College of Creative Studies

Current Course Offerings
Fall 2007

Conceived of as a visible, palpable object through which information may be communicated to the reader, one might conclude that it is the content that matters most in a book. But is this so? To be sure, people have venerated, hoarded, eschewed, execrated, and cherished books, and in many cases, the stir created by books has often centered on their content. But what about the object itself? How has the book evolved and how have textual forms and book formats challenged or expanded our very notion of the book? How have authors, artists, and literary theorists thought about and argued for the book's potential as a vibrant space of lived experience, and about the page as an evolving and contested space?

In this course we shall consider these questions as we examine the formal dimensions of manuscripts, palimpsests, avant-garde poetry, and new forms of the novel. We shall also give particular attention to artist's books: a rich phenomenon resulting from artistic and literary engagement with the book during the 20th century. To ground our discussions on the book, we shall read a diverse selection of theoretical writings, from Stéphane Mallarmé, Johanna Drucker, Betty Bright, Jacques Derrida, Gérard Genette, Marjorie Perloff and Renée Hubert. We shall also read poetry and novels, ranging from William Blake and William Morris to Guillaume Apollinaire, the Italian Futurists and French Surrealists, and extending to experimental novels, Conceptualist artwork with text, and some of the very recent "metro poems" of Jacques Jouet, in which time is as central an element as the words on the page.

Proposed reading list for the course - Primary Text(s):

Apollinaire, Guillaume Calligrammes (excerpts)
Blake, William The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Cendrars, Blaise "Prose du Transsibérien," "19 Elastic Poems" and "Denatured Poems"
Jouet, Jacques Metro Poems (translated excerpts)
Caws, Mary Ann, ed. Mallarmé, Stéphane: Selected Poetry and Prose
Perec, Georges Life a User's Manual
Phillips, Tom A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel (4th ed.)
Pre-Raphaelite writings (William Morris, Dante Rossetti and their circle, selections)
Pound, Ezra Early Writings: Poems and Prose (selections)
Manifestos of the Futurist and Surrealist Movements

Theoretical Readings:

Bright, Betty No Longer Innocent: Book Art in America 1960-1980. NYC: Granary Books. (excerpts)
Derrida, Jacques Acts of Literature. (excerpts)
Drucker, Johanna Figuring the Word. NYC: Granary Books. The Visible Word Chicago: U of Chicago P. (excerpts from both books)
Genette, Gérard Palimpseste (excerpts in translation)
Hubert, Renée Riese and Judd D. The Cutting Edge of Reading: Artists' Books. New York City: Granary Books, 1999. (excerpts)
Perloff, Marjorie Poetry on and off the Page: Essays for Emergent Occasions (excerpts)
Smith, Keith A. Structure of the Visual Book. "Book 95" Third ed. 1994.
Spector, Buzz The Book Maker's Desire. Pasadena: Umbrella Editions, 1995

NOTE: Students should plan to purchase Stephane Mallarme: Selected Poetry and Prose (Caws, Mary Ann); A Humument- A Treated Victorian Novel (Phillips, Tom); The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (Blake, Wm); and Life: A User's Manual (Perec, Georges).

Most of the texts for the class will be in a course reader which will be available at GrafikArt in Isla Vista.