COML 2041 - World Literature in Question

(LA-AS)

Spring. 4 credits. Student option grading.

N. Melas.

This course will explore the question: What is world literature? Is it all the literature ever written everywhere in the world? All the world’s greatest books? All the books a person needs to read to become a true citizen or denizen of the world? But then, what is a world? How does the labor of the imagination construct a world or the world? How can we relate the world of literature to other worlds such as that of history and historical experience? Readings will range widely across time and world space and will include attention to contemporary theories of world literature.