. "Sex, Violence and Complicity: Martin Amis and Ian McEwan." In An Introduction to Contemporary Fiction: International Writing in English since 1970. Cambridge, UK: Polity, 1999, pp. 203-18. ISBN: 9780745619576.
Seaboyer, Judith. "Sadism Demands a Story: Ian McEwan's The Comfort of Strangers." MFS: Modern Fiction Studies 45, no. 4 (1999): 957-86.
Stratton, Florence. "'Hollow at the Core': Deconstructing Yann Martel's Life of Pi." Studies in Canadian Literature 29, no. 2 (2004): 5-21.
Strongman, Luke. "Toward an Irish Literary Postmodernism: Roddy Doyle's Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha." Canadian Journal of Irish Studies 23, no. 1 (July 1997): 31-40.
Su, John. Ethics and Nostalgia in the Contemporary Novel. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2005. ISBN: 9780521854405. [Chapter 4 is on The Remains of the Day.]
Tew, Philip. "Martin Amis and Late-Twentieth-Century Working-Class Masculinity: Money and London Fields." In Martin Amis: Postmodernism and Beyond. Edited by Gavin Keulks. New York, NY: Palgrave, 2006, pp. 71-86. ISBN: 9780230008304.
Thompson, Molly. "'Happy Multicultural Land'? The Implications of an 'Excess of Belonging' in Zadie Smith's White Teeth." In Write Black, Write British: From Post Colonial to Black British Literature. Edited by Kadija Sesay. Hertford, England: Hansib, 2005, pp. 122-40. ISBN: 9781870518062.
Tomc, Sandra. "'The Missionary Position': Feminism and Nationalism in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale." Canadian Literature 138-139 (1993): 73-87.
Trimm, Ryan S. "Inside Job: Professionalism and Postimperial Communities in The Remains of the Day." Lit: Literature Interpretation Theory 16, no. 2 (2005): 135-61.
Walters, Tracey L. "'We're All English Now Mate Like It or Lump It': The Black/Britishness of Zadie Smith's White Teeth." In Write Black, Write British: From Post Colonial to Black British Literature. Edited by Kadija Sesay. Hertford, England: Hansib, 2005, pp. 314-22. ISBN: 9781870518062.
|
|
|
Webliography:
|
Related Resources
Guidelines / Resources for Papers
MLA Style: Everything You Need to Know
Research Resources
Database of Contemporary UK Writers
Margaret Thatcher talking about sinking an Argentinian ship during the Falklands War
This will give you a good sense of her personality.
Margaret Atwood Resources
Margaret Atwood's Official Site
It is quite nice.
The Film Version
I love the VHS cover of the film version of Atwood's novel.
The Opera Version
Oh yes. What's next? The Handmaid's Tale Video Game?
Roddy Doyle Resources
Roddy Doyle Profile
Video for Mustang Sally
As performed in the film version of The Commitments, based on Roddy Doyle's novel, in which a group of down-and-outs convince themselves that the Irish have shared oppression with African-Americans, and should thus share music too!
Online List of "Everyday English" and Slang common in Ireland
Yann Martel Resources
Interview with Yann Martel
This is an audio interview to which someone has added some sad little graphics. But the interview is interesting.
Yann Martel's page on the Contemporary Writers Web site
Yann Martel's latest prank
He does love mischief.
McEwan Resources
Ian McEwan's Homepage
McEwan was one of the first UK writers to register his own name as an internet domain. What is the McEwan 'brand'?
The film version of The Comfort of Strangers
Martin Amis Resources
The Martin Amis Web
The Martin Amis Web was created in 1995 by James Diedrick, author of Understanding Martin Amis. It quickly became the authoritative resource for Amis fans, readers, and researchers. The site is now overseen by Gavin Keulks, author of Father and Son: Kingsley Amis, Martin Amis, and the British Novel Since 1950.
Ishiguro Resources
Kazuo Ishiguro Profile, #1
This page is maintained by the Guardian, an excellent London-based newspaper with superior sections on literature and the arts.
Kazuo Ishiguro Profile, #2
This page is c/o the British Council, which maintains an extensive Web site devoted to the UK's contemporary writers.
Coetzee Resources
Coetzee's Nobel Speech, 2003
Video of Coetzee's Nobel Speech, 2003
Salon.com's Review of Disgrace
Recommended Songs
"Anarchy in the UK" by the Sex Pistols (1976)
"Common People" by Pulp (1995)
|
|
|
|
|
Rating:
0 user(s) have rated this courseware
Views:
22288
|
|
|
|
|