213.251 (H) Freshman Seminar on Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche continues to be one of the most radical and influential philosophers of the West. Famous and infamous for announcing the death of God and the advent of the superhuman, his irreverence for philosophical tradition culminated in the call to “philosophize with a hammer” (so as to demolish the constructions of Western metaphysics). He embarrassed the old philosophers exposing their, as he put it, clumsy lovemaking with truth. And he stunned generations of intellectuals after him with his idea of the eternal return of the same. But Nietzsche was also a hilariously funny writer, a lightfooted and poetic thinker, a bold defender of the experiences of the body, a tender human being, and a sharp critic of German narrow-mindedness.This seminar offers an introduction to Nietzsche’s work and a first journey into a world of German thought, culture and literature. Readings and discussion will be in English.
Pahl 3 credits 213.252 (H) Freshman Seminar: What is a University?
Although the first European universities date back to the ninth century, the idea of a modern research institution is of fairly recent provenance. In this course we will some of the most important works from the 18th and 19th centuries that provided the theoretical framework for institutions like Johns Hopkins and the U of Chicago. A consistent concern of the course will be the relation of the university to the state and education to moral edification and civic duty. Enrollment limited to 20 freshmen.
Tobias 3 credits
213.314 (H) Berlin and Modernity
Explanation of literature and film from early 20th century.
Focus will be on literary movements which developed in
Berlin (Expressionism, Neue, Sachlichkeit, Agitprop)
and effects of urban life on artistic technique. Readings
in German, discussion in English.
Tobias 3 credits 213.317 (H) Robert Walser
Examination of Robert Walser’s novels (Geschwister Tanner, Der Gelhülfe, Jakob von Gunten, Der Räuber) with emphasis on psycho-sexual dynamics of text, narrative structure, and philosophy of the small.
Tobias 3 credits 213.322 (H) Fin de siècle Vienna
Exploration of the major currents in turn-of-the-century
Viennese culture: dreams, eroticism, violence, literary
experimentation and crisis in paternity. Authors to
include Freud, Musil, Schnitzler, Zweig, Trakl and Wittgenstein.
Readings and discussion in English.
Tobias 3 credits 213.331 (H) Detective Fiction in its Nascence
The detective novel has roots in German Romanticism. Kleist and E.T.A. Hoffmann wrote novellas concerning historical crimes and mysteries from the past. We will read several 18th and 19th C mysteries as well as contemporary essays on the detective genre. Readings and discussion in German. Prerequisites: German 361/362.
Tobias 3 credits 213.333 (H) Transformation in Modern Jewish Literature
This course will be an advanced-undergraduate, writing-intensive examination of the theme of transformation as a defining metaphor for the Jewish encounter with modernity, from Reb Nakhman of Breslov at the beginning of the 19th century to Tony Kushner at the end of the 20th. Among the topics we will consider are the means by which Jewish authors adapt modern literary forms such as the novel, the short story, and the drama to the needs of Jews at a recurring moment of historical and political transition; we will also consider the negotiation between fantasy and realism as a means of representing the interaction of local tradition with global modernity. An additional consideration of the question of language will inform our discussion of works written in Yiddish, Hebrew, German, Russian, and English. These issues will be juxtaposed against historical developments such as the gradual industrialization of Eastern Europe, political anti-Semitism, immigration, Zionism and other nationalist movements, warfare, the Holocaust, and changing notions of gender and family roles. All readings and discussions conducted in English.
M. Caplan 3 credits 213.335 (H) Technology and Sexuality in Berlin
This class will focus on the transition from the literary and artistic concern with transience and finitude to the uncanny presence of eternity NOW that defined the development of techno-sexuality in the modern media. The city of Berlin is the playground on which this transformation takes place and will make a regular appearance in the materials we will engage.
Kolarov 3 credits 213.345 (H) Chess Games
Chess surfaces frequently in literary and philosophical
works as metaphor or allegory of battle of pure wits.
Course will examine status assigned chess and, more
generally, games in texts by Hoffmann, Zweig, Nabokov,
Wittgenstein, Lyotard, Beckett, Freud. Texts available in
original and translation; discussions in English. Prerequisites:
091.201-202 or equivalent.
Tobias 3 credits 213.353 (H) Realism
Introduction to mid- and late-19th-century literature
focusing on the reinvention of the sentimental narrative,
the tension between the natural and the supernatural,
and the emphasis on local or regional folklore. Authors
include Keller, Stifter, Droste-Hülshoff, Storm, Fontane.
Readings and discussion in German. Prerequisites:
091.201-202 or equivalent.
Tobias 3 credits 213.354 (H) Yiddish Literature in Translation
This course will provide an overview of the major figures and tendencies in modern
Yiddish literature from the beginning of the 19th century to the present. Focusing
primarily, though not exclusively, on prose narratives, we will examine this
literature in its aesthetic, historical, and cultural dimensions. Topics for discussion
will include the traditional functions assigned to Yiddish in East European Jewish
culture; the attitude toward Yiddish expressed by rival early-modern social
movements; the increasing politicization and secularization of most East
European Jewry throughout the 19th century; the reaction of Yiddish culture to the
upheavals caused by immigration, revolution, and world war; and inevitably the
aftermath of Yiddish culture following the Holocaust. All readings will be in English
and will include such central figures as Reb Nakhman Breslover, Mendele
Moykher-Sforim, Y.L. Peretz, Sholem Aleichem, I.B. Singer, and Avrom Sutzkever,
among others. Prior knowledge of Jewish culture helpful, but not required; no
knowledge of Yiddish required. Cross-listed with Jewish Studies
Caplan 213.377 (H) Mermaids and Water Sprites
Prereq. 213.361-362 or special permission. Many stories have been told about different kinds of water people. What kind of fascination does life in the water hold? What is so interesting about these hybrid creatures¬men with webs between their fingers, women with fishtails? What is lost when these amphibians settle on land for good? We will read literary texts from different periods to pursue these questions. Readings and discussion in German.
Pahl 3 credits 213.385 (H) In Transit: German-Jewish Literature of
Exile
Examination of 20th-century German-Jewish works which
were written in exile and which write of exile as existential
condition and literacy space. Authors include Roth,
Canetti, Becher, Seghers, Zweig, Döblin. Readings and
discussions in German. Prerequisites: 091.201-202 or
equivalent.
Tobias 3 credits 213.386 (H) German-Jewish Thought Since the
Enlightenment
Survey of trends in German-Jewish thought since Haskala
(Enlightenment). Emphasis on debate regarding
“Deutschtum” and “Judentum” in 18th and 19th centuries;
rationalist interpretations of Judaism; rediscovery of
mysticism in 20th-century and anti-rationalist tendencies.
Readings in German and English; discussion in English.
Prerequisites: 091.201-202 or equivalent.
Tobias 3 credits 213.395 (H) Literature and Photography
Investigation of the intersection of literature and photography in 20th-century fiction. How does the frozen image of photography affect narrative representation? The syllabus will include works conceived as collages (Sebald, Roth) as well as theoretical works (Sontag, Barthes, Benjamin) and literary texts indebted to the visual arts (Rilke, Baudelaire, Calvino, Bernhard).
Tobias 3 credits 213.408 (H) The Literatures of Blacks and Jews in the 20th Century
This course will be a seminar comparing representative narratives and poetry by African, Caribbean, and African-American authors of the past 100 years, together with European and American Jewish authors writing in Yiddish, Hebrew, and English. This comparison will examine the paradoxically central role played by minority, “marginal” groups in the creation of modern literature and the articulation of the modern experience. Among the topics to be considered in this course will be the question of whether minority literatures require a distinct interpretive strategy from “mainstream” literary traditions; the problem of political discrimination and the question of identity politics in the creation, and interpretation, of literature; the commonalities of historical experience between Black and Jewish peoples; and the challenge of multiculturalism in modern society. Authors discussed will include, among others, Sholem Aleichem, Charles Chesnutt, Sh. Ansky, Jean Toomer, Sh. Y. Agnon, Amos Tutuola, Bernard Malamud, Caryl Phillips, and Anna Deavere Smith. All readings and discussions conducted in English; enrollment open to graduate and advanced undergraduate students
M. Caplan 3 credits 213.410 (H) Modernism and the Metropolis
This course will be an advanced-undergraduate, writing-intensive examination of the theme of urban space in literature (poetry, drama, fiction) from Europe, Africa, and the United States, spanning the mid-19th century until the mid-20th century, and drawing from English, French, German, Hebrew, and Yiddish sources. Among the topics we will consider are the role of mobility and urbanization in creating modern culture, the dislocations and juxtapositions that constitute urban culture, and the aesthetic role of modernist literature in reflecting the kaleidoscopic experience of the city through techniques such as free verse, multi-media theatre, and stream-of-consciousness narration. Authors discussed will include, among others, Charles Baudelaire, T. S. Eliot, Moyshe-Leyb Halpern, Allen Ginsburg, Bertolt Brecht, Knut Hamsun, Dovid Bergelson, Sh. Y. Agnon, André Breton, Chinua Achebe, and John Kennedy Toole. All readings and discussions conducted in English.
M. Caplan 3 credits 213.420 Human and Machine in German Literature and Film
Human machines and mechanical humans haunt the imagination of writers, filmmakers and their audiences, particularly in Germany. Discussion of influential works like Hoffmann’s “Sandmann,” Kafka, Fritz Lang’s “Metropolis” and contemporary cyborgs. Readings and discussion in German.
Pahl 3 credits 213.429 (H) The Lyric
Survey of 19th- and 20th-century German lyric poetry
for beginning graduate students and advanced undergraduates.
Course will focus on intersection of theoretical
writings on the lyric with lyric form itself. Authors
include Eichendorf, Brentano, Heine, Droste-Hülshoff,
Hoffmannstahl, George, Trakl, Rilke, Bachmann, Celan.
Prerequisites: 091.201-202 or equivalent.
Tobias 3 credits 213.501-502 Independent Study
Staff 213.509-510 (H) German Honors Program
Staff
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