University of Pennsylvania
CGS/ Comparative Literature
260/ English 284
Fall 2001
Jonathan P. Eburne
Outlaws, Exiles, and
Outcasts:
Modernist American Literature in the Age of Prohibition,
1920-1933
In this course, we will examine
the literature and culture of the Prohibition era (1920-1933), an historical
period characterized by radical artistic, political, and social experimentation
as well as by tumultuous social change.
We will study representative works of this periodÑ from the Lost
Generation to the Harlem Renaissance, from the detective novel to the gangster
film, from avant-garde art and poetry to socialist realism and jazz. While recognizing the appeal of these
works today, we will examine them in the context of the literary movements,
periodicals, politics, and historical forces that shaped modernist expression.
In particular, we will focus on
literary responses to both the prosperity and the violence of American culture
in the immediate aftermath of the first World War. On the one hand, American artists and writers witnessed the
rise (and, in 1929, the crash) of consumer capitalism, the invention of film
and Jazz, new possibilities for sexual and ethnic relations, and the influx of
European styles and ideas. On the
other hand, the shock of brutal new forms of warfare was met in the U.S. by the
rise of gangsterism, the horrors of racial persecution, the struggles over
ethnic integration and gender equality, and the idealistic violence of social
protest and labor uprising.
Texts (Available at the Penn Book Center, 34th Street):
W. R. Burnett, Little Caesar
Zelda Fitzgerald, Collected Writings
Gertrude Stein, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
Ernest Hemingway, In Our Time
Dashiell Hammett, Red Harvest
William Faulkner, Sanctuary
Nathanael West, Miss Lonelyhearts
Jack London, John Barleycorn
Kathy Ogren, The Jazz Revolution
David Levering Lewis, The Portable Harlem Renaissance
Reader
Films
Course requirements:
There will be two brief (3-5 pp) assignments, which will constitute 35%
of the course grade. The final
project (8-10 pp) will count for 40% of the course grade. The remaining 25% will be based on
class participation. As a result,
attendance and preparation will be mandatory.