Melville, Conrad, and the Sea

This class reads a number of the major works of Melville and Conrad in order to ask a number of questions crucial to understanding modern narrative: the relationship between realism and the romance (the sea being both the setting for adventure and a place of work); how, why, and by whom stories are told and passed on (the sea being both the place where ‘tall tales’ are told and where they are set); the role of the eye-witness (how do you prove you saw what no else has seen). Texts include "Moby Dick," "Billy Budd," "Lord Jim," and "Heart of Darkness."