Special Studies in Modernism: Exilic Time

Exile entails a wrenching relocation in space, but it also can disarrange the sense of time. This course explores the double time of exilic life, what Nabokov in Pnin calls physical time and spiritual time. Physical time accentuates the pangs of exile--inhabiting a present so radically different from the familiar past. Spiritual time, in which memory and nostalgia seek refuge, is more mobile and creative; it can recall a vanished world and project a future return. We explore the theme of exilic time through its modern variations from Conrad's Under Western Eyes and Joyce's Ulysses to Naipaul's The Mimic Men.