COURSE DESCRIPTION

A workshop for serious writers who would like to explore fictive forms in which representation is subordinate to invention. We will study as well as write stories of mysterious events, marvelous happenings and strange settings. Craft assignments are designed to help writers create fables and fantasies that reflect perceived truths about the real world in a heightened and interesting way. Students present their ongoing work for useful in-class roundtable feedback; they also receive written critiques of their projects and line-by-line editing suggestions. Readings are taken from the works of such writers as Aesop, Brothers Grimm, Angela Carter, Robert Coover, Italo Calvino, Ursula Leguin, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Jorge Luis Borges.

REQUIRED TEXTS

Rabkin, Eric S., Ed. Fantastic Worlds: Myths, Tales, and Stories. NY: Oxford, 1979.

Morrow, Bradford, and Patrick McGrath. The New Gothic: A Collection of Contemporary Gothic Fiction. NYC: Vintage, 1992.

USEFUL REFERENCE — NOT REQUIRED

Walker, Barbara G. The Women's Encylopedia of Myths and Secrets. HarperSanFrancisco: 1983.

GRADING POLICIES:

Grade will be based on workshop participation (20%) as well as (80%) on a portfolio of 20-30 pages of carefully revised fiction to be submitted at the next-to-last meeting of the course along with relevant work notes and drafts. You may base your portfolio work on class exercises; or I will help you work out a portfolio project.

PORTFOLIO CRITIQUES:

All students will receive written comments and line-by-line editing suggestions.

COURSE OUTLINE

Each week a discussion of the literary topic with reference to assigned readings will be followed by writing exercises and a workshop. Below are indicated a range of reading selections from Rabkin and Morrow/McGrath; other selections will be in hand-outs or read aloud. We will not and cannot discuss all these texts; instructor will assign from among them. Those who wish to study further can read the others at leisure.

In the workshop portion of each class, students will read aloud and receive feedback in an informal roundtable setting. The exercise for the week will be distributed to you to do at home.

The instructor reserves the right to change the syllabus.

Abbreviation Key:
R = Rabkin
M/M = Morrow and McGrath
H = hand-out
O = out-loud

1. Introduction: The nature of fantasy (I): Reversal of the ground rules, metamorphosis, the externalization of the explicit.

"The Myth of Actaeon," Ovid. (R)
"The Myth of Narcissus," Ovid. (R)
"The Myth of Philomela," Ovid. (R)
"The Garden of Live Flowers," Carroll. (R)
"The Metamorphosis," Kafka (excerpts — O)

2. The nature of fantasy (2): The illusion of central position; the ominipotence of thought; psychic power by compensation.

"Hansel and Gretel"
"The Magic Swan Geese,". (R)
"The Tinderbox," Anderson. (R)
"Cockroaches," Schulz.
"The Judgment," Kafka. (R)
"Kuzma and the Worm," Gander (O)

3. Journey Stories. Quest and Initiation. Shamanism and ritual.

"Shamanism and the Megalopolis," Eakins. (H)
"A Shaman's Journey...Sea Spirit Takanakapsaluk," Rasmussen. (H)
Excerpts from The Songlines, Chatwin (O)
Excerpts from The Storyteller, Mario Vargas Llosa (O)
"The Cyclops" from the Odyssey (H)
Excerpt from Vladimir Propp (H)

4. Myths: God and Creation Stories (additional readings TBA)

"Genesis." (R)
"The Blackfoot Genesis" (R)
"The Well-Baked Man," Pima (O)
"People Brought in a Basket, Modoc (O)

5. Warrior Hero Stories and the Conventions of Heroic Fantasy

"The Bardic Voice," Gardner
Excerpts from Beowulf (H)
Excerpts from the Arthurian legend (H)
"The Sword of Welleran," Lord Dunsany (R)
"Golden Wings," Morris (R)
Excerpts from Joseph Campbell (H)

6. Tales: Fairy & Trickster. Text and context. Analysis of audience.

Excerpt from Bruno Bettelheim (H)
"The Sleeping Beauty" (R)
"Little Red Cap" (R)
"Storyteller...." De Parle (H)
"Blood," Galloway. (M/M)
"The Dead Queen," Coover. (M/M)
"Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Fox," Ed. Harrison. (R)

7. Beast fables and animal groom stories. More of the trickster.

"Beauty and the Beast" (H)
Excerpts from Marc Shell (H)
"Why Tortoise's Shell Is Not Smooth," Ibo, Ed. Achebe. (R)
Excerpts from "Why Look at Animals," John Berger (H)
"The Zebra Storyteller," Holst. (R)
"The Black Cat," Poe. (R)

8. Tall Tales and Yarns. Characteristics of oral tradition vs print tradition

"Paul Bunyan on the Columbia," Shephard. (R)
"There's No Such Place as America," Bichsel. (R)
"Homage to the San Francisco YMCA," Brautigan. (R)
"Didn't She Know," Bradfield. (M/M)
"The Birth and Childhood of Pantagruel" Rabelais (H)
"Art of the Tale," Twain (H)

9. The Gothic and the subversion of reason

Prometheus (H)
"The Ghostwife," (R)
"The Sandman," Hoffmann.
"The Birthmark," Poe.
Gothic, continued

The Smell," McGrath. (M/M)
"Banquo and the Black Banana," West (M/M)
Excerpts from The Sadeian Woman, Carter (H)
"Horror and Gothic: Genre Characteristics," Eakins (H)
"The Machine, the Badass and the Golem," Eakins (H)

10. The Character of Death

Excerpts from "The Storyteller," Benjamin (H)
"The Fight over Life," Guadeloupe (Afro-American) (O)
Excerpts from "An American Indian View of Death," Tedlock (H)
"The Ghostwife," (R)
Excerpts from Dracula, by Bram Stoker. (H)
Orpheus and Eurydice (H)
"The Merchant of Shadows," Carter. (M/M)
"Leaf by Niggle," Tolkien (R)

11. The Big Trope: Symbolism, Surrealism, Magical Realism

"The Oval Portrait," Poe. (R)
"The Oval Lady " Leonora Carrington. (H)
"A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings," Marquez (H)
Excerpt from Nights at the Circus, Carter (H)
Excerpts from Freud (H)
Excerpts from Surrealism, Herbert Read (H)
"Growth of the Fiction Reef," Eakins (H)

12. Parody, satire, genre-crossing

"Pierre Menard," Borges. (R)
"Pastoral," Landolfi. (R)
"The Piano Player," Barthelme (R)
"The Gingerbread House," Coover (H)
"The Werewolf" Carter (H)
"Freniere," Rice (M/M)
Excerpts from Todorov/Bakhtin (H)
Minute Stories and Flash Stories (O)
Other readings TBA