This seminar engages with three interrelated movements central to literary history: modernism, anti-modernism, and postmodernism. Discussing several challenging yet rewarding texts, ranging from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1899) to Jeanette Winterson’s Stone Gods (2007), we cover texts and debates ranging from the fin de siècle (c.1900) to the present day. Our approach will often be intersectional, aware of the interactions of modernism, anti-modernism, and postmodernism with empire and colonialism, with debates on gender and sexuality, humanism and posthumanism, as well as the power struggles surrounding these. Combining engagement with the contents of the novels in question, the techniques they employ, and the larger developments they are part of, we aim for differentiated discussions and an insightful overview of some of the debates that continue to shape our perception of literature even today.

This course equips students with skills and knowledge that will assist them in future endeavors related to 20^th and 21^st century literature. Please be aware that thoroughly reading and preparing the following novels is a course requirement, and there will be two short quizzes, one in the first session (texts 1-3) and one after Pfingsten (texts 4&5), to check on your reading.

As the course is on a Thursday and there are three bank holiday Thursdays in the summer semester, I suggest that you regard these weeks as reading weeks.

Kurs im HIS-LSF