Course no. 250.

"Lecture transcript and course guidebook"--Cover.

pt. 1. Introduction to the Classics of American literature ; Benjamin Franklin's autobiography --
the first American story ; Washington Irving --
the first American storyteller ; Ralph Waldo Emerson yesterday -- America's coming of age ; Emerson today --
architect of American values ; Emerson tomorrow --
deconstructing culture and self -- Henry David Thoreau --
countercultural hero ; Thoreau --
stylist and humorist extraordinaire ; Walden --
yesterday, today, and tomorrow ; Edgar Allan Poe ; Poe --
ghost writer ; Poe's legacy --
the self as "haunted palace." pt. 2. Nathaniel Hawthorne and the American past ; Scarlet letter --
Puritan romance ; Hawthorne's "A" --
interpretation and semiosis ; Scarlet letter --
political tract or psychological study? ; Hawthorne our contemporary ; Herman Melville and the making of Moby-Dick -- Biggest fish story of them all ; Ahab and the white whale ; Moby-Dick -- tragedy of perspective ; Melville's "Benito Cereno" -- American (mis)adventure at sea ; "Benito Cereno" --
theater of power of power of theater? ; Walt Whitman --
the American bard appears. pt. 3. Whitman --
poet of the body ; Whitman --
poet of the city ; Whitman --
poet of death ; Whitman legacy ; Uncle Tom's cabin --
the unread classic ; Stowe's representation of slavery --
Freedom and art in Uncle Tom's cabin ; Emily Dickinson --
in and out of nature ; Dickinson's poetry --
language and consciousness ; Dickinson --
devotee of death ; Dickinson --
"Amherst's Madame de Sade" ; Dickinson's legacy. pt. 4. Adventures of Tom Sawyer --
American paradise regained ; Huckleberry Finn --
the banned classic ; Huckleberry Finn --
a child's voice, a child's vision ; Huckleberry Finn, American orphan ; Mark Twain's Pudd'nhead Wilson --
black and white charade ; Henry James and the novel of perception -- Turn of the screw --
do you believe in ghosts? ; Turning the screw of interpretation ; Stephen Crane and the literature of war ; Red badge of courage --
brave new world ; Stephen Crane --
scientist of human behavior ; Charlotte Perkins Gilman --
war against patriarchy. pt. 5. "Yellow wall-paper" --
descent into Hell or free at last ; Robert Frost and the spirit of New England ; Robert Frost --
"at home in the metaphor" ; Robert Frost and the fruits of the Earth ; T.S. Eliot --
unloved modern classic ; T.S. Eliot --
"the waste land" and beyond -- F. Scott Fitzgerald's The great Gatsby -- American romance ; Great Gatsby --
a story of lost illusions? ; Fitzgerald's triumph --
writing the American dream ; Ernest Hemingway's The sun also rises --
novel of the lost generation ; Sun also rises --
spiritual quest ; Ernest Hemingway --
wordsmith. pt. 6. Hemingway's The garden of Eden --
female desire unleashed ; Garden of Eden --
combat zone ; William Faulkner's The sound and the fury --
the idiot's tale ; Sound and the fury --
failed rites of passage ; Sound and the fury --
signifying nothing? ; Absalom, Absalom! --
Civil War epic -- Absalom, Absalom! --
the language of love ; Absalom, Absalom! --
the overpass to love ; Grapes of wrath --
American saga ; John Steinbeck --
poet of the little man ; Grapes of wrath --
reconceiving self and family ; Invisible man --
black bildungsroman. pt. 7. Invisible man --
reconceiving history and race ; Invisible man --
"what did I do, to be so black and blue?" ; Eugene O'Neill --
great god of American theater ; Long day's journey into night --
there's no place like home ; Tennessee Williams --
managing libido ; Streetcar named desire --
the death of romance -- Death of a salesman --
death of an ethos? ; Death of a salesman --
tragedy of the American dream ; Toni Morrison's Beloved --
dismembering and remembering ; Beloved --
a story of "thick love" ; Beloved --
Morrison's writing of the body ; Conclusion to Classics of American literature.

Professor Weinstein presents eighty-four lectures on the great classics of American literature, showing how such authors as Irving, Poe, Thoreau, Hemingway, and Faulkner bring the past to life, changing as each generation steps forward to interpret it anew.