Readings:

Niall Lucy, Postmodern Literary Theory (1997)
Terry Eagleton, The Illusions of Postmodernism (1996)
Ishmael Reed, Mumbo Jumbo (1972)
Max Frisch, Man in the Holocene (1980)
Italo Calvino, If on a Winter's Night a Traveller (1981)
J.G. Ballard, The Atrocity Exhibition (1970)
Kathy Acker, The Empire of the Senseless (1988)
William Vollmann, The Atlas (1996)
Don Delillo, Underworld (1997)

All the above are required, and all are (or will be) available at the University Bookstore. There is no reserve reading collection for this course (but see rationale and assignments, below, for an indication of other reading you will be expected to undertake, and see the Web Cites page for web-accessible resources).

Rationale:

The purpose of this course is to consider the relationship between postmodern fiction and literary theory, as it is exemplified in some representative works, and to develop genuine expertise and publishable criticism in specific topic areas within the broader terrain of postmodernism. To that end, we will jointly read two recent critical books on postmodernism and seven novels written during the last three decades by American, British, and continental authors, and seminar participants will join one of four thematic study groups. The themes for and membership in these groups will be established during the first class meeting. The purpose of these groups is threefold:

1. To compile an annotated bibliography on a topic area;
2. To provide a focus for the research and writing of each group member;
3. To develop a perspective from which at least one group member will assess each assigned novel.

• ethics
• ideology
• semiotics
• gender
• science
• history
• identity
• aesthetics
• race
• literature's sister arts

The foregoing list is intended to be suggestive rather than exhaustive. Once established, these thematic study groups will meet regularly outside of class, will assign a rotation within the group for in-class responses to the assigned reading, and will jointly produce (as an html document) an annotated bibliography of sources in their topic area. In addition, group members will be expected to produce a coherent collection of essays on that topic area (see below).

Responsibilities:

• Participation: This is a small class that meets only twice a week: all of the members of the seminar should be at, and participate in, each meeting. In addition, seminar members are responsible for periodic discussions of the reading from their particular thematic perspective: this responsibility will rotate among study group members on a schedule each group will determine for itself.
• Each study group will produce an annotated bibliography of its thematic topic area, in html. These will be due between fall break and Thanksgiving, and when due, will be presented and discussed in class.
• Each seminar participant will produce one essay, but will produce that essay in three forms: an abstract, a full-text version (journal-length: approximately 20 pp.), and conference paper version (10 pp. maximum). The abstract and the conference-paper version will be produced after the full-text version. For due dates, see the month-by-month calendars on the main ENTC 981 page.