Spring 2023 English UN3715 section 001

MAJOR AMERICAN AUTHORS II

BELLOW ELLISON & ROTH

Call Number 13176
Day & Time
Location
R 12:10pm-2:00pm
309 Hamilton Hall
Points 4
Grading Mode Standard
Approvals Required None
Instructor Ross Posnock
Type SEMINAR
Method of Instruction In-Person
Course Description Prerequisites: the instructor's permission. (Seminar). These three major post-war American novelists are each challenging and transgressive in their own way; they comprise a natural grouping given their common preoccupations that grew out of high personal regard. Bellow and Ellison were close friends and Roth was a friend of Bellow's and a great admirer of Ellison. Indeed, Roth's The Human Stain is a sustained meditation upon and homage to Ellison's Invisible Man. These shared concerns include a resistance to the pressure to be representative of one's racial or ethnic group, skepticism of the political and ideological uses of art, and fascination with how an ethnic or racial outsider makes his way into WASP American high culture. One does so by a process of initiation that proceeds less by the sacrifice demanded by assimilation and more by playing the game of appropriation in which culture is conceived as public, open and accessible to anyone, and culture goods are available to be enjoyed and re-worked for one's own creative purposes. Application Instructions: E-mail Professor Ross Posnock (rp2045@columbia.edu) with the subject heading Bellow, Ellison, and Roth seminar. In your message, include basic information: your name, school, major, year of study, and relevant courses taken, along with a brief statement about why you are interested in taking the course.
Web Site Vergil
Department English and Comparative Literature
Enrollment 14 students (18 max) as of 9:06PM Friday, May 9, 2025
Subject English
Number UN3715
Section 001
Division Interfaculty
Campus Morningside
Note Application required
Section key 20231ENGL3715W001