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Derek P. Royal Office: 131 Hall
of Literature Office Phone: ( |
Office Hours: TR 8:00 – 9:30, R 2:30 – 4:30, or by appointment |
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ENG 522 – Major Figures in American
Literature
Spring 2005
Course Syllabus
Required Texts
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Catalog Description
A treatment
of outstanding figures in American literature, such as Twain, Thoreau,
Hemingway, Dickinson, Ellison, Bellow, Cather, or
Warren, or a treatment of two or three important figures who bear some kind of
close relationship to one another as members of a particular school or through
personal relationships. May be repeated for credit when the emphasis changes.
Course Description and Objectives
This semester in ENG 522, we will focus on the work of Philip Roth, one
of
Attendance
Graduate students should never be absent or tardy from
class without a very good reason. If you
are going to be absent, you should let me know this as soon as possible. If you are unable to contact me in time
before class, please make sure that you contact me—via phone, email, or
face-to-face office time—as soon as possible after the class. Missed classroom discussions and
presentations cannot be made up (that is, unless in your research you discover
a means of time travel).
Evaluation
The course grade is largely determined by performance on a variety of
written and oral assignments. See the
accompanying handout for complete explanations of the assignments.
Grading Scale
A+=
D+=69, D=
The portions are weighted as follows:
Class Discussion 10%
Conference Presentation 30%
Course Paper 60%
Graduate students should submit all of these assignments by their due
dates. Also, in order to pass the class all assignments must be completed.
American Disabilities Act (
Students
requesting accommodations for disabilities must go through the Academic Support
Committee. For more information, please
contact the Director of Disability Resources & Services,
Plagiarism and Cheating
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Department policy: The Department of Literature and
Languages adheres to the university definition of “plagiarism” by the Council
of Writing Program Administrators that can be found at
http://www.ilstu.edu/~ddhesse/wpa/positions/WPAplagiarism.pdf.
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Royal’s addendum: To intentionally
plagiarize is to steal another’s words or ideas as if they were your own. Any student who blatantly plagiarizes (i.e., intentionally and directly
lifting whole or partial material from any electronic or printed matter) will
automatically fail the course and should expect disciplinary action by the
college.
Student Conduct and Responsibilities
University policy: All students enrolled at the University
shall follow the tenets of common decency and acceptable behavior conducive to
a positive learning environment.
Schedule
The
following schedule reflects the readings in our various texts. Each week there will also be readings of
secondary critical material, all of which will be assigned in class. Please note when an assignment is due.
“Now vee
may perhaps to begin. Yes?”: Narrative Unmoorings
“The Day It Snowed,” “The Contest for Aaron Gold,” “Heard Melodies Are Sweeter,” “Expect the Vandals,” “The Love Vessel,” “The Good Girl,” “The Mistaken.”
Week 2: January 24 – 28
Gauguin in
Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories, “Novotny’s Pain,” “Some
New Jewish Stereotypes,” “Writing about Jews,” “The Story of Three Stories”
Week 3: January 31 – February 4
Lodged in the Mortar; or, The Many Uses of Liver
“Writing American Fiction,” Portnoy’s Complaint, “Document Dated July 27, 1969,” “How Did
You Come to Write That Book, Anyway?,” “Imagining Jews”
Week 4: February 7 – 11
“On
the Air,” “The President Addresses the Nation”
Week 5: February 14 – 18
The Impotence of Being Earnest
My
Life as a Man, “On My Life as a Man”
Week 6: February 21 – 25
I See Dead People; or, Confronting What Haunts You
“‘I Always Wanted You to Admire My Fasting’:
or, Looking at Kafka,” The Ghost Writer
Week 7: February 28 – March 4
Home Is Where My Book Is[1]
“His Mistress's Voice,” The Counterlife
Cleaning Up the Shit; or, Give Me a Mask and I’ll Tell You the Truth[2]
Opening and closing “letters” in The Facts: A
Novelist’s Autobiography, Patrimony:
A True Story, “The Man in the Middle”
Week 9: March 14 – 18
SPRING BREAK
Week 10: March 21 – 25
“Sheer Playfulness and Deadly Seriousness are my closest friends”
Operation
Shylock: A Confession, “A Bit of Jewish Mischief,” “Juice or Gravy? How I
Met My Fate in a Cafeteria”
Week 11: March 28 – April 1
Master Baiter; or, Dirty Dancing with
Sabbath’s
Theater
Week 12: April 4 – 8
More Than Jewish Mischief: The American Trilogy, Pt. I
American
Pastoral
Week 13: April 11 – 15
American Pastoral, cont.
Week 14: April 18 – 22
Slipping the Narrative Punch: The American Trilogy, Pt. II
The
Human Stain
Week 15: April 25 – 29
Plotting American History
The
Plot Against
Week 16: May 2 – 6
Indispensable Stars
Summing up
Conference Presentations
Week 17: May 9 - 13
Conference Presentations
Final Paper Due
Congratulations! You are all now officially Rothians, Rothiacs,
or perhaps even Rothees!
The
next step is to join the Philip Roth Society,
and I know just the person to talk to about
that…