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Module Content and Indicative Topics

We often tend to think that literary texts are evidence of an author’s creative originality, but that insistence on literature’s creativity stems from a very particular place and historical period: European Romanticism. In this module we will trace different models of cultural production, looking both before Romanticism (part one) and afterwards (part two) to explore moments when imitation was highly valued. How do writers and artists make a space for themselves even as they imitate others? What are the stakes of different cultures’ concerns about imitation and invention, and how do these approaches shape the way we think about authorship and creativity?

The first part of the module will take poetic form as its case study, with a focus on sonnets by and after the medieval Italian poet Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). We will look at a poetic tradition known as Petrarchism as it moves across languages and traditions. We will also consider Petrarchism in music from the Renaissance madrigal to Bob Dylan and hip-hop. What does it mean for a writer to use a form or vocabulary made famous by another? What happens when people who represent themselves in very different ways draw on the same form?

In the second part we will consider a series of more recent cases which relate to different types of authorship: reading, translation, forgery, plagiarism, and pastiche. What are the limits of these different practices? Where ought we to draw the dividing lines? What theoretical issues do these different and modern forms of authorship raise?

We will end the term by thinking about our original practice as academic writers: how do we enter into dialogue with other scholars and do so both responsibly and inventively? What are our own citation practices?

The module will cover the following topics:

• Imitation in theory and practice;

• How to read Petrarch

• Petrarchism and Gender (sixteenth-century French, English, and Italian poetry by women poets);

• The Harlem Renaissance;

• Petrarchism in song;

• Against imitation;

• Translation and linguistic experimentation (Jhumpa Lahiri’s In Other Words);

• Forgery and hoaxes (Peter Carey’s My Life as a Fake);

• Pastiche (Patience Agbabi’s ‘Problem Pages’);

• The task of the critic (Anne Carson’s The Albertine Workout).

Teaching Delivery

The module will be taught through a one-hour weekly lecture and a one-hour weekly seminar. Students have primary reading for each seminar and questions to prepare, as well as suggested secondary reading. Some weeks may involve group presentations.

This is a compulsory module for second-year BA in Comparative Literature students.

By the end of the module, you should be able to:

• reflect on critical issues raised by the varying relationships between texts and authors, especially across linguistic boundaries, thereby contributing to your continuing development as comparatists;

• read texts and authors not in isolation but in dialogue;

• think about literary history as informed by dialogue and conflict;

• learn about Renaissance ideas of imitation both in theory and in practice;

• explore the afterlife of imitation in modern literature;

• interrogate the boundaries between imitation, translation, parody, pastiche, and plagiarism;

• explain some of the main themes and stylistic features of Petrarch’s major vernacular lyric sequence, the Canzoniere (itself a crucial reference point for many later poets);

• describe different types and forms of imitation and their importance in Renaissance poetry in several literary traditions;

• understand, describe, and respond to complex key secondary works and some of the main critical debates around imitation;

• give an account of the development and importance of the sonnet form in different languages (Italian, French, English);

• analyse sonnets and further develop skills in close reading;

• suggest the influence of Petrarchism in but also beyond literature (for instance, in music);

• engage with ideas of imitation practically through the writing of an imitative poem, thereby experimenting with your own poetic voice, perhaps for the first time;

• reflect critically and personally on the processes of writing poetry and the transition from reading to writing;

• examine ideas of authorship and how these have changed over time;

• discuss the status of the translator and the role of translation in different contexts;

• assess the potential for creativity of literary forgeries and hoaxes;

• find and interpret examples of pastiche, parody, and even plagiarism;

• appraise the role of criticism and the relationship between criticism and literature;

• review your own practices as reader and critic.

Recommended Reading

In preparation for the module, we advise reading the following core texts. These can be found in the ÐÂÏã¸ÛÁùºÏ²Ê¿ª½±½á¹ûLibrary, while some specific sonnets are also available on Moodle:

• Francesco Petrarca, ‘Fam. I, 8’;

• Seneca, ‘Epistle 84’;

• Extracts from Petrarch’s Canzoniere;

• Selected sonnets by Gaspara Stampa, Louise Labé, and Mary Wroth;

• Sonnets by Claude McKay;

• Jhumpa Lahiri’s In Other Words;

• Peter Carey’s My Life as a Fake;

• Patience Agbabi, ‘Problem Pages’;

• Anne Carson, The Albertine Workout.