French 647: Le Roman Francais au XXe Siecle

By the end of the 19th-century, masterpieces of the genre had established a set of conventions for the novel, seemingly all of which would be subverted, deconstructed, and playfully re-employed by French novelists over the course of the 20th-century. In this course, we will study the genre in many of its manifestations throughout the 20th- and 21st-centuries, to chart how it has continued to transform itself in response to the great historical, political, epistemological, and ecological crises of the modern and contemporary eras. Readings—some of which figure on the MA exam reading list—will include Gide, Proust, Beckett, Duras, Butor, Perec, Garréta, Vasset, and Salvayre.