Happily Ever After: From Medieval Love Stories to the Modern Marriage Plot
In this course we will explore the intersection of the literary genre of romance with the emergence of the novelistic marriage plot, examining parallel historical shifts in marital and erotic ideology along the way. Beginning with a consideration of the rise of so-called “courtly love” in the twelfth century and the impact of classical poets such as Ovid on medieval and early modern love poetry, we will end the first half of the course with Shakespeare’s marriage comedies. We will also be alert throughout to alternative—but often disguised—queer love stories in the literature of these periods. In the final part of the course, we will turn to the use of the marriage plot in novels by Jane Austen, Edith Wharton, Tayari Jones, and Sally Rooney. The course will approach these texts through a feminist and queer studies lens. Pre-1800