As a popular, ubiquitous literary form, the short story provides a window into the ever-changing landscapes of American cultures across the centuries. In this class, we will discuss narratives by a wide range of American writers, from the origins of the short story in the 19th century up until the present day. We will examine the short prose form as a distinct genre, analyze its formal structures, and study how the short story has been reflecting and commenting on the plethora of American identities and experiences.
With a particular focus on close reading and textual interpretation, we will cover stories by Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mark Twain, Charles W. Chesnutt, Kate Chopin, Jack London, Stephen Crane, Susan Glaspell, Zora Neale Hurston, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Willa Cather, Flannery O’Connor, James Baldwin, Joyce Carol Oates, Leslie Marmon Silko, Amy Tan, Alice Walker, Louise Erdrich, ZZ Packer, Ken Liu, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and Manuel Muñoz.
- Dozent/in: Johanna Feier