A course in modernism’s diverse struggles with matter in the early twentieth century. We will look at why materiality posed a problem for artists of this period and how this engagement with objects and embodiment shaped their work. The course will consist of novels, short stories, poems and critical reading. Poems will consist of imagist, futurist, and vorticist works. Fiction will include short stories by Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, and Virginia Woolf; novels will include Paul Scheerbart, The Gray Cloth; Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis; Rebecca West, The Return of the Soldier; selections from James Joyce’s Ulysses; and Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway.

Texts:

• Paul Scheerbart. The Gray Cloth. MIT Press. [978-0262692960]
• Franz Kafka. Metamorphosis and Other Stories. Penguin Classics. [978-0143105244]
• Rebecca West. The Return of the Soldier. Penguin. [978-0141180656]
• Virginia Woolf. Mrs. Dalloway. Harvest. [978-0156628709]