Comparative Literature

This course studies works (mainly literary) from prehistory to try to better understand the power of attraction that this still so enigmatic period in the history of man exerts on the imagination and to explore, particularly from the daydreams and fantasized representations that unfold there, what that they say about us more than about our distant ancestors. The course also provides an opportunity to address, from the texts studied, specifically literary questions, through for example those of genres and registers, the construction of the story or writing resources. Part of this course is devoted to the study of works of youth literature to discover the vision of prehistory that they offer.

This course studies French-Spanish filmmaker of Luis Buñuel, in particular his final and probably most productive period which was mainly French. Accompanied by screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, his faithful sidekick, the father of Spanish cinema drew his inspiration from several of the great French novels of the preceding decade. This course explores one of them, LE JOURNAL D’UNE FEMME DE CHAMBRE, to reflect on the specific work of adaptation characterized by varying degrees of difference from the original.

This course introduces the different schools of theories that enables one to understand any kind of narrative. Using a selection of prose extracts and poetry, the course teaches methods of reading and analyzing texts in class. By the end of the course, students are expected to reach a general conclusion about possible interpretations of the text, supported by concrete evidence.

This course focuses on the analysis of 19th century American poetry from poets such as Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allen Poe, and Walt Whitman.

This course reflects on how the novel genre was constructed in awareness of multilingualism and the challenges of translation, based on the most translated novel in the world, DON QUIJOTE DE LA MANCHA. It discusses the numerous rewritings of the novel that have been carried out around the world and studies a certain number of “adaptations” for youth, theater, comics, and film.

This team-taught course introduces students to a broad range of texts, authors, and issues in Irish writing. Students work across genres and forms, encountering canonical and less often studied works. This comparative course proposes various ways of thinking about Irish literary texts, while at the same time providing a sound knowledge of the social, cultural, and political conditions in which these texts were written, produced and read.

Demons, ghosts, and monsters have populated the cultural landscape in Japan for centuries. Appearing in anime, manga, games, and movies, mysterious creatures continue to form the core of contemporary popular culture, sparking a global obsession with Japanese monsters. This course explores the cultural history of the strange and supernatural in Japanese literary, visual, and performing arts. Engaging with primary and critical sources from the eighth century to the present, it considers the social roles that representations of “the weird” have played in Japan.

This course focuses on analyzing 19th century poetry from authors such as Emily Dickenson and Henry David Thoreau.

This course focuses on writing that addresses places of memory by transfiguring them into "happiness machines," recycling the poetics deployed in the works of the program, which become literally a way of reintroducing into a new cycle fragments saved from oblivion in order to achieve a renewed perception of the world.

This course is an examination of Shakespeare's work and the cultural and literary background of the two plays HAMLET and AS YOU LIKE IT, studied in the accompanying tutorial course, SHAKESPEARE TUTORIAL. The course explores particularly the various genres of the plays, the theatrical conditions in Shakespeare's times, as well as more general cultural issues such as the Elizabethan world picture and the religious reformation.