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SoSe 13: S-Colonial and Postcolonial Literatures II: Colonial and Postcolonial Adventure

Christa Knellwolf King

Comments

This seminar aims to explain why adventure stories were such an important tool for the dissemination of imperial propaganda and why imperial motifs continued to feature in fictional and cinematic portrayals of travel and adventure well into the late twentieth century. We will discuss the typical narrative patterns of adventure stories and investigate their ways of confirming and subverting European claims to supremacy.

We will discuss a selection of short stories from the 19th and 20th centuries and read Rudyard Kipling's novel Kim (1901) as a representative work. We will also watch Victor Saville's cinematic adaptation of Kim (1950) and compare it with the exoticising romance of the contemporary film The African Queen (1951).

Participants must have read Rudyard Kipling's (short) novel Kim and they must purchase The Virago Book of Women Travellers, ed. Mary Morris. A selection of short stories which we will discuss in the course of the week and a selection of critical texts will be available on Blackboard by the end of May. If you have questions, please contact me: Christa.Knellwolf@fu-berlin.de. You may also contact me by phone, but please arrange a time by email beforehand: 0049-1-427742421 (I work at the University of Vienna).

Additional appointments

Mon, 2013-07-15 10:00 - 17:00