RES 295.01 Special Topic:
Perspectives in Twentieth-Century Central and Eastern European Literature
Grinnell College
Spring, 2001

MWF 11:00, Fine Arts 243

Instructor: Todd Armstrong  
Box L-7
Office Hours: MWF 1-3 and by appt.
641-269-3052
ARH 232D

armstron@grinnell.edu

 

 

 

SYLLABUS

 

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Course Description

Reading List

Course Syllabus

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Writing Assignments

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Spring 2001
Film Festival

 

 

Week 1 Week 8
Week 2 Week 9
Week 3 Week 10
Week 4 Week 11
Week 5 Week 12
Week 6 Week 13
Week 7 Week 14

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Week 1. (January 22-26)

Monday: Introduction of course objectives and structure.

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Wednesday: Yugoslavia, Ivo Andrić and The Bridge on the Drina

    Introduction, Translator's forward, and Chapters I-VII (1-102)

Friday: The Bridge on the Drina

    Chapters VIII-XII (103-153)

Week 2 (January 29-February 2)

Monday: The Bridge on the Drina

    Chapters XIII-XV (154-199)

Tuesday, January 30, 7:30 pm in ARH 302: FILM

Please consult the Film webpage for more information about the films, directors, background information, and discussion questions.

Before the Rain (Macedonia, UK; Color, 1995, dir. Milcho Manchevski)

Wednesday: Discussion of film:

Before the Rain (Macedonia, UK; Color, 1995, dir. Milcho Manchevski)

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Friday: The Bridge on the Drina

Week 3 (February 5-9)

Monday: Balkan Blues: Writing out of Yugoslavia

"Balkan Blues" by Dubravka Ugresić; "The City and Death" by Bogdan Bogdanović; 'Augusburg" by Drago Jančar; "Sarajevo: Portrait of an Inward City" by Dzevad Karahasan (pp 3-104)

Wednesday: Balkan Blues: Writing out of Yugoslavia: Writing out of Yugoslavia

"Astrakhan" by Dragan Veliki; "Farewell to Mother" by Mirko Kovać; "A Man with No Country" by Danilo Kiš;; "Here I Am!" by Slobodan Blagoević

Friday: Balkan Blues: Writing out of Yugoslavia

"Sarajevo (Tales from a City)" a play by Goran Stefanovski;

Café Europa by Slavenka Drakulić (1-108)

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NB: The Cultural Film for the weekend of February 9-11 will be Camera Buff [Amator](Polish with English subtitles, 1979) dir. Krzystof Kieszlowski. Cultural Films are shown Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. in ARH 302.

Week 4 (February 12-16)

Monday: Café Europa by Slavenka Drakulić

pp 109-213

Tuesday, February 13th, 7:30 pm in ARH 302: FILM

Please consult the Film webpage for more information about the films, directors, background information, and discussion questions.

Underground
(France/Germany/Hungary, Color, 1995), dir. Emir Kusturica

Wednesday: Discussion of Underground

Friday: Final discussion of texts from (former) Yugoslavia

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #1: See assignment webpage. DUE by Friday, February 23, at 5 p.m.

Week 5 (February 19-23)

Monday: Poland and Polish Literature:

Historical and Cultural Contexts

Hand-outs

Wednesday: Jerzy Andrzejewski's Ashes and Diamonds

"Foreword"; "Introduction"; and Chapters 1-5 (pp 5-85)

Friday: NO CLASS (work on your papers!)

Week 6 (February 26-March 2)

Monday: Ashes and Diamonds

    Chapters 6-7 (pp 86-174)

Tuesday, February 27, 7:30 p.m. in ARH 302: Film

Ashes and Diamonds
(Poland, 1958, B&W) Dir. Andrzej Wajda

Wednesday: Discussion of Film/novel

Chapters 8-10 (pp 175-239)

Friday: Context of Warsaw; Andrzej Szczypiorski's The Beautiful Mrs. Seidenmann

Chapters I-VI (pp 3-58)

Week 7 (March 5-March 9)

Monday: The Beautiful Mrs. Seidenmann

Chapters VII-XII (pp 59-125)

Wednesday: The Beautiful Mrs. Seidnemann

Chapters XIII-XXI (pp 126-204)

Friday: The Holocaust and Tadeusz Borowski's This Way to the Gas Ladies and Gentlemen

    pp 9-97

WRITING ASSIGNMENT #2: See assignment webpage. DUE by Friday, March 16, at 5 p.m.

Week 8 (March 12-March 16)

Monday: CLASS WILL MEET IN SOUTH LOUNGE FOR A DISCUSSION WITH SAM HARRIS '58

Tadeusz Borowski's This Way to the Gas Ladies and Gentlemen (pp. 98-180); Excerpt from Sam Harris's Sammy: Child Survivor of the Holocaust; Hand-outs

SPECIAL EVENT: On Monday, March 12 at 8 p.m. in South Lounge the Rosenfield Program will host a talk by Sam Harris '58, Holocaust Survivor, "Surviving the Holocaust."

Tuesday, March 13, 7:30 pm in ARH 302: FILM

Europa, Europa
(Poland, Germany/1991 Color) dir. Agnieszka Holland

Wednesday: Meeting with Jenny Michaels' Holocaust literature course;
Discussion of Europa, Europa, Poems by Czeslaw Milosz, Antoni Slonimski, Wislawa Szymborska

NB: I will be out of town Thursday afternoon and all day Friday; if you need to consult with me on papers, please try to make arrangements to meet with me on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Friday: NO CLASS: Work on your papers!

 

Spring Break

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For those of you who want to read ahead: after the break the order of readings will be: The Captive Mind; The Book of Laughter and Forgetting; The Garden Party and Other Plays; and Waiting for Darkness, Waiting for Night. Below is a tentative schedule of readings.

Week 9 (April 2-April 6)

NB: The Rosenfield Program, the Luce Program and the Russian and Eastern European Studies Concentration will host a symposium, Preserving the Environment of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union April 3-5. For more information, consult the Campus Memo, or the Rosenfield website.

Monday: Literature and Totalitarianism in Central and Eastern Europe

Introduction

Wednesday: Czeslaw Milosz's The Captive Mind

    pp 3-81: Preface, Chapters I-III ("The Pill of Murti-Bing," "Looking to the West," "Ketman")

Friday: The Captive Mind

    pp 82-174: Chapters IV-VI ("Alpha, the Moralist," "Beta, the Disappointed Lover," "Gamma, the Slave of History")

Week 10 (April 9-April 13)

Monday: The Captive Mind

pp 174-251: Chapters VII-IX ("Delta, the Troubadour," "Man, this Enemy," "The Lesson of the Baltics")

Tuesday, April 10, 7:30 pm in ARH 302: FILM

Larks on a String (Czechoslovakia,

Wednesday: Discussion of Film

Friday: Introduction to Czech Literature; The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

    Parts One-Three ("Lost Letters," "Mother," "The Angels")

Week 11 (April 16-April 20)

Monday: The Book of Laugher and Forgetting

Parts Four-Five ("Lost Letters," "Litost")

Wednesday: The Book of Laugher and Forgetting

Parts Six-Seven ("The Angels," The Border"); Handout: Afterword ("A Talk with the Author by Philip Roth")

Friday: The Garden Party and Other Plays by Vaclav havel

    "The Garden Party," "Memorandum" and "The Increased Difficulty of Concentration"

NB: The Russian Department and the Russian and Eastern European Studies Concentration will host the annual SLAVIC COFFEEHOUSE in the Forum Coffeehouse on Saturday, April 21, from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Week 12 (April 23-April 27)

Monday: The Garden Party and Other Plays

"Audience (Conversation)," "Unveiling (Private View)" "Protest," "Mistake"

Tuesday, April 24, 7:30 p.m. in ARH 302: FILM

Man of Marble
(Poland, 1976, Color and B&W) Dir. Andrzej Wajda

Wednesday: Discussion of Film

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Friday: The Velvet Revolution; Waiting for Darkness, Waiting for Light by Ivan Klima

Week 13 (April 30-May 4)

Monday: Klima, Waiting for Darkness, Waiting for Light

Chapter Three

Tuesday, April 31, 7:30 in ARH 302: Film

Kolya
(Czech Republic, 1994, Color) Dir. Jan Sverak

Wednesday: Discussion of Film

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Friday Ivan Klima's Waiting for Darkness, Waiting for Light

Chapter Four and Epilogue

Week 14 (May 7-May 11)

Monday: Final Discussion

Wednesday: Writing Conferences

Thursday: Writing Conferences

Friday: Writing Conferences

FINAL WRITING ASSIGNMENT: See assignment webpage.

THERE IS NO FINAL EXAM IN THE COURSE. YOUR FINAL ASSIGNMENT IS

DUE ON Wednesday, May 16th, 5 p.m.