Comparative Approach of European Literatures [ LFLTR1130 ]

Course website on ICampus :  http://www.icampus.ucl.ac.be/

None.

We can study, for example: Homer and the Greek tragedians; Virgil and Cicero; the poems and heroic tales of the Middle Ages; Petrarch and the Sonnet tradition; Villon and lyricism in 15th Century Europe; Shakespeare and the Elizabethan theater; the Spanish theater of the Golden Age; the Enlightenment and its origins in France; European Romanticism in Germany; Proust and Joyce.

This study will highlight the aspects that give importance to these authors and these moments in the building of the European literary heritage. Students will have access to extracts of the texts studied: on top of the lectures, a folder of readings will be provided.

- To become familiar with some of the great authors of European literature, major reference points in the history of culture;
- By the end of the course, the student should be able to situate the monuments of literature in a broader cultural perspective, as well as perceive the importance of the works from different perspectives (historical, ideological, thematic, aesthetic, generic, stylistically, etc.).

The assessment of this course comprises four parts:

1) a multiple choice test about the contents of the formal lectures presented by Erica Durante and Hubert Roland;

2) an open question about the contents of the formal lectures presented by Paul-Augustin Deproost;

3) an open question about the contents of the formal lectures presented by Guido Latré;

4) a multiple choice test about the contents of the common motif developed this year, consisting of questions prepared by the four lecturers concerning the text syllabus and those parts of their formal lectures that deal with the common motif.

The course is presented by a team of four lecturers, each coming from a different discipline, viz. Classical Philology (Prof. Paul-Augustin Deproost), General and Comparative Literature (Prof. Erica Durante), English literature (Prof. Guido Latré), and German literature (Prof. Hubert Roland). This diversity among the teachers in charge will allow the students to become familiar with various approaches to literary studies.

On the basis of a chronological structure from the Ancient times to the 20th century, each lecturer will, in accordance with his or her areas of specialization, be responsible for a particular period in the development of European literature, and use his or her own method of teaching and assessment, which may be different from those applied by the other lecturers on this course.

Within this panorama of European literatures, the lecturers will draw the students' attention to one particular question that will run like a thread through the whole course, from Classical Antiquity to the present day. The topic chosen for the current academic year will be Travel writing. It will be dealt with on the basis of a comparative analysis of a number of texts from different periods in time and from different languages, genres and cultures. The four teachers will devote a part of their lessons to this common motif, and have prepared a text syllabus entitled Terres et Textes. It contains all the extracts that will be studied within the framework of the parts of the course that deal with the travel motif in literature.

The primary aim of this course is to provide a broad introduction to European literatures, both in terms of texts and major periods, and in terms of methods of literary analysis. The course is designed to give the students an overview of historical developments in European literature by discussing the authors, works and currents that are deemed indispensable for a student in the Arts Faculty, and more generally, for the cultural background of all students.

Students will discover various approaches to literary texts, including the comparative method, applied to the major European authors and works of literature, without excluding in principle any language or period. The complex itinerary of this course will start at the origins of western culture (the Bible and Greek and Latin literature) and end in the 20th century, dealing along the way with the medieval and humanist traditions, the artistic and literary Renaissance, the Baroque, the Enlightenment and the 19th century. Some authors and some comparisons between texts will be studied more in depth.

Required reading (2012-2013)

A text syllabus entitled Terres et Textes, which contains the different texts the lecturers have selected in connection with the common motif of the current academic year, viz. that of Travel writing in European literature from Antiquity to the our own day and age.

Reference books:

For your own further reading, the lecturers recommend the following two manuals for the study of European literatures. Both are available in the Arts Faculty library (BFLT).

- BENOIT-DUSAUSOY Annick et FONTAINE Guy (eds.), Lettres européennes. Manuel universitaire d'histoire de la littérature européenne, 2nd edition, Bruxelles, De Boeck, 2007, 860 pp.

- POLET Jean-Claude, Parcours dans le Patrimoine Littéraire Européen, Bruxelles, De Boeck, 2008, 291 pp.

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