Literature 2162 - Fictional Writers and the Russian Metatext

Institution:

Bard College

Subject:

Description:

RES Fiction in which the main character is a writer, or in which the narrator refers to the process of writing, often takes on a self-referential function. What does it mean to write about writing? What can a fictional text whose subject is fictional texts tell us about the potential of language as a selfshaping tool, or about the role of art in a given cultural context? This course employs such metatextual questions in its study of fiction by major Russian authors of the 19th and 20th centuries. The class explores literary theories on genre, irony, aesthetics, and the reader-writer-character triangle in the linkage of construction of self to construction of text, particularly in fiction that experiments with forms such as the fictional diary or the complex frame narrative. Authors studied include Bulgakov, Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Lermontov, Pushkin, and Nabokov.

Credits:

4.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.bard.edu

Phone Number:

(845) 758-6822

Regional Accreditation:

Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools

Calendar System:

Semester

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