Instructor

Ted Morrissey

Class Type 

Literature

Course Description

“Make it new” was Ezra Pound’s motto as he helped to usher in literary modernism after the First World War, and since then waves of writers have taken Pound’s advice very much to heart by playing with virtually every element of storytelling. This course in experimental writing will examine myriad narrative techniques from writers who have established devoted cult followings to those who have regularly appeared on the bestsellers lists. Students will study these authors’ groundbreaking techniques and also work with their own narrative experimentation. Even writers who do not see themselves as “experimentalists” will find ways to enhance the traditional techniques they are more accustomed to using. Moreover, it is important for teachers of literature as well as of writing to be familiar with nontraditional techniques of storytelling.

Textbook

Abramson, Seth, et al., eds., BAX 2020: Best American Experimental Writing, Wesleyan University Press, 2020 [978-0819579584]

Jackson, Shelley.
The Melancholy of Anatomy: Stories.
9780385721202