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English 385a

Professor McInerney

T 7:30-10 p.m.

HUIII

Topics in Apocalyptic Writing
  • Surely some revelation is at hand;

    Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

    -- William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming"

    •

    The last book of the Bible, sometimes called Apocalypse, sometimes Revelation, was written at the end of the first century AD, in the apparent belief that the end of the world was imminent. The world has not ended (yet) but the themes of John’s book continue to fascinate. Should it be read literally or metaphorically? Is it prediction or allegory? What is the connection between revelation and the end of the world? Between mythology and eschatology, vision and violence, prophecy and poetry, memory and millenialism? This course will center on readings of John, Langland, Dante and Blake, but will require the reading of images as well as texts. This may include (but will not be limited to) medieval manuscript illuminations in illustration of the Apocalypse of John, medieval and early modern allegorical paintings, and Blake’s Illuminations. We will also make excursions into the works of other prophets and poets, theorizers of the prophetic, the poetic and the allegorical, and into the worlds of some people who may be both, either or neither and who believe that world really is about to end, in 2000, 2001, or maybe 2007. . .

    Texts:

    John, The Book of Revelation

    Dante Alighieri, Inferno and Purgatory

    Langland, Piers Plowman (we will read the C-Text complete, as well as selections from the A and B texts)

    Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell; America, A Prophecy; Milton

    Selections from Joachim of Fiore, Hildegard of Bingen, T.S. Eliot, Paul De Man, Harold Bloom, Emmanuel Swedenborg, William Butler Yeats, Jean Baudrillard, Daniel Wojcik, etc.

    Requirements:

    Class presentations

    2 brief (3-5 pg.) close readings, one of a text and one of an image

    1 longer research paper (15pp)

    Epiphanies and revelations are encouraged, but not absolutely required.

     

    Prerequisite: At least two 2-- level courses in English or consent of instructor.

    This class fulfills the pre-1800 requirement; it is limited to 15.