Instructor: Ellen Koehler, Department of History, College of Letters and Science
Description: This course will explore the political, cultural, and social history of early nineteenth-century France through the lens of Victor Hugo's masterpiece Les Miserables. Considered by many to be France's most influential modern author and poet, Hugo lived through and chronicled France's most turbulent periods following the Revolution of 1789. Not only a gripping saga of post-revolutionary France, Les Miserables also records and comments on the historical development of Hugo's contemporary conditions, and as such is a valuable historical document in its own right. This course will use selected passages from Hugo's text to explore questions which were central to France during this period, including the legacy of the Revolution and Napoleon's Empire, the influence of Romanticism, competing social and political views of the French nation, and France's relation to the rest of Europe. Throughout the course, we will also explore the extent to which these questions remain pertinent in the twenty]first century. In addition, by examining Hugo's work and his relation to the events depicted in it, this course should enhance students' abilities to analyze and place authors and sources from other periods (including historically-based works of fiction) within their historical context.
Format: The seminar will meet for two hours each week. A reading schedule of the assigned passages from Les Miserables will be distributed at the first meeting. Each meeting will be divided between informal lecture presentations by the instructor (which will include an explanation of the historical and narrative context of that week's assigned reading), discussion, student presentations, and viewing of selected video and slide materials. Students will be expected to have a copy of the novel. Grading: Students will be required to give a 15-minute presentation on a topic chosen in consultation with the instructor (25%) and will write two short (3-5 page) papers (25% each). The remaining 25% will be based on the quality of participation in class discussion.
About the Instructor: Ellen Koehler is a lecturer in the Department of History, teaching courses in the history of Western Civilization and European Intellectual and Cultural history. Her research interests include the intersection of political culture, religion, and the arts in nineteenth-century France and the history of civil society in Europe from the eighteenth century Enlightenment to the present.