Writing Assignments

What should one learn from a course on literature?

Students and professors may and likely do have differing opinions on the content and form of a course on literature.  What are your expectations for this course? What are you hoping to learn? How and what does one learn from reading? If you are not the first comment, then examine and think about what has come before you. Your answer need not be long, but it should be thoughtful. (200-250 words).

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This comment should be posted before our first class on Tuesday.

22 thoughts on “Writing Assignments

  1. Danielle Berry

    I have high hopes and expectations for this course. My primary goals in taking this course are gaining fresh insight into some works I’ve already read and embarking on the reading of works new to me with the aid of multiple opinions. Anyone can sit down and read a book, but I think that discussion of books is critical. The thing I value most in a literature class is the exchange of differing opinions. With the presence of these oppositions, one is able to look at literature through a variety of lenses- more lenses than one has access to when one reads alone. Also, I hope to learn more about Russian culture. After reading and discussing the two novels during J-term, I realized how much Russian literature can be used as a study of culture. I feel that reading these books in a class setting will provide the opportunity to catch many of the cultural subtleties that I would otherwise have missed. Also, I expect to gain more insight into the motives of characters by looking at these books from a Russian standpoint. One other thing I expect from this course is the examination of uniquely Russian traditions and practices that appear in the literature. When reading alone, I become lost and confused when that sort of thing crops up.

  2. Luis Rivera

    I am also looking forward to the discussions of these Russian novels. In our First Year Seminar, we read “Moscow to the end of the line” and “We” along with other short stories but didn’t touch on classic works such as “Anna Karenina” or “Crime and Punishment”. One of my goals is to learn a great deal from these novels, not only in the realm of literature but also like how Danielle mentioned, to learn more about Russian culture. I agree with her statement, “Anyone can sit down and read a book, but I think that discussion of books is critical”. We can learn a great deal from what others have to say about a certain novel or even passage. It is going to be interesting hearing opinions from those who have read the novels before and also the opinions from those who hadn’t read the novels until now like myself. Another thing I expect to learn is how Russian literature differs from say English literature. Whether it maybe the motives or the writing style I would like to see how and why Russian literature is held in high esteem. Reading a book can easily be done; but to discuss, dissect and argue about a book is something totally different. Lastly, I expect to gain a new perspective on Russians in general before going abroad.

  3. Emma Stanford

    Like Luis, I want to explore how Russian literature differs from other types of literature. What attracts me to the 19th-century Russian literature I’ve read–not that I’ve read very much–is how it seems to tackle enormous issues, such as religion and ethics and love and the value of human life, way ahead of the curve, back when English authors seemed more focused on plot and entertainment value. The Russian books I’ve read combine superb plotting, deep characters, and a serious consideration of issues that are still tremendously important a hundred and fifty years later. I want to try to discover what motivated these authors to write the way they did, and what the intellectual climate in Russia was like to inspire such writing. I also want to analyze in more depth the kinds of theories and views laid out by the authors. But mostly I’m just excited to be reading more Russian literature. I’m tremendously excited for this course.

  4. Anoushka Sinha

    My impressions of Russian literature always mirrored my impressions of Russia itself: distant, robust, and somewhat overwhelming in its vastness. Simply trying to pick up a hardback copy of War and Peace gave weight to these notions. I admired Russian lit from afar and accepted these works as “classics” without understanding them.

    Sometimes, one just needs to take a class to build up the willpower to tackle a subject. This course seems like a golden opportunity to do just that. I want to learn more about Russia and its complex history through the ideas and perspectives bottled in these works. And, like Danielle and Luis, I look forward to class discussions to enrich my understanding of the readings. In fact, based on the three comments posted above, I expect many students to be quite well-versed (or at least especially keen) in Russian literature, and I’m as excited to learn from them as I am to learn from these works.

  5. Jieming Sun

    At the moment, I know nothing about 19th century Russian literature, but my father approved of the course when I told him, saying that there were many great writers in the period. I’ve started reading Anna Karenina, and I see familiar patterns and habits that are still present more than a hundred years later, although I’ve never really thought about them in words as clear as Tolstoy puts them in. On the other hand, Tolstoy also presents a very different side of society from what I am familiar with – so much drama and personal politics exists in Anna’s world that it is hard for me to imagine in my current life.

    I’ve never taken a literature class before, but I agree with Danielle in that the discussion of a book is very important, so I look forward to the discussions and the different format of this class from the other more quantitative classes that I am taking in the spring.

  6. Helena Treeck

    The study of literature, to me, is a study of the society with all its facets at the time the works concerned were written. By reading and discussing these pieces of world literature, I hope to learn the Russian views on the big questions of life. I have not yet read most of the novels we will read and am excited to find out about a whole new Russian world, with all its glamour and cruelty. Like the other bloggers, I consider discussion of literature crucial to discovering new angles and themes to look at it, but believe, that in the end the interpretation of literature is a very subjective issue. I also hope to find (or be given and discuss) ideas and themes that connect the works, which we will read.

    Given that we are reading the works in translation I also hope that you, Prof. Beyer, will point out phrases and passages that are standing out in Russian. Maybe we could learn why and how choosing them was important at the time. In that way we could find out some of those things that get lost in translation. It would be especially helpful to explain phrases that make sense in Russian but not in translation: “like a salted green Dutch cucumber” ☺

  7. Sarah Studwell

    My expectation for this course is to discuss these books with a higher level of academic scrutiny than in my high school english class. I optimistically assume that since everyone signed up for this course of their own accord, there will be a genuine interest in Russian Literature and the unraveling of its meaning below the surface. As has already been stating, just passively reading a book on your own gives a completely different experience from reading it actively with the intent to analyze and discuss the text. I would also love to learn about the Russian way of life and culture which makes the authors we study write in the manner, and on the particular subjects, that they do.

  8. Erik Shaw

    Although I have read many of the works that we will be reading in class, I am excited to reread and gain a deeper understanding of them. I have not read any of the books for a class, so this will be a good opportunity for me to discuss some of my favorite works of literature. It will also give me the opportunity to organize my thoughts about these pieces of literature, and put into words what I found so profound and worthwhile about them in my youth. I will also gain new impressions and insights through discussion, writing essays, and reading over these books again. Reading works like this gives you a picture of a different place and time that is in some ways very different from now. Yet, there are things that always stay the same. I feel like these authors touch on many issues that are important today. They are able to portray the human condition and what is most important in life. So, there is much to learn through reading these works, and I feel like sharing ideas through discussion will bring to light many important details that I may have overlooked while reading these books on my own.

  9. Eugene Scherbakov

    I am excited for this course because I have not yet jumped headlong into Russian literature and feel it is high time to do so. I feel as though Russia, as a civilization and culture, has so much to offer the Western world and perhaps the main artery for that knowledge is the literature of the place. Everyone knows of the spiritual questions and passion of Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy, people almost speak of them in hushed venerated whispers, as though they were giants who had their say in the forging of man’s soul. But I want to read Pushkin, learn his naive and prodigiously joyful poetry that has been so impressed on the Russian character that it has become a defining trait. Most importantly, I am looking forward to myself growing with what I learn in this class. And I’m excited to do this all in a class taught by Professor Beyer so I can be guided through the otherwise daunting labyrinth that is Russian literature.

  10. Hillary Chutter-Ames

    My main hope and expectation for this course is for engaging and deep discussion of the texts we will be reading. I have loved the Russian novels that I’ve previously read and I’m very excited to read some new authors, like Gogol. Reading the novels on my own is enjoyable, but as Luis said, the sharing of opinions and interpretations is not only intellectually engaging but leads to a deeper understanding of the work and allows us to better explore its meaning for us personally. Like Eugene, I’m looking forward to reading Pushkin and exploring his influence on the Russian psyche. Beyond literary techniques and craft, I think the most interesting knowledge gained from reading is its impact on its society and culture, and how it interacts with the historical period in which it was written. In this course I’m hoping to learn about Russian history and culture in the 19th century and how this golden age impacted 20th century literature. I’m really interested in Emma’s comment about the relationship between Russian literature and its intelligentsia and intellectual climate. As many others have mentioned, literature is an amazing way to learn about and engage with different cultures, and ultimately I hope that this course will prompt new insights into and understanding of Russian culture.

  11. Joanna Rothkopf

    I have always considered the in-depth study of literature to be a vital component to a complete education. In a rigorous class, one should expect to veer away from simple plot summaries and delve into timeless philosophical, religious and humanitarian issues. Studying literature should examine not only the artful construction of phrases and tropes, but the context that surrounds the narrative and the important issues the text evokes. In this course, I am excited to engage in discussion with fellow classmates who I know have more of a background in Russian history and political context, and others who have more experience analyzing the written word. The Russian literary tradition is a great one, and one which I have not had the opportunity to formally study. I am excited to examine the texts in such an environment, rich with various points of view and areas of interest and expertise. Additionally, I feel as if studying this literary tradition in one focused semester (rather than a survey course) will be deeply beneficial, as it will allow us to make intertextual comparisons and learn about Russia’s social and intellectual climate of the time. With amazingly motivated and intelligent classmates and an incredible reading list, I am sure this class will be a valuable introduction to a rich tradition.

  12. Benjamin Stegmann

    This course represents a departure from my normal line of thinking for me, being my first real literature class besides cookie cutter “English” classes in high school. However, in my first year seminar I was lucky enough to study some Russian literature along with Russian 102 and am eager to begin looking into it again with even more focus and intensity. I am hoping to gain new perspectives on books that I have already read and to learn as much as I can from the books that I have not yet had the pleasure of reading, whether it be literary elements, cultural identities, or life lessons.
    I love to read because of that feeling I get, when I become totally immersed in a book. After a while, you stop actually reading and almost feel like you see the moments yourself. These are the times that I feel I learn something from reading and honestly I am not sure what it is, sometimes more of a feeling or an impression than anything else. Connecting these images and impressions with the actual words as we do in class, gives one insight into culture and makes one appreciate history to an entirely new extent. What makes me so excited for this class is the artistry with which authors like Tolstoy and Dostoevsky write, making these connections seem just as beautiful as the book itself.

  13. Ali Hamdan

    I am a geography major. I have oriented my studies, academically and personally, towards the study of culture and collective identities from around the globe, focusing primarily on the Middle East and Central Asia. As such I have studied monuments, histories, architectural elements and linguistic (among other) markers of identity in these societies and others, but another crucial element of the study of culture is literature.
    Literature expresses a creative aspect of both author and culture that is somewhat unique among the arts and sciences because it combines fact, opinion and art to create a hybrid being that we cannot help but explore. Etched into the novel, the short story and the poem are the answers to moral conundrums, the near-invisible puppet-strings of power relations, and a sort of sheer giddiness at clever use of language, all guided by a narrative form that assures the kind of continuity sometimes absent from life. To be plain, literature is a construction, and it can be informative and fun to look at the manual from time to time – which I fully intend to do.
    Having not studied Russia in depth (and being a Geography major, I should mention) I am always eager to start somewhere new, because what I learn about one locale is almost always relevant to others. As many have remarked, Russian literature is among the weightiest, most powerful of the world’s.

    In addition to what I have just said, I simply love reading, and would love a chance to explore – academically and personally – some of the world’s greats.

  14. Nelson Navarro

    I consider reading and analyzing a country’s literature one of the best ways to learn about the country’s people, after actually living in the country and experiencing its language and culture first-hand. By comparing different Russian literary works to each other, as well as to American works and to literature of different cultures, I believe we will gain a much better understanding of the Russian people. The different particularities of the writing style, the plot, the characters, most likely reflect the culture and mentality of Russian society of that time.

    Having taken Sergei’s RUSS 122, I see RUSS 151 as a continuation of the study of the “Russian Mind.” Since I’ve only taken one literature course at Middlebury, I feel it is necessary to include literature in my curriculum this semester in order to, as Joanna said, have a complete education (and not only because it is a requirement for my major). I look forward to the in-depth analysis in English of some of the world’s greatest literary works, particularly because it will also make reading them later in Russian a whole lot easier. However, I a mostly interested in and excited about gaining a deeper understanding of the Russian culture, a culture vastly different from my own, especially since I will be spending next year in Russia (!).

  15. Patrick Ford

    The study of Russian literature seems almost Sisyphean to me – I just finished War and Peace a few weeks ago and now Anna Karenina?

    As most everyone else has already commented, the study of literature provides a certain degree of perspective on a culture and its historical context. In the context of Russia, I’ve always been fascinated by the interplay between the state censors, writers and critics, and consequently its role as a rebellious force. I am also very interested in the idea that censorship by virtue of the demands placed on authors was largely responsible for the “greatness” of Russian fiction.

    I also think there’s another equally important aspect of literature that merits some discussion – the relationship between the text and the reader. Literature has the ability to expand our horizons, warp our perceptions and make us feel – if it weren’t for that, I doubt I’d read anything.

    My reading has been eclectic and, as a result, I am slightly less familiar with Golden Age literature and more familiar with contemporary literature than I ought to be. As such my principal expectation of the course is that it will help to remedy this deficit….actually, that’s not wholly true. My principal expectation is that it will permit me to graduate, but the preceding is a close second. As a tertiary concern, I hope that the class’s discussions will reinvigorate my ideas about and interest in literature, which seem to have recently stagnated.

  16. dwmartin

    I am excited to dive into the world of 19th century Russian literature as this semester begins, as it has long been an area of interest for me but I feel, much like Danielle and Erik, that I have not yet been in an environment where the works are being properly analyzed and discussed. I’ve picked up works from Dostoyevsky and Turgenev and I’ve enjoyed reading them a lot, yet I feel my experience was somewhat shortchanged by not being able to garner different interpretations of characters as enigmatic as Raskolnikov and Bazarov. When in a class, intently studying a specific area of literature, the goal should be to understand where the works are coming from and what their significance is with regards to the themes they address. I look forward to exploring the subtleties of this genre, which I find to be resplendent with some of the greatest insights about human nature, religion and philosophy any period of literature has ever produced.

  17. David Taylor

    I am greatly looking forward to taking this course. Like several of my classmates, I know very little about 19th century Russian literature. Of the books we will be reading, I have only before read Crime and Punishment. It was far and away my favorite book that I read in high school, and I am looking forward to a more in depth course on Russian literature. As for what I hope to get from a literature class, well I’ve never done very well in literature classes. I am hoping that this course will change that for me and give me the love of great literature that many of my friends have. I took this course because it looks very promising both as a literature course, and also as an insight into 19th century Russian life. Russia underwent many changes during the 19th century, which lead directly into the revolutions of the 20th century. I’m hoping to gain the societal perspective that the authors we will be reading enjoyed, and use that to further my own understanding of the time and of literature.

  18. Phoebe Carver

    Like my peers, I am excited to learn more about Russian culture and history through literature. I have a basic background when it comes to literature, but one gaping hole has always been in Russian lit. I have read almost none and I am excited to delve into a new genre of literature.
    From what I understand, Russian literature is intense, difficult and genius. I am excited to take the plunge and get reading tough material with the guidance of a professor and the discussion of my peers. This will be my first literature class at Middlebury and it will be a nice change of pace.
    I feel personally connected to this material because my mom is fluent in Russian and has a master’s in Russian literature. She is ecstatic that I am interested in her field, and I cannot wait to discuss the material we read with her. “Anna Karenina” is my mom’s favorite book and I was so happy to see it on the syllabus.
    More generally, I believe that literature examines the most central of problems concerning society, individuals, and human relationships. I am looking forward to seeing a new cultural perspective on these issues explored in literature.

  19. Barrett Smith

    Reading the works of literature of any culture serves as a window into the thoughts and perspectives of that culture at the time. Or at the very least it provides a window into the mind of an author and in the cases of great novelists like Dostoevsky that is just as interesting of a window. From these perspectives (especially realizing those of other cultures as I will do in Russian Lit), I believe one gains greater insights into their own thoughts and perspectives. In a sense, I read literature for a wholly selfish reason: perceived betterment of myself.
    My greatest expectation is quite simple: to gain context with which to read Russian Literature. Over this last summer I read Crime and Punishment, Notes from Underground, and Anton Chekhov’s Short Stories (among other non-Russian works). I enjoyed them immensely, but as my studies into Russian language, culture, and thought have been rather limited to this point, I left feeling like I was somehow missing something. Really, I am looking at this course as an opportunity to gain a better understanding of and thus a greater appreciation for Russian Literature. Although I’ve already read a few of the selections, I nevertheless look forward to picking up Dostoevsky again, hoping to glean even more from his wonderful writings.

  20. Jacob Udell

    Everyone’s comments have been great, but I wanted to touch on the connection that the individual feels to text and narrative. I am constantly striving to connect critical thought with the cultivation and growth of myself as a person – to see the ‘intellectual’ and the ‘spiritual’ as fundamentally lacking without the other. There is no better way to do this than by reading literature, for novels, plainly conceived, are not more than an author’s attempt to put his or her deepest intellectual and philosophical parts of themselves into a finite number of words and paragraphs. I’m especially excited about the authors we are reading because, from the little I know about them, they seem to place their full persons in front of the reader directly and explicitly. It’s our task, then, to examine, critique, and find inspiration in what they have to say as a class. I hope that, over the course of the semester, we are able to cultivate a class atmosphere where one’s personal connection to the text is respected in the same way that a critical reading of the text might be. I don’t know about you all, but I’m at college to learn about myself in relation to my responsibility to others and that which surrounds me (whether I even have such a thing is also an important conversation…). I’m excited to view everyone in the class as a teacher in the never-ending struggle towards that goal.

  21. Jarrett Dury-Agri

    Literature classes should be, in my opinion, first and foremost about reading. Before secondary sources or professional literary criticisms, my ideal class leaves its students to the texts’ original richness; I feel that literature’s power stems from the reading and interpretation of writing by individuals. Translation might, as Helena mentioned, complicate this process (so, I hope ultimately to understand something of these works’ linguistic qualities and cultural content or context), but the end result is still an experience of, participation in, or perspective on the reading. If literature illuminates certain truths about the human experience (as Emma notes Russian authors famously do), then reading and interpreting for oneself are the start of understanding, followed by communication with others, until arriving at some justifiable perspective. I hope for a healthy exchange of, and mediation between, our various ways of looking at the intriguing, daunting, and apparently awesome subject material.
    I’m looking forward to this course’s emphasis on reading the texts first, thinking about them second, and learning about them third. I imagine such a procedure can lead me to new conclusions about the Golden Age of Russian literature, but equally importantly to realizations about my own and others’ thought processes, as well as the human truths intrinsic to this body of work. I’m excited that several of my classmates have experience from which to speak and interpret, yet just as glad that others (like me) come to the table with fresh slates. Discussion in this environment, under the guidance of a seasoned reader with his own ideas, will make the course worthwhile.

  22. Nathan Goldstone

    My excitement for this course is much akin to Jacob’s, as I too hope to experience this class not only as a serious literature student, but also as an individual. From Russian literature’s reputation, I understand that these works undoubtedly contain many secrets of, and insights into, the human condition, and going into this semester knowing that I will learn something about myself and others — but not knowing what, exactly — is a tantalizing reminder of what draws me to literature as both a reader and a writer. What I hope to gain from this class, then, is an understanding as to what makes the chosen authors (or the chosen works) so important to the world today; why Tolstoy is the forerunner of twentieth-century political pacifism, and how Dostoevsky traverses the human psyche better than any of his peers, and other such questions that I seek to explore and answer for myself. On a similar note, I hope to gain from the works an understanding of what makes Russian writing Russian. As I read Crime and Punishment now, I am occasionally distracted from the story itself by the writing — how Dostoevsky delves into each of his characters’ minds and displays them fully on the page, for example — and I’d like to compare this style with the other writers, in order to explain to myself how they fit together as a single tradition.

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