Course Description
Since time immemorial, literary writers and philosophers have engaged in an intense dialogue and intellectual exchange. How have the discourses of literature, poetry, and philosophy mutually influenced and complemented each other? Figures considered may include Plato, Kleist, Hoelderlin, Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Kafka, Hesse, Arendt, Adorno, Celan and Gadamer. Taught in English.
Athena Title
LIT AND PHILOSOPHY
Prerequisite
Permission of Honors
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
This honors seminar provides an important opportunity for students interested in German Studies to explore the strong affinities that exist between literature, poetry and philosophy in the German field. Since these "elective affinities" between the two discourses are arguably unique to German culture, this new course will offer students the chance to study a seminal aspect of the German intellectual tradition. By combining literature with nonfictional prose and theoretical texts that are foundational to the German cultural field, this in-depth seminar will also allow students to hone their analytical and interpretive skills. Targeted writing exercises (journal entries) and interpretive papers will supply the students with the tools to write advanced and specialized essays. Because of the literary component, the course will not overlap with courses in other departments. Moreover, the course is not geared at specialized philosophy students but at students in the humanities who combine a strong interest in literature with an equally keen curiosity for theoretical questions.
Topical Outline
Sample Topical Outline: Early Beginnings: Plato and Aristotle’s views on poets and philosophers (a necessary component of the class, as the German tradition builds on these early canonical texts) Poetry and Mysticism: Meister Eckhart, Paul Celan (20th-century poet), Else Lasker-Schueler, and Paul Klee Goethe’s Elective Affinities Schiller’s Essays: On Naive and Sentimental Poetry Hoelderlin’s Poetry: Between Classicism and Romanticism Kleist’s Novellas: Perception, Aesthetics, and the Law Schlegel’s Irony — Contrasted with Kierkegaard’s reflections on Irony Schopenhauer on Music; Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy Before the Law: Kafka’s novel The Castle Orientalism and Herman Hesse’s Siddharta Rilke’s Thing Poems and Elegies Celan and Gadamer: Focus on Gadamer’s readings of Celan’s poetry Contrasted with Arendt and Adorno’s readings of Post-Holocaust literature