SEMINARS SPRING 2008
HONR 219P Do Not Enter: Outsiders in Twentieth Century American
Drama
Monday/Wednesday, 2:00-3:15 p.m.
Dr. Korey Rothman, Department of Theater
In the Jewish literary tradition the boundaries between the everyday world and the other world are frequently crossed. Thus, the supernatural, the mystical, the magical elements figure largely in forms of religious literature dating back to Talmudic times and in storytelling traditions. In this course we will learn about imagination in Ashkenazi culture, from medieval to modern and even post-modern settings.
Course objectives: (1) to better understand the connection between pre-modern and modern images and metaphors through examination of legends and myths, (2) to explore the uses of magical words, curses, and blessings and also magical objects, talismans, kmeyes, (3) to understand the power of magic in an uncontrollable world, discussing magic healing and the need to ward off evil eyes, (4) to understand how the culture borrowed and adapted legends and myths from neighboring cultures, (5) to examine the symbiosis and potential conflicts between such seemingly oppositional forces as monotheism and paganism, myth and modern science, imagination and realism, (6) to explore genres of modern fantasy and science fiction in terms of Jewish sources.
This literature permits consideration of the wishes and dreams and fears of over a thousand years of Jewish life. In a focus on imaginative aspects of Jewish literary development one can better examine the nexus between literary, folkloristic, and religious traditions and how all three emerge into modern consciousness. The first part of the course begins with a survey of assorted myths from various anthologies and collections translated from both Hebrew and Yiddish. We will discuss the ways rabbinic and Hasidic tales employ the otherworldly as well as biblical imagery in moralistic and instructional ways.
The second section draws from classic Yiddish literature from medieval to the early period of modern Yiddish literature. Medieval sources include Eliahu Bochur Bovo Bukh and assorted legends of the Golem, a man made of clay. We move from there to the Yiddish (in translation) works of IL Peretz, S. Anski, S.Y. Agnon, and Itzik Manger, who collectively feature an assortment of images of Satan, Lilith, dybbuks, magical goats, and talking babies with tales of paradise. Much of this literature deals playfully with the transition from tradition to modernity. In modern Jewish literature we find still much use of the supernatural in new and creative ways in the works of Isaac Bashevis Singer, Bernard Malamud, and Cynthia Ozick.
The final part of the course looks at post modern uses of the weird and supernatural, still employing the notion of dybbuks and golems in various ways and media. We will discuss such media as science fiction and klezmer adaptations. The course will involve a variety of traditional and non-traditional approaches, including class discussions, exams, and papers as well as creation of modern myths and legends.
CORE: Literature; Diversity
