The Making of Literature: Topics in Literary Production and Reception

This course examines questions of how literary texts are produced and read. It introduces students to the back story of literary works, examining how they come to take their eventual form on the page or stage, and what happens to them once they are made. It asks: what forces shape literary works, including their material or embodied forms and their ability to travel? How do we trace the afterlife of literary texts in their histories of readership, audience, reception and influence? Students will encounter a range of theories and methodologies for the study of production and reception which may include: book history, reception theory, the sociology of the book, publishing studies, and histories of reading, authorship and performance.