This course aims to explore the relationship between literature and the theoretical and clinical writings of psychoanalysis. Through readings representing a range of psychoanalytic and literary traditions, we will examine the connections that can be made between psychic structures and literary structures, between the language of the mind and the emotions and the language of the literary, cultural or cinematic text.
Fall 2013: Kritzman (2A)
What is Psychoanalysis?
What is the relationship between “literary” works and the theoretical and clinical writings of psychoanalysis? This large question will be examined through readings of essays and case histories by such analysts and theorists as Freud, Klein, Lacan, Kristeva, Butler, Bersani and Zizek. The course will focus on the theme of the family romance and its relationship to the question of gender in works by authors such as Sophocles, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Kafka, Woolf, Mann, Proust, Duras, Kushner, Almadovar, and Woody Allen. (LIT/INT/W)
