Spring 2003

8:235 Readings in Twentieth-Century Literatures I:
Transcultural Modernism

Course Description

In this course we will investigate transatlantic, border-crossing dynamics of literary creativity in the early 20th century. We will focus on the cross-cultural interactions that shaped "modernism" and emergent "postcolonial" literatures.

During this period a number of writers from countries colonized by Britain, such as Jamaica, South Africa, New Zealand, and India, migrated to England where they participated in various literary, political, and arts groups. At the same time English writers traveled to the colonies and were deeply influenced by cultures other than their own that they, nevertheless, often considered inferior. This transcultural interaction did not take place between political equals, shaped as it was by the context of British colonialism. The literature of this period is marked by colonial violence. Further, it did not fall into a simple division between England and the distant colonies. For example, writers such as Joseph Conrad, originally from Poland, W.B. Yeats, from Ireland, and Claude McKay, from Jamaica but also prominent in the Harlem Renaissance of the U.S., crossed these borders. Frequently writers from different colonies felt strong affinities with one another and greatly influenced each other's work. An example is the mutual admiration expressed by Irish and Indian writers such as W.B. Yeats, Mulk Raj Anand, and Rabindranath Tagore.

We will explore this rich and conflicted interchange by reading several groupings of texts and authors. The first grouping takes Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness as its starting point. Conrad's novel becomes a text to which many other writers of the period subsequently respond, revisiting this "voyage out" (Virginia Woolf's title) from Britain to the colonies almost obsessively. We will read Conrad's novel alongside novels by Virginia Woolf (England) and Jean Rhys (Dominica) that counter it in different ways. Other writers we will read in dialogue with one another include Rabindranath Tagore, (India), Katherine Mansfield (New Zealand); Claude McKay (Jamaica), Roger Fry (England), D.H. Lawrence (England) and Sol Plaatje (South Africa).

We will read a few critical and historical texts, most of which will be available on reserve in the Main Library. We will also view and discuss works of visual art.

Since this is a graduate Readings course, I will not assign a lengthy research paper. Instead, students will write an extensive Reading Journal and a paper of 8 - 10 pages designed for presentation at an academic conference. At the end of the semester, we will hold a mock conference on Transcultural Modernism, where students will present and discuss their papers. Additional short papers and brief oral presentations are required at different times during the semester.

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