871N02                                              Office hours (Denney 154D) MW3:30-5:00

Professor Erin McGraw                   Email:  mcgraw.46@osu.edu

Forms of Literature--Winter 2002

Fiction

The purpose of this course is to explore the stances and assumptions of a number of different narrative forms used by fiction writers:  memoir, meditation, fairy tale, myth, microfiction, fantasy, and satire.  We will be reading several books and essays that explore these forms, discussing their narrative strategies and the implications for any fiction that adopts them.  In addition, we will take on writing exercises, to try our hands at some of these forms.

            For weeks eight through ten of the term, students will be required to submit either a story, written in one of the forms we've discussed, or a paper analyzing narrative form.  Papers and stories will be workshopped. Students are responsible for making their own copies of MSS--one for every student and two for me.  Bring these to the class meeting the day before the story is to be workshopped.  Late MSS will be counted as course failure.  Only two copies need to be made of your final draft, which will be due in my mailbox in the English Department Office (Denney Hall 421) by noon on Wednesday, March 20^th.

Any suspected plagiarism--the appropriation of another writer's work for your own--will be reported immediately to the Committee on Academic Misconduct.

Students will be expected to have hefty input on each story presented for workshop, both written and spoken.  Written comments should include both marginal notes and approximately a page of summative comments at the end.  Because student involvement is essential for the success of the course, attendance will be monitored.  After three absences for whatever reason, grades will be dropped half a grade for each subsequent absence.  The Office for Disability Services, 150 Pomerene Hall, offers services for students with documented disabilities.  The office's number is 2-3307.

Novelist Nick Hornby will read on Tuesday, Febraury 19^th, at 8:00 p.m. in the Wexner Center, and Sandstone fiction prize winner Wendy Rawlings will read on Monday, February 25^th, in the Denney Hall Commons Room at 3:30.  Attendance at one of these events is mandatory.  Attendance at both is recommended.

            There will be no final exam.  Course grades will be based on in-class participation and grades received on the stories or papers submitted for workshop and revised by March 20^th.

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Guide to my Proofreading Marks

            Consider deleting

            Wonderful

            Diction.  Find another word.

            Delete

            Period

            Transition.  There isn't one, and there needs to be

            Run in; make one paragraph out of two.

            You're padding

            Empty Calorie.  This isn't moving the story ahead

            Tighten.  Make some cuts here

            Misplaced modifier

            Comma splice

Expand or develop.  You've got a good idea sketched out here, but it needs more flesh.

            Cliche.  Find something fresher

            Redundant

            Awkward

            Overexplanatory Dialogue.  People who know each other

                wouldn't talk like this

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Course Syllabus

Jan. 7              Intro

Jan. 9              MYTH

                        Mythology:  Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes, Edith Hamilton

                                    Introduction; Part Two, chapters 5, 6, 7; Part Four, The

                                    Trojan War; Part Five, The House of Atreus.

Jan. 14            The Antelope Wife, Louise Erdrich.

Jan. 16            FAIRY TALE

                        Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, Jack Zipes, tr.

                                    "Once There Were Two Brothers Named Grimm"; "The

                                    Frog King"; "Faithful Johannes"; "Brother and Sister";

                                    "Rapunzel"; "Hansel and Gretel";  "The Fisherman and His

Wife"; "Little Red Cap"; "Rumpelstiltskin"; "The Wolf and

the Man"; "The Blue Light"; "The Stubborn Child"; "Lazy

Heinz"; "Lean Lisa."

(Jan. 21          Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.  No class)

Jan. 23           The Bloody Chamber, Angela Carter.

Jan. 28           MEMOIR

                        This Boy's Life, Tobias Wolff.

Jan. 30           Wartime Lies, Louis Begley.

Feb. 4             FANTASY

                        Titus Groan, Mervyn Peake.  (Included in The Gormenghast

 Novels)

Feb. 6             Zelik Rifkin and the Tree of Dreams, Steve Stern.  (Included in A Plague of Dreamers)

                        "Angel Levine" and "Idiots First," Bernard Malamud.  (Course

                        packet from Grade-A notes)

Feb. 11           SATIRE

                        "A Modest Proposal," Jonathan Swift  (Course packet from Grade-A

                        notes)

            Small World, David Lodge

Feb. 13           MEDITATION AND MICROFICTION

                        "On the Pleasure of Hating," William Hazlitt

                        "Against Joie de Vivre," Phillip Lopate

                        "Seeing," Annie Dillard  (All in course packet from Grade-A notes)

Feb. 18           Einstein's Dreams, Alan Lightman

                        Micro Fiction, Jerome Stern

Feb. 20- Mar. 13      Workshop

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Workshop Sign-Up

MSS will be due in the class session before your workshop date.

Please try to avoid more than three MSS for any one day.

Feb. 20

Feb. 25

Feb. 27

Mar.  4

(Mar. 6--AWP.  No class)

Mar. 11

Mar. 13