32210

SoSe 24: Ridiculous Forms: Comedy, Parody, Satire

Sonja Pyykkö

Comments

Common opinion has it that political satire is dead since Trump’s election, that the era of parody is definitely over after postmodernism, and that jokes are a minefield for misunderstandings and therefore better left unuttered in polite society. Yet comedic, parodic, and satirical texts haven’t disappeared anywhere, on the contrary: postmodern classics, e.g., by Barthelme, De Lillo, Ellis, Nabokov, Pynchon, and Roth have recently been joined by works from Paul Beatty, Helen De Witt, Percival Everett, Ottessa Moshfegh, and Lexi Freiman, to name only a few of the most prominent humorists in contemporary US fiction. This seminar will delve into the comic genres through an overview of literary theory and criticism starting with the famous lost second book of Aristotle’s Poetics on comedy and then continuing (skipping a couple of centuries) through psychoanalytic theories of humor, formalist, structuralist and poststructuralist theories of parody, and New Critical writings on satire. Nearing the present day, we will examine both well-known modes, such as black comedy, and less familiar ones, including blank parody and hysterical realism, and speculate about the emergence of a new type of tragicomedy: trauma-comedy. The objective is to provide a comprehensive theoretical overview of the comic genres that doubles as an overview of the major critical and theoretical movements of the 20th and 21st centuries. Participants will be expected to have read and bring their own copies of Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita (1958), Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49 (1965), Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s Complaint (1969), Paul Beatty’s The Sellout (2015), and Ottessa Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation (2018). We will also be reading more selections from recent fiction by female, black, and queer authors, but these will be announced later and uploaded as scans. close

14 Class schedule

Regular appointments

Tue, 14:00 - 16:00 14 Class schedule

Tue, 2024-04-16 14:00 - 16:00

Lecturers:
Sonja Pyykkö