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Satoru Saito
Department of Asian Languages and Cultures
April 10, 2013
Proposed Course Title: Seminar on Modern Japanese Literature
Proposed Course Number: 565:480
No prerequisites or co-requisites but prior coursework on literature or Japanese history and culture is encouraged.
Rationale for Introducing the Course
With the introduction of the new M.A. program in Asian Studies, there is a pressing need for courses catering to graduate students who are interested in Japanese literature. Moreover, the presence of M.A. students will creates opportunities for upper-level undergraduate students interested in Japanese literature to pursue advanced coursework on modern Japanese literature in a seminar setting.
Course Description
This course examines the critical literary developments of modern Japan, from the late-nineteenth century to the postwar period through a close reading of literary texts. A particular attention will be paid to the understanding of various analytical frameworks, from the historical to the theoretical. Through the consideration of such frameworks, the course seeks to equip students with the tools necessary to critically analyze literary texts in general and other works of modern Japanese literature in particular that they may encounter in the future. In order to best achieve this goal, the course takes up many canonical texts to consider not only how such texts form the interpretative foundations of modern Japanese literature but also how the interpretation of such texts themselves can be radically challenged through new interpretative frameworks.
The course will be taught in English, and there are no prerequisites for this course, although prior coursework on literature or Japanese history and culture is encouraged. The basic structure of the course is a lecture and introductory discussion on Mondays, followed by more in-depth discussion on Wednesdays. All students are expected to participate in class discussion.
Requirements
Weekly passage analysis, class attendance and performance 20%
3 short papers (2-3 pages double-spaced) 30%
End of the semester presentation 10%
Final paper (15 pages double-spaced for undergraduates;
20 pages double-spaced for graduate students) 40%
Weekly questions, class attendance and performance
Students are expected to attend all classes and participate in class discussions. To facilitate class discussions, which normally takes place each Wednesday, students should select 2 passages of interest and briefly write comments on why these passages were interesting. These passages and comments will serve as the foundations of class discussion, and students will turn these comments at the end of class.
Three short papers (2-3 pages on Unit I, Unit II and III)
Students are expected produce three short papers in the course of the semester based on the relevant materials and themes of a given unit. These papers should be analytical in nature (no additional research required) and should be based on specific examples. These papers should display not only the students’ understanding of course material presented and discussed in class but also their engagement with the material in their own terms and through their own ideas.
Final paper (15 pages double-spaced for undergraduates; 20 pages double-spaced for graduate students)
The final paper is the culmination of the course. The final paper should present an organized argument on a chosen theme. Students are encouraged to discuss extensively with the instructor to determine their final paper topic. Undergraduate papers do not require additional research; graduate papers should utilize additional research.
Learning Outcome Goals for the Course
This course will introduce students to key works and major developments of modern Japanese literature; it will teach students to interpret these works and developments in a critical manner within a variety of analytical frameworks; students will learn the skills and techniques by which to enact a close reading of texts; students will learn to formulate and develop their own ideas to produce an academic paper about the literary texts and developments of modern Japan.
Department Learning Goals Met by This Course
This course will help students acquire substantial knowledge of Japanese culture and its artistic form (modern Japanese literature); analyze and interpret texts and relate relevant issues to other areas in the humanities following an interdiciplinary approach.
Assessment Plan
The assessment methods for this course are designed to evaluate student mastery of the course goals. The assignments require students to illustrate their understanding of lectures and reading materials within an interdisciplinary framework, including historical analysis and literary theory. Upon the completion of the course, students will have learned analytical and rhetorical skills necessary to formulate and develop their own ideas using concrete examples in a critical manner.
Proposed Schedule
UNIT I: Meiji Japan and the Formation of Modern Japanese Literature
Week 1: The 1880s and the Rise of the Japanese Novel
“The Charter Oath,” in Sources of Japanese Tradition, Vol. II, ed. by Wm.
Theodore de Bary (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), pp. 136-37.
From Modern Japanese Literature: An Anthology, ed. by Donald Keene (New York: Grove Press, 1956):
Kanagaki Robun, “The Beef Eater,” pp. 31-33.
Hattori Bushô, “The Western Peep Show,” pp. 34-36.
Tsubouchi Shôyô, The Essence of the Novel, pp. 55-58.
From The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature, ed. by J. Thomas
Rimer and Van C. Gessel (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007):
Mori Ôgai, “The Dancing Girl,” pp. 10-25.
San’yûtei Enchô, The Ghost Tale of the Peony Lantern, pp. 25-30.
Tôkai Sanshi, Strange Encounters with Beautiful Women , pp. 30-45.
Futabatei Shimei, Drifting Clouds, pp. 56-66.
From Marleigh Grayer Ryan, Japan’s First Modern Novel: Ukigumo by Futabatei Shimei (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Center for Japanese Studies, 1990):
Futabatei Shimei, Drifting Clouds, pp. 321-356.
Tomi Suzuki, “The Position of the Shôsetsu: Paradigm Change and New
Literature Discourse,” in Narrating the Self: Fictions of Japanese
Modernity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), pp. 15-32.
*In addition, read Andrew Gordon, A History of Modern Japan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. 60-137 in the course of this week and next week.
Week 2: Japanese Naturalism and the Confessional Subject
Kunikida Doppo, “Meat and Potatoes,” in The Columbia Anthology of Modern
Japanese Literature, ed. by J. Thomas Rimer and Van C. Gessel, pp. 153
-167.
Shimazaki Tôson, The Broken Commandment, trans. by Kenneth Strong (Tokyo:
University of Tokyo Press, 1977), pp. 3-13, 120-124, 217
-249.
From The Quilt and Other Stories by Tayama Katai, trans. by Kenneth Henshall
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1981):
Tayama Katai, “The End of Jûemon,” pp. 97-148.
Tayama Katai, The Quilt, pp. 35-96.
Week 3: End of an Era
Natsume Sôseki, Kokoro, trans. by Edwin McClellan (Washington, D.C.: Regnery
Publishing, 1957)
Week 4: Alternate Modes of Storytelling (History and Allegory)
Natsume Sôseki, “The Civilization of Modern-Day Japan,” in The Columbia
Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature, pp. 315-322.
From The Historical Fiction of Mori Ôgai, ed. by David Dilworth and J. Thomas
Rimer (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1991):
Mori Ôgai, “The Last Testament of Okitsu Yagoemon,” pp. 45-64.
Mori Ôgai, “The Abe Family,” pp. 65-100.
UNIT II: Japanese Modernism in the 1920s and 1930s
Week 5: The Modern Girl and the Rise of Visual Culture
Tanizaki Jun’ichirô, Naomi, trans. by Anthony Chambers (New York: North Point
Press, 1985)
*In addition, read Andrew Gordon, A History of Modern Japan, pp. 138-203
during Week 5-8.
Week 6: Detective Stories and the Tales of the Fantastic
From Edogawa Ranpo, Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination, trans. by James
B. Harris (Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Company, 1956):
“The Human Chair,” pp. 1-24.
“The Psychological Test,” pp. 25-64.
“Hell of Mirrors,” pp. 107-123.
“The Traveler with the Pasted Rag Picture,” pp. 195-222.
From Edogawa Ranpo, The Edogawa Ranpo Reader, trans. by Seth Jacobowitz
(Fukuoka, Japan: Kurodahan Press, 2008)
“The Stalker in the Attic,” pp. 43-80.
Week 7: Proletarian Literature/Women’s Literature
Kobayashi Takiji, The Crab Cannery Ship, in The Crab Cannery Ship: And Other
Novels of Struggle, trans. by Zeljko Cipris (Honolulu: University of
Hawaii Press, 2013), pp. 19-96.
Selections from upcoming anthology, Literature for Revolution: An Anthology of
Japanese Proletarian Writings (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2012)
Week 8: Modernization and the Fragmented Subject
Akutagawa Ryûnosuke, A Fool’s Life, in The Essential Akutagawa, ed. By Seiji
M. Lippit (New York: Marsillo Publishers, 1999), pp. 177-204.
Yokomitsu Riichi, “The Machine,” in “Love” and Other Stories of Yokomitsu
Riichi, trans. by Dennis Keene (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1987),
pp. 151-181.
Kobayashi Hideo, “Literature of the Lost Home,” in Literature of the Lost Home:
Kobayashi Hideo—Literary Criticism, 1924-1939, ed. and trans. by Paul
Anderer (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), pp. 46-54.
Unit III: Postwar Japan and Woman as Symbol
Week 9: The Country and Nostalgia, an Escape from Modernity
Kawabata Yasunari, The Snow Country, trans. by Edward Seidensticker (New
York: Vintage, 1996)
*In addition, read Andrew Gordon, A History of Modern Japan, pp. 204-243 in the course of this week and next week.
Week 10: The Aesthetics of the Fading Past and Narratives of Suicide
Dazai Osamu, The Setting Sun, trans. by Donald Keene (New York: New
Directions Publishing, 1956)
Mishima Yukio, “Patriotism,” in Death in Midsummer and Other Stories by
Mishima Yukio (New York: New Directions, 1966), pp. 93-118.
Week 11: Tradition, Sexuality, and the Language of Empowerment
Enchi Fumiko, Masks, trans. by Juliet Winters Carpenter (New York: Vintage,
1983)
*In addition, read Andrew Gordon, A History of Modern Japan, pp. 244-289 in
the course of this week and next week.
Week 12: Parodic Narrative and the Revolutionary Subject
Ôe Kenzaburô, The Silent Cry, trans. by John Bester (New York: Kodansha USA,
1994)
Week 13: Student Presentations