Proposed Undergraduate Course

Single Author: Bret Easton Ellis

rationale

• Bret Easton Ellis is fast becoming a major voice in contemporary literature. His work explores the zeitgeist of current American consumer culture. The early twentieth-century saw the American Dream inflate and burst under the watchful eyes of the Lost Generation (Fitgerald and Hemingway). The late twentieth / early twenty-first-century sees a new upsurge of the American Dream and its disintegration through Generation X (Coupland, Ellis, Janowitz, McInerney). From the numbing effects of the college partying experience in Less than Zero (1985) to the drug-addled fantasies of The Rules of Attraction (1987) to the psychopathological effects of Reagan-era yuppy corporate/consumer culture in American Psycho (1991) to the vampiric consequences of family dysfunction and breakdown in The Informers (1994); from the terroristic consequences of glamorati, modeling and advertising industries in Glamorama (1998) to the traumatic afterlife of a torporific existence in Lunar Park (2005), Ellis satires sex and violence in the college novel, the spy novel, the ghost story, and the mock memoir to hold a mirror to American society and culture in order to show us the ugly, repressed underside of our collective psyche that results from the crass, selfish choices we live and breathe.
• A course devoted to Ellis will allow students to delve completely into the mind set of the author. Bookending the course with a text from the Lost Generation in the beginning and a fellow Generation X text in the conclusion will afford students literary and cultural context for Ellis's texts. The research component of the course, which will be developed through group presentations, will show students multiple perspectives on the author. Showing film versions will demonstrate how a director reads, interprets, and translates Ellis's literary vision to film. Teaching the books in succession will show the continuous development of not only Ellis's literary world, but his world view. Reading relevant works of critical theory will deepen the students understanding of the existential, psychoanalytical, Marxist, and postmodernist issues in Ellis's work. The first paper (comparing and contrasting two Ellis books) will encourage students to approach the author's vision as a continuous whole. The second paper will encourage them to put Ellis in context with either those who came before (the Lost Generation) or with his peers (Generation X). I envision a course that encourages students to work toward a comprehensive appreciation of a contemporary author while also giving them the keys to branching out on their own in terms of scholarly research and influence comparisons.

texts

• novels by Bret Easton Ellis
  • Less than Zero (1985)
  • The Rules of Attraction (1987)
  • American Psycho (1991)
  • The Informers (1994)
  • Glamorama (1998)
  • Lunar Park (2005)
  • Imperial Bedrooms (2010)
• films adapted from Ellis novels
  • Less than Zero (Dir. Marek Kanievska, 1987)
  • The Rules of Attraction (Dir. Roger Avary, 2002)
  • American Psycho (Dir. Mary Harron, 2000)
  • The Informers (Dr. Gregor Jordan, 2008)
• Ellis's modern influence and contemporary writers
  • F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise (1920)
  • Jay McInerney, Bright Lights, Big City (1984)
• selected critical theory articles
• existentialism
• psychoanalysis
• feminism
• Marxism
• postmodernism

assignments

• response and informal presentation (2-3 pages, 2-3 minutes): Students will sign-up to post to the course discussion board and informally present a response to a particular character or issue in a book, accomplishing three tasks: 1) building a character sketch (which will be combined with other students' responses to construct a cast of each book), 2) offering preliminary thematic analysis of the book, and 3) broaching issues for the first day of class discussion.
• group annotated bibliography and formal presentation: Groups will research and annotate critical scholarship and contemporary reviews on a particular Ellis novel, coinciding with the second day of class discussion of that novel.
• close reading paper (4-5 pages): Students will analyze a key passage, demonstrating how it broaches key conflicts and introduces the novel's overarching theme.
• comparison/contrast paper (6-7 pages): Students will either 1) compare and contrast two Ellis books in terms of character, voice, and/or theme, etc. or 2) compare and contrast an Ellis book with its film version
• research paper (10-12 pages): students will compare and contrast one Ellis book with one book on the outside reading list (or one of their choosing, subject to instructor approval) in terms of character, voice, and/or theme, etc, using at least three works of scholarly criticism on each novel (six total) to support their interpretations.
• sample outside texts: modern
• Samuel Beckett, Molloy
• Albert Camus, The Stranger
• Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground
• Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man
• William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying
• F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
• Ernest Hemingway, In Our Time
• James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
• sample outside texts: contemporary
• Nicholson Baker, The Mezzanine
• Douglas Coupland, Shampoo Planet
• Tama Janowitz, Slaves of New York
• Jay McInerney, Story of My Life
• Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita
• Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
• Hubert Selby, Jr., Last Exit to Brooklyn
• Donna Tartt, The Secret History

syllabus

• Week 1: Introductions, Postmodern Literature
• Week 2: Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise / Jazz Age and Lost Generation
• Week 3: Ellis, Less Than Zero and existentialism articles
• Week 4: Film, Less Than Zero
• Week 5: McInerney, Bright Lights, Big City
• Week 6: Ells, The Rules of Attraction and psychoanalysis articles
• Week 7: Film, The Rules of Attraction and close reading paper due
• Week 8: Ellis, American Psycho and feminism and Marxism articles
• Week 9: Film, American Psycho
• Week 10: Ellis, The Informers
• Week 11: Film, The Informers
• Week 12: Ellis, Glamorama
• Week 13: Ellis, Glamorama, concluded and comparison/contrast paper due
• Week 14: Ellis, Lunar Park and postmodernism articles
• Week 15: Thanksgiving Break
• Week 16: Ellis, Imperial Bedrooms
• Finals Week: Research Paper Due