Stylistic Choices: Reading the Works of Melville and Morrison

Revered as two of the most complex American fiction writers, Herman Melville (1819-1891) and Toni Morrison (1931-2019) produced works that continue to remain relevant for students of literature and creative writing at all levels. Highly anthologized and synonymous with the western literary cannon, Melville and Morrison explore epic notions of race and identity, culture and positionality, as well as emotion and morality.

This is a one-quarter, sixteen credit major authors program devoted to examining the of both Toni Morrison and Herman Melville’s writing styles. Through lecture, small group discussion, close textual analysis, and writing workshops, we will discuss these literary figures, historically contextualize their work, and solidify the importance of their writing styles and chosen themes in American Literature. This program is structured to allow students of creative writing and literary study an opportunity to close read, discuss, experiment with and diverge from these author’s styles.

Assignments include textual analysis papers, development of research project and multimodal text.

This is a reading and writing intensive program categorized as Intermediate Depth in the Path of Literary Arts & Studies.