ENGL 370(S) Truth and Lives (Same as Literary Studies 370)

A great many memoirs have been published over the last thirty years-some would say way too many. In this course we shall read selectively among them, focusing mostly on those novelists have composed. What, we shall ask, is the attraction of this form, if indeed it can be called a form? And what are its limitations? In addition to memoirs and personal essays, we shall also read some explicitly fictional work by the same writers. The group will include Vladimir Nabokov, Primo Levi, Philip Roth, Nicholson Baker, David Foster Wallace, and Geoffrey Wolff and Tobias Wolff. Requirements: three short assignments and two 10-page essays. Prerequisite: English 101. Enrollment limited to 25.

Hour: KLEINER