Bartleby & Co. - Einzelansicht

Herman Melville's Bartleby has become on of the most frequently discussed literary characters in the modern/ist canon. While some readers see him as an embodiment of subversion and radical passivity, others focus on his virtually utopian innocence or, in yet other perspectives, interpret him as a complicated liberator, or a representative of death.

Proceeding from and constantly returning to Melville's story, our seminar will focus on a range of theoretical text devoted to the enigmatic scrivener -- from Marxist and deconstructive perspectives as well as queer and phenomenological positions. Authors will include Jacques Derrida, Gilles Deleuze, Alain Badiou, Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt, Giorgio Agamben, Jacques Rabcière and J Hillis Miller.

Herman Melville, Bartleby the Scrivener.

More material will be made available on Moodle.

3 CPs for regular attendance, expert group presentation and written summary of the same.