EL 349W

EL 349W | 20th-C. American Fiction

Fall 2024 (Under Revision)

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Useful Links: OneDrive Wiki, Blackboard, Eli Review

Pre-Semester – Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3 – Week 4 – Week 5 – Week 6 – Week 7 – Week 8 – Week 9 – Week 10 – Week 11 – Week 12 – Week 13 – Week 14 – Week 15 & Final

Am Lit eTexts and Helpful Sites: Here
Overview of Authors: Here

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This writing intensive (W) course is a gallop through (and a bit beyond) 20th-century American fiction, emphasizing longer prose works and organized so that we’ll be able to explore some of the radical (and sometimes subtle) changes in expression and aesthetic philosophy that took place during the 20th century (and are taking place today, right now, as you read). We will consider how historical and social contexts affect both the writing of literature and its reception. We will think about how Modernism gives way to Postmodernism, about how Realism in some ways sets the stage for both, and about the fraught relationship between fiction and nonfiction in contemporary prose. We will consider the limits of big labels like “Realism,” “Modernism,” and “Postmodernism,” along with the necessity of receiving each work on its own complex terms. We’ll consider how visual storytelling fits into what’s happening to fiction these days. We’ll read constantly. We’ll write constantly.  

Major Writing/Composing Assignments to Anticipate

• Daily Quizzes (If There’s Reading, There Might Be a Quiz)
• Occasional Online Posts at our OneDrive Wiki (link above).
• Several Substantial Peer Feedback Assignments in Eli Review
• Between ~20 and ~30+ pages of formal writing for the course—a right-sized challenge for an upper division literature seminar.
  • Two Short Close Readings (~2 pages each)
  • A Substantial Author Inquiry (Research) Project (~5-10 pages)
  • A Substantial Literary-Critical Analysis (Seminar Paper) (~8-12 pages)
  • A Reflective Reading Response on the Writing for the Course (~3-5 pages)
  • Two Exams: Midterm and Final (Including Essay sections of ~2+ Pages Each) (~4-6 Less-Formal Pages)
• A Course Participation Score

You Should Always Have the Readings in Front of You in Class

Right in front of you, even if on a (bigger-than-a-phone!) screen. We’re here to read together. Let the text take its right place of honor in the room.

Frequent Small Deadlines, Rather Than Sudden Huge Deadlines

This course breaks composition projects into small pieces and asks you to hit small, developmental deadlines, rather than just a few big, big, big deadlines. The idea is to help you think about writing as a process and make small adjustments along the way. Hitting these deadlines, even if you hit them a little rough, will keep you on track and make the course very manageable. (And this course has been road tested with many, many students, with all kinds of minds and hearts. You can do it! But these papers are not designed for writing the night before the due date. They’re made for a different kind of learning.)

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Pre-Semester / First Week Chores

• Make sure you have access to the books; I expect you to have them with you and be ready to reference them during class meetings. During discussion, they should occupy a place of honor, right in front of you, on your desk.
• Take note that, at the end of Week 2, you’ll be committing to an author for research. Spend some time learning about these authors!
• Do the brief pre-class reading set for our first meeting day (see Week 1, below).

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Week 1 (Sep. 4 and 6)

Note: Notice that “due” items and small notes about any given week are listed right under each week’s heading. For example:

• Due THIS Friday: Brief self-intro on the the course’s OneDrive wiki (link above and at Bb).
• Due NEXT Friday: Sign up for research subject/author (on wiki) before NEXT Friday’s class. (Sign up on the wiki no earlier than Thursday at 7:00 AM.) Between now and then, take some time to get a sense of the authors we’re reading, so that you can choose someone that truly piques your interest.
• Please Note: Readings are meant to be completed for class time on the day when they’re listed on the schedule. Day 1 is Monday, Day 2 is Wednesday, and Day 3 is Friday, always.
• Please Print or Bring a Big Screen: Remember that you need to either PRINT online texts or have some way (Kindle? iPad? Laptop?) to view your electronic copy in class. Phone screens are unreasonably small for this purpose.

Day 1: No Class Yet

Day 2: Course Introduction. Do brief pre-course reading listed (and linked) below.

To frame some big ideas for the course, we’ll touch on HD’s “Oread,” Wallace Stevens’s “The Emperor of Ice-Cream,” and, from Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio, two brief sketches, “The Book of the Grotesque” and “Paper Pills.” (We may not get to *depth* on all of these today, but these four pieces work together in an interesting way to set up the 20th century in American fiction; we’ll use them as initial touchstones for the course.)

Day 3: Cane (Jean Toomer), Part 1 (through “Blood Burning Moon”). This one’s a little like falling into a troubling dream poem, especially this first section. (Read this FOR class.)

Due: Self Intro on OneDrive Wiki

Receive: Today in class, I should have assignment packets for the two Close Readings and the Inquiry Project.

Focus Some Energy, Right Away: On looking over the list of course authors and thinking about which one you’d like to take on for the Inquiry Project + Critical Essay.

↓↓↓ About Passing Quizzes ↓↓↓

I’ll never be trying to truly stump you on a daily reading quiz, if we have one, though there will often be a question designed to reward careful readers.

Advice: As you read carefully, keep track of characters, situations, pivotal moments, and major themes you see in the writing. Put those in your notes for quick review before class. That kind of disciplined practice will help you to be ready (and may pay back dividends when you study for exams, too).

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Week 2 (Sep. 9, 11, and 13)

Two databases readily available at our library site, Gale in Context and Gale Literature, will help you quickly learn more about the authors we’re reading this semester, as you narrow in on a choice for your big research and writing/analysis projects. Go to the library website, find the list of databases (“A-Z Databases” link), and do some digging in these specific databases. (Now is the time to move past just using the default search bar for all your needs. You’re ready for better things.) Once you do the raw search for an author’s name inside one of these databases, find the link to limit your “hits” to biographies, in order to get to the core facts more quickly. (I’m literally sending you off to the library to do some fun digging on interesting authors; enjoy this, English major. Love it with all your bookish might.)

• Due Friday: Sign up for research subject (on the wiki) before Friday’s class. (Sign up no earlier than Thursday at 7:00 am.) 

Day 1: Cane, Part 2 (through “Bona and Paul”) + In Class: Intro to Author Inquiry Project / Research

Day 2: Cane, Part 3 (to the end)

You can sign up for your research subject as early as Thursday at 7:00 am. See blue box above about learning more about the authors.

Day 3: The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald), Chapters 1-2

Notice: The reading for today is fairly short, partly to give you time to think about picking an author and partly so that you can ask yourself over and over these two questions: What am I learning about this narrator? and What can I say about the STYLE of this writing?

Check in with Your Researcher Self: Have you been intending to take a look at the author list for two weeks? Have you still not done that? What kept you from giving that task time? What strategies might you use, in the future, to make sure you take time for tasks like this? Two things to try, maybe: One, you could literally schedule time for a task like this, like a date with the library. Don’t be late. Seriously. Two, you may need more structure in your days! Consider scheduling time to read and write for this course (and all your courses) in your week, and holding yourself to it, as if you’re heading to a job. If you’re on top of the day’s reading and due work, work a little ahead on the upcoming writing project, but always show up for the scheduled work time.

Due: Claim Author on OneDrive Wiki (Inquiry Project)

Over the Weekend?: To stay on the chillest work schedule, start your research work this weekend, even if you only have an hour or so to get started. See next week’s work for more info on what’s due next Friday.

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Week 3 (Sep. 16, 18, and 20) 

• Note: Remember that you need to either PRINT online texts or have some reasonable way (Kindle? iPad? Laptop?) to view your electronic copy in class. Tiny, tiny phone screens don’t really count in this context. 
• Due by Friday @5:00: Proof and Justification of *3* ILL or SUMMIT Requests (Inquiry Project).
• Due Friday @5:00: Close Reading #1 DRAFT to Eli Review, for Review (Toomer or Fitzgerald)

Day 1: The Great Gatsby, Chapter 3 to mid-Chapter 7: “So we drove on toward death…”

Hey, Look: Did you see the ILL/SUMMIT assignment, due Friday? If you’re not sure what this is about, give the Inquiry Project assignment packet a good look. (Top of page 2.) Make yourself a couple of dates with the library this week in order to get this done! Recommendations below (scroll to the big green box) about how to approach the job.

Day 2: The Great Gatsby, to the end

Heads Up: The draft version of your first close reading is due Friday. Schedule writing time tonight or tomorrow, and give this short writing assignment your best shot. (Notice that the Gatsby reading is a bit shorter for today, partly to give you time to draft.) There’s a week ahead in which you’ll read and respond to the drafts of others and in which you’ll work on revising and improving your own work. For now, just make sure you’ve got a draft that seems to you like approximately the sort of thing the assignment is asking you to write. What’s really important here is just that you take a sincere shot at it, even if you miss the mark a bit; these short papers are really designed to help you learn about what it means to do a close reading and what sorts of skills you need to keep building. They will give back a lot to you if you draft them on time and participate fully in the Eli Review process.

Starting Points: Especially if you’re feeling stuck (but really no matter what!), you should review the starting points list from the assignment packet. For your convenience, I’ve also placed that list online: here.

Day 3: Short Stories: “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber,” “Three Shots,” “Indian Camp,” “The Doctor and the Doctor’s Wife” (Ernest Hemingway)

Due @5:00 PM: Close Reading #1 to Eli Review (Remember: Drafts can’t be late, but they CAN be *drafts*–not great writing yet, with lots of room to improve. Turn it in ugly, if that’s what you need to do!)

Due @11:45 PM: Proof of ILL or SUMMIT requests (Inquiry Project) emailed to me.

↓↓↓ Help for the SUMMIT / ILL Assignment ↓↓↓

(0) Make sure you read the “Pregame: SUMMIT and/or ILL Requests” section on the inquiry Project assignment sheet, so you know what you’re turning in.

(1) Strongly consider doing this work IN the library. Enter that space, and then set your mind and heart to “research.” Consider making a library date WITH anyone else who is working on the same writer you’re working on, especially. But, even if no one else is working on the same writer as you, you’d probably benefit from finding a library friend or three and heading in together.

(2) Start your work like an English major. Skip the basic library search bar for now and try out the “Step 1: Focused Overviews” moves here: https://abjohnson.net/teaching/research-process/

–> (2.1) Regarding (2): I can’t overemphasize what a revelation the Gale Literature database may be for this kind of research. In the Gale, look for relevant author bios (find the button that lets you limit the search to bios), and, from those bio articles, use the recommended further readings and citations as wayfinders to more good stuff.

–> (2.2) What do you do when you see a cited journal article that looks good but isn’t “linked”? Note the journal title, hop to the library website, and use the “Journals A-Z” link to do a search for that journal. If we don’t have access, the site will tell you how to request the article.

(3) Another big English major move. Find the MLA database (“A-Z Databases” link at the library site), search for your author, and keep an eye out for books released in the last few years that won’t likely be in our library yet. THEN do a search for those books at the main library page. Using the main library search bar, move from the basic search for the book’s title, then, if that fails, use the Whitworth + SUMMIT search to see if you can get it from a SUMMIT partner library.

(4) After those moves, try a basic search for your author, from the library home page. In the left hand column, sort from newest to oldest so you can see what’s come out recently. Then limit to books and ebooks. Scroll down through at least the last several years, and note the books that look most interesting.

(5) Especially if you had few results, modify that search to also include Whitworth + SUMMIT, using the drop-down to the right of the search bar. Note the new books that come up from SUMMIT (our coalition of libraries) and start thinking of which ones you might want to have sent to you.


What you’re looking for: Names of scholars that come up over and over; recent, awesome-looking books; older books that look truly informative; articles (especially recent ones) that we don’t have access to at Whitworth but that you would like to read. For the most promising of those: Have them sent to you by either SUMMIT loan or “Interlibrary Loan.”

In many cases, you’ll be looking at a link, on the page for the book/resource, that tells you how to have the thing sent. If that’s not the case, jot down the info (writer, title, publisher, year) and look for the “Borrow/Renew/Request” link under services on the homepage for the library. Find the “request” instructions there and follow them. 

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Week 4 (Sep. 23, 25, and 27)

• Due Wednesday @ Class Time: Feedback to Eli Review for Close Reading #1
• Due Thursday at 11:45 PM: Revision plan at Eli Review for CR#1
• Due Friday at 11:45 PM: Close Reading #1 to BLACKBOARD (for me) and Wiki (for all of us)
• This week, you should continue moving forward with your research agenda for the Inquiry Project. Start by writing down some research goals for yourself for the week, and literally schedule some library time for yourself–some hours just being a literature nerd in that big building full of books. Schedule it! This is your research and writing time, and figuring out how to book it and hold to it is 100% a professional skill you’re working on. You’re working on it right now. You’re doing it.

Make sure you check out the Gale in Context and Gale Literature databases at the library site.

Day 1: Quicksand (Nella Larsen), Chapters 1-12

Good Advice: At least read your CR#1 each day this week, as you tweak and improve it. Just a quick read so it stays in your mind. Tweak obvious things as you go, make notes, and schedule a dedicated hour, at some point, for focused revision. You want to keep the case in your head and the project on your mind, even if you just barely touch it most days this week. Feedback from your peers should roll in on Eli over the next couple of days.

Greatest thing: You already have a draft here. You’re not dealing with blank-screen writer’s block. You’re just taking what you’ve got and making it better. Writer, it might be fun, even.

Day 2, Quicksand, to the end

Due Wednesday @ Class Time: Feedback to Eli for CR#1 (Due @Class Time, to Give Your Peers Time to Revise Based on Your Feedback)

Due: Sign up for a Week 4 research conference time (at the OneDrive Wiki).

Due *Thursday* at 11:45 PM: Revision plan at Eli for CR#1. For this, you’re using the revision plan tools at Eli, which allow you to rate and work with your feedback from peers.

Day 3: This is a day off from regular class, replaced by your required research check ins, completion of revisions to your CR#1, and making some good progress on your research.

Due Friday at 11:45 PM: CR#1 to Blackboard (for me) and Wiki (for all of us)

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Week 5 (Sep. 30; Oct. 2 and 4)

• Due Friday @11:45 PM: Substantial Research Update Using ScreenPal or a good alternative (Inquiry Project). Look at the examples of this on the wiki! They’ll help!
• If you’ve not yet really dug in on the Inquiry Project, you’re about to have to switch gears from “oh, there’s plenty of time” to “oh, no, where did the time go!” Look back to last week’s notes for the week: Plan time, set the time aside, give yourself permission to honor your own research plan.
• This is the point in the project where you should know some interesting things about the writer and about the critics who write most (or most interestingly) about the writer. Grab a friend on Sunday night and explain it; if you don’t have much to say, schedule a lot of research time this week!

Day 1:  As I Lay Dying (William Faulkner), to Samson section ending in “But be durn if I can say it,” p. 119 in Vintage 1990 edition

Wise Move: Look through some of the old research updates linked from the wiki.

Day 2: As I Lay Dying (William Faulkner), to the end.

Day 3: The Ponder Heart (Eudora Welty), to p. 80 / “They charged Uncle Daniel with…” Approx. 1/2 of book, first four chapters. This one’s funny.

Due @11:45 PM PM: Research Update. See Author Inquiry Assignment for Details.

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Week 6 (Oct. 7, 9, and 11)

• Due Wednesday at Class Time: Draft of Library Assessment (Inquiry Project) to Eli Review
• Due Friday @5:00: Close Reading #2 to Eli Review for Review (Vonnegut or after)

Day 1: The Ponder Heart (Eudora Welty), to the end.

Wise Move: Notice you’ve got the draft of your library assessment due on Wednesday. Take a look at what you’ve got so far, at what it takes to write that piece of the Inquiry Project, and at whether you feel ready to draft this thing between now and Wednesday. This is pretty breezy writing about what’s here and what we could benefit from adding, and it’s a draft. Give it a shot, and don’t worry about getting it perfect.

Are you feeling stuck getting started on CR#2? Review some possible starting points, here.

Day 2:  Cannery Row (John Steinbeck), through Chapter 16

Due: Draft of LIBRARY ASSESSMENT to Eli Review (Inquiry Project) (Class Time)

Day 3: Cannery Row (John Steinbeck), to the end

Due: Close Reading #2 (Vonnegut or After) to Eli Review (5:00 PM)

Due: Library Assessment Peer Feedback (Eli Review) (11:45 PM) (Inquiry Project)

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Week 7 (Oct. 14, 16, and 18)

• Due Monday @ Class Time: Feedback to Eli Review for Close Reading #2
• WEDNESDAY, Class Time: Midterm; Essay Sections Due FRIDAY at 5:00
• Due Thursday at 11:45 PM: Revision plan at Eli Review for CR #2
• Due Friday @11:45 PM: Close Reading #2 to Blackboard (for me) and Wiki (for all of us)

Day 1: Catch Up / Gather Thoughts Prep to Turn in Author Inquiry and Fire Up Critical Analysis. Talking about the thesis / initial claim and the enthymeme, plus the final section of the Inquiry. (In Class)

Due: Feedback for CR#2 to Eli Review (Classtime, to Give Your Peers Time to Revise Based on Your Feedback)

Day 2: MIDTERM Part 1 (In Class)

Midterm Exam, Part 1 (in-Class Essays)

CR#2 Revision Plan: Do this at Eli before the end of the day on Thursday.

Day 3: MIDTERM Part 2 (In Class)

Midterm Exam, Part 2 (Identifications and Explanations)

Due: Close Reading #2 to Blackboard (for me) and Wiki (for all of us): Friday at 11:45 PM. (Test prep and revision may be getting in each others’ way for you this week. If that’s the case, please remember that you can ask for a three day / 72-hour extension on the final draft of CR#2, no worries / no penalties.)

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Week 8 (Oct. 21 and 23)

• Due Monday @Class Time: Opening of Author Snapshot (Inquiry Project) to Eli Review
• Due Wednesday @5:00: Feedback on Author Snapshot to Eli Review
• Due This Week: Author Inquiry Project Due Before You Leave for Break (THURSDAY, 5:00, at the Latest) 

Day 1: Some “New Journalism” and “Gonzo Journalism” from the 60s: “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” (Hunter S. Thompson) + “Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream” (Joan Didion) 

Content Note: We just crossed from the mid-20th century to the latter half. Things get weirder and more explicit from here on out. For this occasion, I made you a YouTube playlist with some preparatory anthems. Hippie folk music was running its course and punk rock was being born, and so were your parents. For the next couple of weeks, things won’t be as chronological as they’ve been so far in the course. Pay attention to the dates when things were written.

Due: Opening of Author Snapshot (Inquiry Project) to Eli Review for Feedback. It’s a draft! It can be really terrible! Make it a complete draft of a whole paragraph, but it can be complete and also really not good yet.

Day 2: Selections from Waiting for Snow in Havana (Carlos Eire, 2003)

Published in the 2000s, this story, like Monday’s readings, is a 1960s story, and it’s another example of writing in the “creative nonfiction” space, where the tools of fiction are being brought to bear on truth telling. Think about the voice and form, as you read!

Due Wednesday @5:00: Feedback on Author Snapshot to Eli Review

Due THURSDAY @ 11:45 pm

Distributed in Class: Comics Primer for Next Week

Day 3: No Class (Fall Break)

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Week 9 (Oct 30 and Nov. 1)

• Due Friday @5:00: Initial Claim for Critical Analysis (@Eli)

Day 1: No Class (Fall Break)

Day 2: Comics / Visual Narrative: A  Primer 

Read: Excerpts from Scott McCloud @Bb
Browse: the Comics Sampler at Blackboard (Lynda Barry, Lilli Carre, Fred Chao, Theo Ellsworth, Geneviève Elverum, Neil Gaiman [British!], David Mazzucchelli, Bryan Lee O’Malley, R. Crumb, and Harvey Pekar, Art Spiegelman, Adrian Tomine, Chris Ware)

Give good, close attention to the McCloud, which is a comic about comics; if there’s a quiz, it will be about the McCloud. And then sample the three parts of the comics sampler at Bb, thinking about style/form, use of the page, drawing styles, and so on. Think about what kind of storytelling a comics page can do. (Sorry about the three documents instead of one; Blackboard made it so.)

Day 3: Batman: Hush (Jeph Loeb, writer; Jim Lee, Artist; et al.) (Read it all.)

Due: Initial Claim (Critical Analysis) (Eli Review) (5:00)

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Week 10 (Nov. 4, 6, and 8)

• Hey, it’s advising season! Make sure you connect with your academic advisors this week!
• Due Wednesday, 11:45 PM: Peer Feedback for Initial Claims (Critical Analysis)
• Advice: During this week, do some new research work to locate high-value articles specifically on the text you’ll be writing about for the Critical Analysis. (Pace yourself, and this can be an enjoyable writing experience. Wait until the last days… and not so much.)

Day 1: Ragtime (EL Doctorow, 1975), Part 1 (Chapters 1-13)

This book was written in the aftermath of WWII and the rise of the 1960s counterculture in the US, even though it’s set much earlier. As you read, think about how its very irreverent look back at the past is as much about 1960s counterculture as it is about 1920s culture.

Day 2: Ragtime, Part 2 (Chapters 14 – 28)

Due Wednesday, 11:45 PM: Peer Feedback for Initial Claims

Day 3: Ragtime, Parts 3 and 4 (All the Rest)

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Week 11 (Nov. 11. 13. and 15)

• Due Monday, Class Time: Middle Paragraph to Eli (Critical Analysis)
• Due Friday @11:45 PM: Middle Paragraph Feedback to Eli (Critical Analysis)

Day 1: The Woman Warrior (Maxine Hong Kingston), Chapters 1-2

Due: Middle Paragraph (Eli Review) (Classtime, to Give Peers More Time to Work) (Critical Analysis)

Day 2: The Woman Warrior, Chapters 3-4. This is a longer reading! Plan for it!

Day 3: The Woman Warrior, Chapter 5

Due: Middle Paragraph Feedback (Due @11:45 PM) (Critical Analysis)

This weekend, you should try to produce a serious first draft of the whole Critical Analysis. It can be very worthwhile to draft it poorly this week. Slipshod and messy. Then fix it gradually over the next week or so.

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Week 12 (Nov. 18. 20, and 22)

• Due Monday @Class Time: Draft of Critical Analysis OPENING PARAGRAPHS to Eli
• Due Friday @5:00: Peer Feedback on Opening Paragraphs
• Look Ahead: Critical Analysis is Due Before Break

Day 1: Housekeeping (Marilynne Robinson), through Chapter 6

Due: Opening Paragraphs (Eli Review) (Classtime, to Give Peers More Time to Work) (Critical Analysis)

Day 2: Housekeeping, to the end 

Day 3: “In the American Society” (Gish Jen)

Due: Peer Feedback on Opening Paragraphs (5:00 PM) (Critical Analysis)

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Week 13 (Nov. 25)

• Due Tuesday at Midnight: Critical Analysis to Bb
• Due Tuesday at Midnight: Hard Copy of Critical Analysis Works Cited Pages (to My Office)

Day 1: “Bloodchild” (Octavia Butler)

Due Tuesday at Midnight: Critical Analysis to Bb
Due Tuesday at Midnight: Hard Copy of Critical Analysis Works Cited Pages (to My Office)

Day 2: No Class (Thanksgiving Break)

Day 3: No Class (Thanksgiving Break)

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Week 14 (Dec. 2, 4, and 6) 

• Due Wednesday @5:00: Any (Optional!) Revised Close Readings (See Revision Guidelines)
• Due NEXT Monday @5:00: Reflective “Meditation” Essay
• Consider connecting with some classmates to talk over the upcoming reflective essay! Also, this is a good time to plan final exam study groups.

Day 1: The Tsar of Love and Techno (Anthony Marra), 1st Three Stories

Day 2: The Tsar of Love and Techno (Anthony Marra), Next Two Stories

Due: Any (Optional!) Revised Close Readings (See Revision Guidelines) (5:00 PM)

Day 3: The Tsar of Love and Techno (Anthony Marra), Last Four Stories

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Week 15 (Dec. 9 + Final)

• Due Monday @5:00: Reflective “Meditation” Essay 
• Thursday: Final Exam

Day 1: TBA / Catch Up / Final Prep

Due: Reflective Response

Final/Exam 2: Thursday, December 12, 3:30-5:30 pm

Final Exam (#2 of 2): Thursday, Dec. 15, 3:30 AM – 5:30 PM

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The Writers We’re Reading, an Overview

(In Order of Appearance in the Course)

• Jean Toomer (African-American, Grandchild of the 1st African American Governor in the US, with an Immensely Complicated Family Background, 1894-1967), Cane (1923)
• F. Scott Fitzgerald (Drank His Way from the Upper Midwest to Europe to California, 1896-1940), The Great Gatsby (1925)
• Ernest Hemingway (Chicago, Paris, Florida, Cuba, Bit of a Journalist, Bit of a Madman, 1899-1961), Selections from In Our Time (1925) and Winner Take Nothing (1933) + “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber” (1936)
• Nella Larson (African-American, Child of Immigrants, Nurse, Librarian, Harlem Renaissance Writer, 1891-1964), Quicksand (1928)
• William Faulkner (A Writer of the American South Before and After the Civil War, th Southern Gothic, and the Psychological Grotesque, 1897-1962), As I Lay Dying (1930)
• John Steinbeck (California Writer, Political Radical, 1902-1968), Cannery Row (1945)
• Eudora Welty (Depression-Era WPS Photographer, Southern Writer with an Eye for Symbols and an Extraordinary Ear for Voices, 1909-2001), The Ponder Heart (1953, in New Yorker magazine)
• Didion, Joan (Californian, Army Brat, Essayist’s Essayist and Journalist, b. 1934), “Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream” (1966)
• Hunter S. Thompson (Gonzo Journalist, Bit of a Madman, Has Been Portrayed on Film by Johnny Depp and Bill Murray, 1937-2005), “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” (1970)
• E. L. Doctorow (Russian-American, Jewish, NYC, 1931-2015), Ragtime (1974)
• Maxine Hong Kingston (Chinese-American, Californian, Innovator in Creative Nonfiction, b. 1940), The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood among Ghosts (1976)
• Marilynne Robinson (Sandpoint, Idaho Writer, Echoes of Christianity All Over Her Work, b. 1943), Housekeeping (1980)
• Octavia Butler (African-American Writer of Science Fiction, 1947-2006), “Bloodchild” (1984)
• Gish Jen (Chinese-American and Probably the Funniest Writer in this Course, b. 1955), “In the American Society” (1991)
• Jeph Loeb (Whose Name Shows Up as a Marvel and DC Producer a Lot, b. 1958), writer, Jim Lee (Korean-American and Currently Publisher and Chief Creative Officer at DC Comics, b. 1964), pencils, and Scott Williams (b. ?), ink. Batman: Hush (2002-03).
• Carlos Eire (Cuban-American, Saw Fidel Castro Come to Power, Sent to the US at Age 11 Without His Parents, Yale Historian, b. 1950), Waiting for Snow in Havana (2003) (excerpts)
• Anthony Marra (He’s Young, and He’s Published Two Brilliant Books) (b. 1984), The Tsar of Love and Techno (2015)
• AND ALSO: We’re not doing enough of their work to make them good choices to write about for the course’s major papers, but we’re looking at some comics pages from these folks: Chris Ware (Midwestern Cartoonist, b. 1967), Lynda Barry (Seattle, Chicago, Underground Comics, Filipino-Irish-Norwegian-American, b. 1956) , Neil Gaiman (British Writer of Much Fantasy Stuff, b. 1960), Fred Chao (Asian-American, Bay Area, b. 1978), Shaun Tan (Asian-Australian, b. 1974), Art Spiegelman (Son of Jewish Polish Immigrants who Survived the Holocaust, b. 1948), James Kochalka (Vermont Comics Blogger, Musician, and More b. 1967), Lilli Carre (Chicago Artist by Way of LA, b. 1983), David Mazzucchelli (Known for Work on Batman and Daredevil, b. 1960), R. Crumb (Underground Comix Legend, b. 1943), and Harvey Pekar (Famous Sad Curmudgeon and Son of Jewish Polish Immigrants, 1939-2010). And we’re looking at the work of Scott McCloud (Cartoonist and Comics Theorist) (b. 1960), Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art (Excerpts) (1993)
• AND ALSO: On day 1, we’re touching briefly on Wallace Stevens (Modernist Poet and Insurance Company Exec, 1879-1955), Sherwood Anderson (Midwestern Writer and a Major Influence on Faulkner and Others, 1876-1941), and H.D. (Major Imagist Poet, Hilda Doolittle, 1886-1961). Also not enough material here to choose them for your course papers, probably, though you might be able to talk me into Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio (1919), if you ask.