3.0

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Much of what we know about love and desire we owe to fiction’s ability to evoke these experiences. Consider for example that the publication, in Germany, of The Sorrows of Young Werther inspired young men across Europe to dress and behave just like him. We will study in this course a selection of love stories chosen because they break the mold and question their conventions. Taking a critical distance from these tales of seduction, we will examine not only the manifestations and meanings of love, but also the configurations of gender they inspire and reflect. Indeed, just as nowadays film and television represent, as well as mold, our identities as desiring subject, fictions from the eighteenth-century onwards have shaped our current understanding of gendered subjectivities. The readings for this seminar (all available in English) include: Austen, "Persuasion"; Balzac, "The Girl with the Golden Eyes" and "Sarrasine"; Barthes, "Lover’s Discourse"; Goethe, "The Sorrows of Young Werther"; Mann, "Death in Venice"; Rousseau, excerpts from "Julie or The New Heloise"; Sulzer, "A Perfect Waiter", Winterson, "Written on the Body".