COMP 365
Beckett, Pinter and Stoppard
Last Offered Fall 2017
Division I
Cross-listed THEA 365 / ENGL 306
This course is not offered in the current catalog

Class Details

Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard have been amongst the most influential playwrights of the anglophone theatre over much of the last six decades. This course will explore their mutual concern with the capacities and dysfunctions of language, their questioning of Art’s value and the scope for originality in the post-nuclear and postmodern era, and, above all, their collective focus on the extent to which selfhood may be realized in and through performance. Besides reading major plays, we will also give some consideration to the dramatic work crafted by these writers for radio, television and film, and to the political and social commitments animating and counterpointing their literary careers. Readings may include: Endgame, The Caretaker, Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Krapp’s Last Tape, The Homecoming, No Man’s Land, Betrayal, Waiting for Godot, Dogg’s Hamlet, The Invention of Love, Arcadia, Rock ‘n’ Roll, Not I, Rockaby, A Kind of Alaska, Catastrophe, The Real Thing, Indian Ink, Artist Descending a Staircase and One for the Road. Throughout, we will give consideration to these works as both literary and theatrical texts.
The Class: Format: seminar
Limit: 18
Expected: 18
Class#: 1551
Grading: no pass/fail option, no fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: two long papers, four 1- to 2-page shorter responses, class participation
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: Theatre and English majors
Distributions: Division I
Notes: This course is cross-listed and the prefixes carry the following divisional credit:
COMP 365 Division I THEA 365 Division I ENGL 306 Division I
Attributes: ENGL Literary Histories C

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