Time Schedule:
Kelly Walsh
C LIT 240
Seattle Campus
Comparative approach to literature and a workshop in writing comparative papers in English. Emphasis on cross-cultural comparison of literary works. Readings in English with an option to read selected texts in the original languages Offered: AWSp.
Class description
The Tragic Mode
Focusing on the mode called "tragedy," we will trace its evolution from Sophocles to Arthur Miller. Our starting point will be Aristotle's Poetics, where he argues that the tragic hero's "peripeteia," or reversal of fortune, is determined by "incidents arousing pity and fear, wherewith to accomplish its catharsis of such emotions." The power to bring about such an emotional purging derives from the sense, epitomized by Sophocles, that fate and destiny are beyond humankind's control. Suffering, therefore, is seen as inevitable, and tragedy becomes a means of organizing human experience, transforming that suffering into an aesthetic form. And "it is only as an aesthetic phenomenon," Nietzsche insisted, "that existence and the world are eternally justified." If, however, the Greeks (along with Nietzsche) saw horror and anguish as the ineluctable condition of human existence, what has become of tragedy in an increasingly digitalized and sanitized modernity? What remains -- if the inexorability of suffering is disavowed -- of its capacity to elicit terror and pity? Situating these questions within multiple historical and cultural contexts, we will consider, for instance, what tragedy looks like in the postcolonial age, and whether the "bourgeois tragedy" of Miller's less-than-heroic Willy Loman signals its ultimate adulteration and decline. As we form constellations between such figures as Sophocles and Chinua Achebe or Shakespeare and William Faulkner, we will also be asking what role genre plays in our understanding of tragedy. Should we consider, as Aristotle did, drama to be its privileged form? In what ways do poetry and prose broaden our definition of tragedy? And how have the attempts to come to terms with human suffering and death changed throughout the ages? Closely reading works from various epochs and literary traditions, you will thus be asked to critically interrogate the conventions of tragedy, and to articulate your insights into what this politically, economically, historically, and culturally determined form reveals about the "human condition."
Required Texts:
Achebe, Chinua: Things Fall Apart Faulkner, William: The Sound and the Fury Hugo, Victor: Hernani Miller, Arthur: Death of a Salesman Shakespeare, William: King Lear Sophocles: Theban Plays: King Oedipus; Oedipus at Colonus; Antigone
A required course reader, including essays, drama, and poetry, will be available at the Ave Copy Center, 4141 University Way NE.
Student learning goals
General method of instruction
Recommended preparation
Class assignments and grading
