English 161. Introduction to Narrative
Why do human beings produce and consume narratives as prolifically as they do? What is the role of narrative in culture? This course approaches these questions through a study of great novels and short stories by authors chosen for their diversity as well as their literary stature. The course will involve close reading and critical analysis of a wide variety of narrative texts, informed by an introduction to some of the theoretical issues currently controversial in narrative studies. The course will contrast history with literature based on reading factual prose narratives along with fictional narratives based on the same events, and will contain a unit on visual narrative, including graphic novels and the adapatation of prose narrative to narrative film.
Learning goals: Students will learn the central skill of close reading using narrative texts in a variety of genres, and will learn to write coherently about these texts and their historical and cultural contexts. Students will also gain experience with three ways in which evidence is construed and knowledge acquired in the discipline of literary study in English.
PLAS Boilerplate: English 161 fulfills the Perspectives ( PLAS ) requirement in the area of Reading Literature. Students will become familiar with the disciplinary norms associated with literary reading. They will learn to pay close attention to language and be familiar with the reasons for the writer’s particular choice of language. They will learn how the writer uses the techniques and elements of literature and the particular resources of genre to create meaning. They will learn how texts differ from one another and how they interact with the larger society and its historical changes.
Texts
Ann Charters: The Story and Its Writer. 8/e (Bedford St. Martin's)
Jane Austen: Emma (Oxford UP)
Art Spiegelman: Maus: A Survivor's Tale (Pantheon)
Coursepack (on BlackBoard)
Syllabus
Week
I: Introduction to the course.
Introduction
to Narrative: Primary Concepts: Authors, Audiences, Narrators.
Week
II: Plot.
R.S.
Crane: The Concept of Plot and the Plot of Tom Jones (BlackBoard
Coursepack);
Guy
de Maupassant: The Necklace (Charters);
F.
Scott Fitzgerald:
Edith
Wharton: Roman Fever (Charters).
Week
III: Character.
Anton
Chekhov: The Lady with the Pet Dog (Charters)
James
Joyce: The Dead (Charters).
Week
IV: Point of View.
Isaac
Bashevis Singer: Gimpel the
Fool (Charters);
D.H.
Lawrence: The Rocking Horse Winner (Charters);
Week
V: Voice and Focalization.
James
Joyce: Araby (Charters);
William
Faulkner: That Evening Sun (Charters);
Katherine
Mansfield: The Garden Party (Charters) .
Week
VI: Time and Pacing.
Frank
O'Connor: Guests of the Nation (Charters).
John
Cheever: The Swimmer (Charters)
Week
VII: The Language of Fiction.
Imaginative
Week
VIII: The Reader in the Tale.
Gerald
Prince: Introduction to the Study of the Narratee (BlackBoard Coursepack);
Peter
Rabinowitz: Truth in Fiction: A Re-examination of Audiences (BlackBoard Coursepack); Peter
Brooks: Narrative Desire (BlackBoard Coursepack).
Imaginative
readings to be announced.
Week
IX: Fiction and Gender:
Anton
Chekhov: The Darling (Charters);
Charlotte
Perkins Gilman: The Yellow Wallpaper (Charters);
Joyce
Carol Oates: Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? (Charters)
Willa
Cather: Paul's Case (Charters)
Week
X: Fiction and Class: Social approaches to narrative:
Fredric
Jameson: The Realist Floor Plan (BlackBoard Coursepack);
Gustave
Flaubert: A Simple Heart (Charters)
John
Updike: A & P (Charters).
Week
XI: Fiction and Race/Ethnicity:
Henry
Louis Gates, Jr.: Introduction to The Signifying Monkey (BlackBoard
Coursepack)
James
Baldwin: Sonny's Blues (Charters);
Kate
Chopin: Désirée's Baby (Charters)
Week
XII: Factual/Fictional Narrative
Joyce
Carol Oates: “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”
Stephen
Crane: “The Sinking of the Commodore”
Stephen
Crane: “The Open Boat”
Week
XIII: Narration within Graphic Novels
Week
XIV: Fiction into Film
Jane
Austen: Emma
Amy Heckerling: Clueless
The course will include three papers, an essay final exam, and attention to writing issues in class, according to the Writing Intensive criteria.
For the papers the student will choose one story, not among the ones assigned above, from the class anthology.
In the first paper, due during the fifth week, the student will write a careful explication of the story to seek the author’s intent and will thus practice the central skill of close reading.
In the second paper, due during the ninth week, the student will set the story in historical/cultural and/or biographical context; the PLAS goals of understanding change over time, the perspectives of others, and the construction of forms of cultural and individual difference are relevant to this assignment.
In the third paper, due during the thirteenth week, the student will set the story in the context of some literary or cultural theory that has been explored in class; this assignment will be used to position literary study in the liberal arts and in its relationship and contribution to the larger society.
All three assignments will engage students in active inquiry as they develop their own ideas from the common course material, and all three will involve working with primary documents. The three together will give students experience with three ways in which evidence is construed and knowledge acquired in the discipline of literary study in English.
Contact information:
David H. Richter, Professor of English, Queens College and CUNY Graduate Center
KL 639
Office Phone: 718-997-4667
Email: david.richter@qc.cuny.edu
Office Hours: 12:30-1:30 MW