Rewritings and Revisions
This course offers an introduction to rewritings as revisions of canonical literary texts and their underlying social implications. We will focus on three novels by Margaret Atwood, J. M. Coetzee and Jean Rhys as rewritings of three classics from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, namely Shakespeare’s The Tempest (1611), Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719) and Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847). After early, rather pragmatic rewritings (e.g. Dryden’s The Tempest), these texts have provided a basis for highly creative and critical revisions in the 20th and 21st centuries. Through the novels of Rhys, Coetzee and Atwood, and (short) excerpts from other works, incl. short stories, dramatic works and poetry by authors such as Angela Carter, Derek Walcott and Sia Figiel, we will trace the trajectories and intersections of postcolonial, feminist and postmodernist approaches to rewriting. As a special form of intertextuality, rewritings of famous texts provide both connection and resistance to a literary canon and the culture(s) from which these works emerged. Moreover, they serve as great starting points for investigating a variety of significant themes, such as the relationship of past and present, the importance of perspective, and the role of narrative texts at the intersection of power, history and individual identity.
Literature: The three novels, i.e. Jean Rhys: Wide Sargasso Sea (1966), J.M. Coetzee: Foe (1986), and Margaret Atwood: Hag-Seed (2016), should be obtained by students. Introductions to the rewritten works (incl. key passages), other rewritings and secondary literature on literary and cultural theory (as well as different contexts) will be provided here on Moodle. Please read the texts by the dates indicated.
- Trainer/in: Lampadius Stefan