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There are open seats in many great English courses, including ENG 600, ENG 742, and more. See below for descriptions.

English 600.01 (Theory of Literature)

Description:

Mirror, Mirror: Reflexivity and the Crisis of Representation.” Studies in the esthetic reflection of “the real.” We will explore the theme of the double (doppelgänger) and the implications and responsibilities inherent in artistic representation. The Double and the Other: in fiction/reality; psychological conception of the self; in love; in writing; in art; in language; in culture; nature/technology; self/other; mediation and doubling; voyeurism/surveillance; gender roles; trauma. We will examine the intrinsic mirroring or doubling of the self within every artistic project. Are you looking at me? Are you looking at me? Are you looking at me? Readings by Borges, Poe, Conrad, Clemens, Nabokov, E. T. A. Hoffmann, Stevenson, Dostoevsky, Henry James, Wilde, Auster. Critical essays by Otto Rank, Freud, Lacan, Coates. Films by Hitchcock, Sekely, Collet-Serra, Siodmak, Brahm. Paper, midterm, and final exam.

English 742 (Seminar: Studies in Criticism)

Description:

Out of the Past and Into the Night: The Noir Vision in American Culture.” This seminar examines the history, issues, and theories of the noir vision in American culture as exemplified by literary and mass cultural fiction and its interactions with historical, social, political, psychological, and literary-cinematic contexts. We will focus special attention to themes of fragmentation, isolation, paranoia, urbanization, race, gender, and class conflict. Novels by: Chandler, Hammett, Cain, Welles, Spillane, Caspary, Mosley, Wolfert. Films by:
Huston, Hawks, Wilder, Preminger, Vidor, Maté, Welles, Tourneur, Polonsky, Franklin, Winner. Short critical readings include: Benjamin, Freud, Fiedler, Jameson, Marcus, etc. Seminar format: class presentation and written handout, integrative thematic short synthesis, term paper.