Fall 2005

E 322 • Milan Kundera and World Literature

Course Description

This course explores the life and work of one of the world's greatest living authors. We will trace Milan Kundera's political and literary path from his communist poetic youth to his present postmodern Francophilia and compare his novels with those authors he himself considers his predecessors and influences in European literature, such as Franz Kafka, Witold Gombrowicz, Lawrence Sterne, Robert Musil, and Miguel Cervantes. Special attention will be paid to his essays, which provoked heated literary and political polemics.

Grading Policy

2 eight-page papers and one rewrite = 70%
10-minute presentation = 10%
Final = 20%

Texts

The Joke
Farewell Waltz
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Slowness
The Art of the Novel
Testaments Betrayed
Course pack available at Speedway

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