Writing in Blood: Literature’s Body

To what extent is our condition defined and our destiny determined by the physical bodies that envelop us? In this seminar we will accompany poets, playwrights, and novelists as they investigate the ecstasies, agonies, ambiguities, and transformations that flesh imposes upon our daily lives. Simultaneously, we will consider their various attempts to transcend our bodily limitations, whether by means of religion, imagination, sexuality, or pharmaceuticals. Along the way, we will collaborate with our writers as they scrutinize the human form as a biological fact, social segregator, philosophical conundrum, and undiscovered country. Authors will include Dickinson, Yeats, Shakespeare, Beckett, Ondaatje, and Coetzee. 3 hrs. sem.