Peter Bien
Wednesday 9:30 – 11:30 AM
January 11 through February 15, 2006
Kendal @ Hanover Card Rm.
This course will concentrate on two masterpieces of what is called "High Modernism" in twentieth-century literature, Thomas Mann's short story "Death in Venice" and his novel The Magic Mountain. Both are difficult, since Mann wrote in a sort of layer-cake mode, with the palatable icing on top and all sorts of (perhaps less agreeable) layers underneath. The novel consists of 705 very full pages. Via both lecture and discussion, the instructor hopes to expose the mysteries of these works, which deal with sickness - maybe the spiritual state of Germany (and Europe?) before the First World War. If cholera and tuberculosis dishearten you, do not enroll.
PETER BIEN is Professor of English and Comparative Literature, emeritus, Dartmouth College. He specializes in twentieth-century High Modernism, his Dartmouth course in Joyce, Mann, Proust, and Kafka having been a favorite with students. Previously in ILEAD he taught Milton's Paradise Lost (definitely not High Modernism) and - twice - Joyce's Ulysses, the ultimate expression of High Modernism. He likes to prove to students that difficult literature can also be exciting.
