COMP 13
On Stupidity Winter 2025

This course is guided by what is perhaps the wisest question in literary-cultural criticism: “What is stupidity?” Since the early modern period, the pursuit of knowledge by means of reason has redefined what it is to know and to be knowledgeable. But what about the other side of the coin – what can we glean from not knowing, or refusing to know? In this course, we will consider the stupidest books, the stupidest authors, and the stupidest readers in the Germanic and Slavic literary traditions. Looking at opera, film, and theater, we will discuss the role of media in the expression of stupidity. We also will reflect on which freedoms stupidity allows cultural expression, especially under oppressive regimes. Engaging with philosophical writings on stupidity (Kant, Bakhtin, Horkheimer and Adorno, Kristeva), literary representations of stupidity (Rilke, Hölderlin, Dostoyevsky, Gogol, Erofeev, Kafka, Walser), operatic depictions of the buffoon (Mozart and Schnittke), we will consider the many variations on the trope of stupidity such as idiocy and poetic courage, sublime dumbness and speechlessness, willful ignorance and notions of the “sheep”, resistant and alternative forms of knowledge in stock figures such as the buffoon and the holy fool. Class meetings will consist of mini-lectures, free writing opportunities, discussions, and activities. Outside of the classroom, students will write three mini essays applying terms and ideas from our theoretical materials to literary works of their choice. The course will culminate in a final project shared in a class reception in the last session. The language of instruction will be English, but students with a reading knowledge of Russian and German will have the opportunity to read and discuss our materials in the original language. By the end of the course, students will have mastered stupidity and will have the ability to apply it to their remaining undergraduate coursework.