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Kay Nielsen (1886-1957):
Scheherazade (1922)



139.329:
Advanced Fiction Writing

An exploration of the poetics – and politics – of experimentation and subversion in contemporary fiction and metafiction. As well as analysing the work (both creative and critical) of major practitioners and theorists, students will compose their own stories to demonstrate their understanding of the field.




Joel & Ethan Coen: Barton Fink (1991)


Administration

The course is framed around the classic Eastern story-collection The Thousand and One Nights. By examining the variations on story-telling contained within it, as well as the responses it has elicited from contemporary critics and fiction-writers, you will be encouraged to see the continuities within narrative conventions, ancient and modern. The focus throughout will be on adding to your battery of theoretical and practical skills as a practising writer, so you will be asked to compile a portfolio of creative work, as well as writing a short critical essay.





Sandeep Gangadharan: Vyasa dictates the Mahabharata to Ganesha (2009)


Major Topics

It is a mixture that I heartily recommend to apprentice writers: one foot in the high-tech topical here and now, one foot in narrative antiquity, and a third foot, if you can spare it, in the heroic middle distance.
– John Barth, “Further Questions?” (1998): 80.

  • Section 1 - Introduction:
    Paratext
    • Workshop: Procedures

  • Section 2 - The Fantastic (i):
    The Psychology of Fantasy
    • Workshop: Exercise 1 - Faking Sincerity

  • Section 3 - The Fantastic (ii):
    How Do You Write a Ghost Story?
    • Workshop: Exercise 2 - Ghost Story

  • Section 4 - Magic Realism (i):
    The Politics of Representation
    • Workshop: Exercise 3 - Psychology

  • Section 5 - Magic Realism (ii):
    Deciphering the Tropics
    • Workshop: Exercise 4 - Parody

  • Section 6 - Metafiction (i):
    The Philosophy of Being
    • Workshop: Exercise 5 - What If?

  • Section 7 - Metafiction (ii):
    How to be Somewhere and Nowhere
    • Workshop: Critical Skills (i) - Analysing a Story

  • Section 8 - New Wave SF (i):
    The Power of Speculative Fiction
    • Workshop: Critical Skills (ii)

  • Section 9 - New Wave SF (ii):
    Dangerous Visions
    • Workshop: Creative Portfolio (i)

  • Section 10 - Utopia / Dystopia (i):
    Propaganda or Art?
    • Workshop: Creative Portfolio (ii)

  • Section 11 - Utopia / Dystopia (ii):
    The Country of the Blind
    • Workshop: Creative Portfolio (iii)

  • Section 12 - Conclusion:
    The Point of an Ending
    • Workshop: Creative Portfolio (iv)





Edgar Allan Poe: The Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade (1845)


Authors

Biographical and bibliograpical information about each of the authors - or major texts - included in the Course readings (either from the Prescribed Text or the Course Book of Readings).

  1. Armstrong, Martin (1882-1974)
  2. Barthes, Roland (1915-1980)
  3. Borges, Jorge Luis (1899-1986)
  4. Burton, Richard F. (1821-1890)
  5. Clinton, Jerome W. (1937-2003)
  6. Corballis, Tim (1971- )
  7. Dick, Philip K. (1928-1982)
  8. Dukes, Breton
  9. García Márquez, Gabriel (1927-2014)
  10. Grotzfeld, Heinz
  11. Haddawy, Husain
  12. Hamori, Andras
  13. Horovitz, Josef (1974-1931)
  14. Ihimaera, Witi (1944- )
  15. Jakobson, Roman (1896-1982)
  16. James, M. R. (1862-1936)
  17. Kilito, Abdelfattah (1945- )
  18. Lane, Edward W. (1801-1876)
  19. Le Guin, Ursula K. (1929-2018)
  20. Lem, Stanislaw (1921-2006)
  21. Mahdi, Muhsin (1926-2007)
  22. Pinault, David
  23. Poe, Edgar Allan (1809-1849)
  24. Ross, Jack (1962- )
  25. Shaw, Tina (1961- )
  26. Tawhai, Alice
  27. Thousand and One Nights, The
  28. Todorov, Tzvetan (1939-2017)
  29. Wells, H. G. (1866-1946)