English 159 - Fall, 2020

Topics in the Novel

Topic: NARRATING THE NATION: MOBY DICK

 

Class Information

Instructor: Vernon, Matthew
CRN: 53245
Time: MWF 9:00-9:50
GE Areas: Writing Experience

Description

This class will provide a thorough exploration of Melville's Moby Dick. The set of topics this class will cover will be as wide-ranging as the novel itself: capitalism, race, ecology, gender, fate, faith, epistemology, exploration, the sublime, and psychology. To contend with the breadth of Melville's thought, this class will be complemented by other Melville stories as well as brief readings drawn from roughly contemporary sources. Finally, we will turn our attention to the afterlife of the novel, in its adaptation in film and its recapitulation in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man.
 

Texts

Melville short stories
Moby Dick