Masterpieces of World Literature

This literature course explores how great writers refract their world and how their works are transformed when they intervene in our global cultural landscape today.

No national literature has ever grown up in isolation from the cultures around it; from the earliest periods, great works of literature have probed the tensions, conflicts, and connections among neighboring cultures and often more distant regions as well.

Focusing particularly on works of literature that take the experience of the wider world as their theme, this course will explore the varied artistic modes in which great writers have situated themselves in the world, helping us to understand the deep roots of today's intertwined global cultures.

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• The history of World Literature
• How literary works and books are transformed by cultural transmission
• How to critically analyze literary works
• The significance of major technological advances in writing

Texts/authors considered in the course:

Section 1:Goethe and the Birth of World Literature

Section 2: The Epic of Gilgamesh

Section 3: Homer, The Odyssey

Section 4: The 1001 Nights Section 5: Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

Section 6: The Lusiads Section 7: Voltaire, Candide Section 8:Lu Xun and Eileen Chang

Section 9: Jorge Luis Borges, Ficciones

Section 10:Wole Soyinka, Death and the King's Horseman

Section 11:Salman Rushdie and Jhumpa Lahiri

Section 12: Orhan Pamuk, My Name is Red