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[Pablo Picasso: Minotauromachy (1935)]


Banned Books

Administration:

[Clovis Trouille: La Voyeuse]

• Welcome


• Timetable


• Course Description


• Bibliography


• Assignments

Authors:

[The Pornographer]

• Radclyffe Hall (1880-1943)


• James Joyce (1882-1941)


• D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930)


• Boris Pasternak (1890-1960)


• Henry Miller (1891-1980)


• Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977)


• Graham Greene (1904-1991)


• William Burroughs (1914-1997)


• Kathy Acker (1947-1997)


• Salman Rushdie (1947- )

Novels:

[Entropy]

• Ulysses (1922)


• The Well of Loneliness (1928)


• Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)


• Tropic of Cancer (1934)


• The Power and the Glory (1940)


• Lolita (1955)


• Doctor Zhivago (1957)


• Naked Lunch (1959)


• The Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec (1975)


• The Satanic Verses (1988)

Sessions:

[Laurentius de Voltolina: The Lecturer (c.1350)]

1. Introduction
   • Lecture: Why Ban Books?
   • Workshop: Areopagitica (1644)
   • Exercise: Test Case - The Golden Ass


2. James Joyce: Ulysses (1922)
   • Lecture: The Muses of Fiction
   • Workshop: Civilisation and its Discontents (1930)
   • Exercise: The Bloomsday Game


3. Radclyffe Hall: The Well of Loneliness (1928)
   • Lecture: Plot
   • Workshop: The Second Sex (1949)
   • Exercise: Spot the Lesbian Sex-Scene


4. D. H. Lawrence: Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)
   • Lecture: Character
   • Workshop: John Thomas and Lady Jane (1954)
   • Exercise: Comparing Connies


5. Henry Miller: Tropic of Cancer (1934)
   • Lecture: Setting
   • Workshop: Inside the Whale (1940)
   • Exercise: Where is Francis?


6. Graham Greene: The Power and the Glory (1940)
   • Lecture: Time
   • Workshop: The Lawless Roads (1939)
   • Exercise: Paradoxes of the Faith


7. Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita (1955)
   • Lecture: Point of view
   • Workshop: Seduction of the Innocent (1954)
   • Exercise: Pornography or Moral Tract?


8. Boris Pasternak: Doctor Zhivago (1957)
   • Lecture: Detail
   • Workshop: We Never Make Mistakes (1963)
   • Exercise: Who is Lara?


9. William Burroughs: Naked Lunch (1959)
   • Lecture: Structure
   • Workshop: Interzone (1989)
   • Exercise: DIY Cut-ups


10. Kathy Acker: The Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec (1975)
    • Lecture: Style
    • Workshop: The Pirate (1974)
    • Exercise: Spot the Piracy


11. Salman Rushdie: The Satanic Verses (1988)
    • Lecture: Theme
    • Workshop: The Jewel in the Crown (1966 / 1984)
    • Exercise: How Many People Can You Offend in One Lifetime?


12. Conclusion
    • Lecture: Pornotopia
    • Workshop: A Cyborg Manifesto (1985)
    • Exercise: Design Your Own Utopia

[Snuff]

Timetable

[GPS Magazine]

Semester Two
[21st July-25th October]

Week 1

Mon (21/7) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 1
Introduction: Why Ban Books?

Anthology Texts:

• John Milton: Areopagitica (1644)
• The Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act (1993)

Thurs (24/7)- 1-3 pm, Workshop 1: Areopagitica
[Group assignments]

Week 2

Mon (28/7): 3-4 pm, Lecture 2
James Joyce: Ulysses (1922) - The Muses of Fiction

Anthology Texts:

• James Joyce: from Ulysses (1922)
• Sigmund Freud: from Civilisation and Its Discontents (1930)
• Sigmund Freud, ed.: A Young Girl's Diary (1919)

Thurs (31/7): 1-3 pm, Workshop 2: Civilisation and Its Discontents
[Group 1: First seminar]

Week 3

Mon (4/8) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 3
Radclyffe Hall: The Well of Loneliness (1928) - Plot

Anthology Texts:

• Radclyffe Hall: from The Well of Loneliness (1928)
• Simone de Beauvoir: from The Second Sex (1949)

Thurs (7/8) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 3: The Second Sex
[Group 2: First seminar]

Week 4

Mon (11/8) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 4
D. H. Lawrence: Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928) - Character

Anthology Texts:

• D. H. Lawrence: from Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)
• D. H. Lawrence: from The First Lady Chatterley (1944)
• D. H. Lawrence: from John Thomas and Lady Jane (1972)

Thurs (14/8) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 4: John Thomas and Lady Jane
[Group 3: First seminar]

Week 5

Mon (18/8) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 5
Henry Miller: Tropic of Cancer (1934) - Setting

Anthology Texts:

• Henry Miller: from Tropic of Cancer (1934)
• George Orwell: from Inside the Whale (1940)

Thurs (21/8) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 5: Inside the Whale
[Group 4: First seminar]

Week 6

Mon (25/8) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 6
Graham Greene: The Power and the Glory (1940) - Time

Anthology Texts:

• Graham Greene: from The Power and the Glory (1940)
• Graham Greene: from The Lawless Roads (1939)

Thurs (28/8) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 6: The Lawless Roads
[Group 5: First seminar]

Mid-Semester Break (1st-12th September)

Week 7

Mon (15/9) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 7
Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita - Point-of-view

Anthology Texts:

• Vladimir Nabokov: from Lolita (1955)
• Vladimir Nabokov: from The Enchanter (1939 / 1985)
• Dr Frederick Wertham: from Seduction of the Innocent (1954)

Thurs (18/9) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 7: Seduction of the Innocent
[Group 1: Second seminar]

Assignment 2: Essay due in

Week 8

Mon (22/9) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 8
Boris Pasternak: Doctor Zhivago (1957) - Detail

Anthology Texts:

• Boris Pasternak: from Doctor Zhivago (1957)
• Olga Ivinskaya: from A Captive of Time (1978)
• Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: "An Incident at Krechetovka Station," from We Never Make Mistakes (1963)

Thurs (25/9) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 8: We Never Make Mistakes
[Group 2: Second seminar]

Week 9

Mon (29/9) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 9
William Burroughs: Naked Lunch (1959) – Structure

Anthology Texts:

• William S. Burroughs: from Naked Lunch (1959)
• William S. Burroughs: from Interzone (1989)

Thurs (2/10) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 9: Interzone
[Group 3: Second seminar]

Week 10

Mon (6/10) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 10
Kathy Acker: The Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec (1978) - Style

Anthology Texts:

• Kathy Acker: from The Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec (1975)
• Kathy Acker: from Blood and Guts in High School (1978)
• Harold Robbins: from The Pirate (1974)

Thurs (9/10) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 10: The Pirate
[Group 4: Second seminar]

Week 11

Mon (13/10) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 11
Salman Rushdie: The Satanic Verses (1988) - Theme

Anthology Texts:

• Salman Rushdie: from The Satanic Verses (1988)
• Salman Rushdie: from Haroun and the Sea of Stories (1990)
• Paul Scott: from The Jewel in the Crown (1966 / 1984)

Thurs (16/10) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 11: The Jewel in the Crown
[Group 5: Second seminar]

Week 12

Mon (20/10) - 3-4 pm, Lecture 12
Conclusion: Pornotopia

Anthology Texts:

• Rick Poynor: from Designing Pornotopia: Travels in Visual Culture (2006)
• Donna Haraway: A Cyborg Manifesto (1985)

Thurs (23/10) - 1-3 pm, Workshop 12: A Cyborg Manifesto

Labour Day (27th October)

[100 Banned Books]

Welcome

[Wordpress]

Welcome to English Stage 2: 666 Banned Books: Censored & Restricted 20th-Century Fiction.

I've been asked to guest-convene and teach the course for the second semester of this year.

My contact details in the Department will be:

Rm 302A
Arts 1
3737599 x 673520
Teaching Hours: Monday 3-4 pm / Thursday 1-3 pm
Office hour: Monday 2-3 pm.
Email

If you need to see me outside those times, please phone or email to make an appointment.

The tutorials will be taken by myself and Dr Claire Talbot. Her contact details are:

Rm 522
Arts 1
Teaching Hours: Thursday 1-3 pm
Office hours: Thursday 11-12 am.
Email

The student representative for this paper is:

Daniel Carfax

So what exactly is the course? Here's what's up on the university website:

[Skype]


ENGLISH 2: 666
Banned Books:
Censored & Restricted 20th-Century Fiction

Worth:

15.0 points

Description:

This course aims to help students examine a number of recent novels which have been banned or restricted for one reason or another by their respective societies. We will therefore be placing most of our emphasis on the cultural background and reasoning behind various types of censorship, but this will also be complemented by close reading and discussion of the novels as literary texts. The first three works to be studied will be James Joyce's Ulysses (1922), Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness (1928), and D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928).

Semester:

Semester 2

Lecturer:

TBA

Authors / Texts:

1. James Joyce (1882-1941): Ulysses (1922) - banned in Britain and America [moral censorship]
2. Radclyffe Hall (1880-1943): The Well of Loneliness (1928) - banned in Britain [moral censorship]
3. D. H. Lawrence (1885-1930): Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928) - banned in Britain and America [moral censorship]
4. Henry Miller (1891-1980): Tropic of Cancer (1934) - banned in Britain and America [moral censorship]
5. Graham Greene (1904-1991): The Power and the Glory (1940) - censured by the Vatican [religious censorship]
6. Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977): Lolita (1955) - banned in Britain [moral censorship]
7. Boris Pasternak (1890-1960): Doctor Zhivago (1957) - banned in the USSR [political censorship]
8. William Burroughs (1914-1997): Naked Lunch (1959) - banned in Britain and America [moral censorship]
9. Kathy Acker (1947-1997): The Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec (1975) - withdrawn from sale in Britain [accused of plagiarism]
10. Salman Rushdie (b. 1947): The Satanic Verses (1988) - banned in most of the Islamic world [religious censorship]

Assessment:

2 Group Seminars - 20% [10% each]
Essay (1200-1500 words) - 20%
3-hour Exam (closed book) - 60%

Prerequisites:

Any 30 points at Stage I in English

Restrictions:

None

[Sinophile]

So all I ask of you, our prospective students (at any rate for the moment) is to read the books and see what you think of them. Then come along to tutorials ready to debate your views.

What I'm going to do is put up a homepage here for each of our ten authors, and another (linked) page for each of the ten novels. These will be easy accessible from the side of your screen, and will be updated periodically as new information and links come to hand.

When lectures start, I'll also be putting up notes about each session, together with information about tutorials and assignments which you can either print out or consult here online.

NB: Previous versions of the course have included a lecture on Hubert Selby Jr.'s Last Exit to Brooklyn (1964). This has now been replaced by Kathy Acker's Adult Life of Toulouse Lautrec. Please ignore any references to Selby's novel in course materials printed before the substitution took place. It will not be included in the essay topics, nor will you be able to answer on it in the exam. You may, however, decide to read it as an interesting background text.

[Use Your Brain]