Topics in the Literature of Life Writing

All third-year English literature courses share the following features:

1. Students are presumed to have had first-year level instruction and experience in writing critical essays on literary subjects.
2. Students are required to read in the course subject area beyond the texts assigned by the instructor.
3. Students are required to incorporate into their oral and written coursework secondary source materials which may include biographical information, literary criticism or theory, unassigned texts by the author under study, relevant cultural or intellectual history, or other aesthetic works such as music or visual art.

Readings and topics will vary with each instructor’s presentation of a course, but all course materials are consistent with the stated objectives/outcomes for the course.

In English 3150, students may examine life writing works linked by sub-genre, by author, or by theme, such as any of the following:

• Narratives of trauma, disability, or disease;
• Autobiography and the theatre;
• Literary letters;
• Narratives of slavery and emancipation;
• Creative non-fiction and the personal essay;
• Spiritual autobiography;
• Travel journals; and
• Life writing in the Holocaust

These works will be complemented by related readings from non-literary perspectives, such as journalistic essays, articles from academic journals, or internet information pages, including criticism and theory as it relates to the work of the particular authors, periods, or themes under study.

For purposes of comparison, students may also examine some mock-autobiographical works (such as fiction, diaries or memoirs that purport to be based on “real-life”) and /or autobiographical film, theatre, music, or performance art.