E610 Authors and Authorship (3 cr.)

In this course students examine the significance of the author in one’s interpretation of texts. The course explores a variety of potential authorial functions, such as writer of a body of work, spokesperson of a culture, member of a particular tradition or movement, and arbiter of the text’s meaning.

Upon completion of this course, students are expected to be able to do the following:

1. Evaluate the import of an author’s biography to the meaning of a text.
2. Analyze examples of authorial self-construction (narrative voice, intrusion of the author as a character, the author as “divine” architect, the incorporation of author figures or other artists within a text, etc.).
3. Draw connections between an author’s work and traditions or movements with which the author is identified.
4. Consider how an author’s larger body of work affects the meaning of an individual text.