2025 Fall
COMLIT 250 002 - LEC 002
Studies in Literary Theory
Balzac and Critique
Michael Lucey
Class #:33351
Units: 4
Instruction Mode:
In-Person Instruction
Offered through
Comparative Literature
Current Enrollment
Total Open Seats:
7
Enrolled: 2
Waitlisted: 0
Capacity: 9
Waitlist Max: 0
No Reserved Seats
Hours & Workload
9 hours of outside work hours per week, and 3 hours of instructor presentation of course materials per week.
Other classes by Michael Lucey
Course Catalog Description
Comparative investigation of a topic in the theory of literature.
Class Description
We'll have three major goals in this seminar: 1) to acquire a reasonable familiarity with representative works from the massive and massively influential ""realist"" novelistic project that Honoré de Balzac elaborated in the 1830s and 1840s; 2) to think about the way Balzac's project could be viewed as a version of critique by way of novelistic form; 3) to explore a range of major critical approaches (along with some of their theoretical underpinnings) from the last half century or so via the way they have taken up various texts by Balzac. Those approaches will include marxism, poststructuralism, deconstruction, feminism, queer theory, speech act theory/performativity, and decolonial critique. Seminar participants will be encouraged to develop a writing project that involves exploring a bit further both in Balzac's corpus and in one of the critical literatures we will be engaging with. French Department students will be reading the Balzac texts in French. Other students are welcome to read in English.
Class Notes
Texts by Balzac that the seminar will take up include: "Sarrasine", "La Fille aux Yeux d'Or", "La Duchesse de Langeais", Le Père Goriot [Old Man Goriot], Eugénie Grandet, Illusions perdues [Lost Illusions], La Cousine Bette [Cousin Bette], Les Paysans [The Peasants, aka Sons of the Soil]. Critical r..
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Texts by Balzac that the seminar will take up include: "Sarrasine", "La Fille aux Yeux d'Or", "La Duchesse de Langeais", Le Père Goriot [Old Man Goriot], Eugénie Grandet, Illusions perdues [Lost Illusions], La Cousine Bette [Cousin Bette], Les Paysans [The Peasants, aka Sons of the Soil]. Critical readings will probably include Lukács, Adorno, Auerbach, Barthes, Jameson, Shoshana Felman, Margaret Cohen, Naomi Schor, Barbara Johnson, Lisa Lowe, Aníbal Quijano, and some other contemporary criticism.
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Rules & Requirements
Repeat Rules
Course is not repeatable for credit.
Reserved Seats
Current Enrollment
No Reserved Seats
Textbooks & Materials
See class syllabus or https://calstudentstore.berkeley.edu/textbooks for the most current information.
Guide to Open, Free, & Affordable Course Materials