Prof. Nancy Black                                            English 794X

Office: 2314 Boylan                                          Fall 2002

Hours: M,T,Th, 3:00-6:00 p.m.             Telephone: 951-5197; Voice mail messages

E-mail: nblack@brooklyn.cuny.edu               only may be left at 951-4275

Web site: http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/black

 

The Short Story

 

Required Texts:

  1. 40 Short Stories: A Portable Anthology. Ed. Beverly Lawn. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1992. ISBN: 0-312-25912-3
  2. James Joyce. The Dead. Ed. Daniel R. Schwarz. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1994. ISBN: 0-312-08073-5
  3. M. H. Abrams. A Glossary of Literary Terms. 7th ed. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace, 1999. ISBN: 0-15-505452-X

 

Sept. 5             Introductions; Kincaid and García Márquez

Sept. 12           Hawthorne, Poe, and Melville; the “ISM’s--Realism, Naturalism, Modernism, and Postmodernism

Sept. 19           Jewett, de Maupassant, and Chopin; “What is Psychoanalytic Criticism?” (The Dead, pp. 85-102)

Sept. 26           Chekhov, Gilman, and Crane; “What is Reader-Response Criticism?” (The Dead, pp. 125-36)

Oct. 3              Cather and Joyce (“Araby” and “The Dead”); “What is New Historicism?” (The Dead, pp. 150-63)

 Oct. 10           Kafka, Lawrence, and Porter; “What is Feminist Criticism?” (The Dead, pp. 178-90)

                        First paper due (five-page close analysis of one short story read thus far, preferably one not discussed extensively in class; DO NOT USE SECONDARY WORKS).

Oct. 17            Fitzgerald, Faulkner, and Hemingway; “What is Deconstruction?” (The Dead, pp. 206-19)

 Oct. 24           Kawabata, Steinbeck, and Welty; Schwarz’s essay in The Dead, pp. 102-24

Oct. 31            Mahfouz, Ellison, and Jackson; Rabinowitz’s essay in The Dead, pp. 137-49

Nov. 7             Paley, Baldwin, and O’Connor; Levenson’s essay in The Dead, pp. 163- 77

Nov. 14           Achebe, Updike, and Oates; Norris’s essay in The Dead, pp. 190-205

Nov. 21           Carver, Atwood, and Bambara; Riquelme’s essay in The Dead, pp. 219-33

Nov. 28           No Class

Dec. 5              Mukherjee, Walker, and O’Brien; Final paper due (eight to ten-page analysis of one short story, using one modern critical approach and incorporating recent criticism of the story that utilizes that approach (1980-2002).

Dec. 12            Tan, Cisneros, and Erdrich

Dec. 19            Final Examination

 

 

Requirements:

1.  Carefully prepare the reading selections before each class.

2.  There will be two essays and a final examination.

3.  The final grade will be calculated as follows:

            essay #1                                   20%

            essay #2                                   40%

            class participation, including

            informal writing             20%

            final exam                                 20%

4.  Students are expected to attend class regularly, to arrive on time, and to hand in papers on the dates due. Late papers will have one grade deducted per week from the grade the paper would have received if it were not late.

 

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