English 495: Spring 2010

Dr. Dennis Cutchins, "James, Twain, and America"

This section will focus primarily on the late 19th-century literature of Henry James and Mark Twain, exploring the historical and cultural milieu in which these men wrote and the notable differences in their styles.

Dr. Frank Christianson, "Reading the West"

This course will examine the idea of the western frontier in nineteenth-century American literature and culture. We will explore how various notions of the West took shape and were popularized in the form of short fiction, dime novels, and stage melodramas. Readings will include work by a variety of nineteenth-century figures such as Stephen Crane, William "Buffalo Bill" Cody, Teddy Roosevelt, and Frederick Jackson Turner. The mixture of popular and literary cultures will provide a more fully developed portrait of the myth of the West from its origins.