Graduate Seminar

Isabel Allende and Luisa Valenzuela

Syllabus

REQUIRED READINGS:

COURSE DESCRIPTION: Comparative Literature 571T Major Authors: Isabel Allende and Luisa Valenzuela focuses upon the novels, short stories, and essays of Isabel Allende and Luisa Valenzuela, two of South America's pre-eminent contemporary authors. To begin the course, we will read some selected essays by three well-known commentators--Rosario Castellanos, Jean Franco, and Victoria Ocampo--to frame our discussion, and we will introduce ourselves to the history, culture, and politics of their homelands--Chile and Argentina. Then we will read and discuss the novels and stories of Allende and Valenzuela in order to understand better how they confront their political, cultural, and historical inheritances. In addition, we will read one theoretical text--Debra Castillo's Talking Back--a work which attempts to formulate a coherent theoretical approach to Latin American women's writing.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS: Students will be required to read each of the listed works, to discuss them in class, to keep a journal of their responses to the readings and discussions, and to write two 10-page research/semina papers, one on each author, which explore some aspect of a work that either we have not discussed in class or we have not developed to the student's satisfaction. The first paper is due in the eighth week of classes and the second in the final week. In addition, each student will give, at the end of the semester, a report of approximately 20 minutes, which explores some aspect of his/her research not covered in the two papers, but which is nonetheless important to her/his overall research. This report will require that the student spend time in the library exploring the reviews and analyses of critics here and in Latin America.

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