Saturday, October 16, 2010

Spring 2011 texts

For those who are curious, here are the texts for my spring 2011 class, UH 300-009 a.k.a. 21st-Century Fantasy: The Dark Fantastic. The title is a bit misleading, as we'll spend the first third of the semester on some influential precursors before we hit the current stuff.
  • Jeffrey Ford, The Shadow Year (2008)
  • Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book (2008)
  • Joe Hill, Heart-Shaped Box (2007)
  • Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House (1959)
  • Stephen King, Under the Dome (2009)
  • Kelly Link, Pretty Monsters (2008)
  • Peter Straub, American Fantastic Tales: Terror and the Uncanny from Poe to Now (2 vols., 2009)
  • Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger (2009)
I reserve the right to add or subtract texts, of course, but the above is the list I have sent the bookstore. Movies I haven't quite decided on, but they definitely will include The Haunting (dir. Robert Wise, 1963) and might include Pan's Labyrinth (dir. Guillermo del Toro, 2006) or The Orphanage (dir. Juan Antonio Bayona, 2007) or Let the Right One In (dir. Tomas Alfredson, 2008).

I'd like to wedge Terry Pratchett's new Tiffany Aching novel onto the syllabus, too, but I'd hate to do that without the previous three T.A. novels as well ... and there's only so much room. Grumble, gnash, grind.

Please help spread the word to those who might be interested.

5 comments:

Katy said...

Ooh the titles already have me interested. I love scifi, but I must admit fantasy interests me far more. Now I know to get these books and start reading them over winter break. Thanks Andy!

Courtney said...

The books all sound awesome! Now I want to take this class. The movies are great picks too. I loved Let the Right One In and just saw Let Me In a few days ago. Both are really good movies.

John Harris said...

It looks like you're dipping a little further back into the past with some of these, but that makes them no less exciting. I really want to read some of these, and that is a hell of a movie selection (Pan's Labyrinth is SO GOOD). Who knows, maybe I'll be able to take this class too.

Bailey Carpenter said...

I want to take this class so bad but I don't know if I'll be able to :( (this is the part when Andy is thanking his lucky stars that he doesn't have to deal with another semester of my class commentary)

Jordan said...

I didn't get into the class. I'm wait-listed. Andy should raise the cap for me... ;)