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This seminar is an experiment: We will go back in time to discuss English and European literature and culture at three points in time, 1726, 1826 and 1926. Depending on the interests of participants, we will discuss not only key literary texts (partly in excerpts), but also music, architecture and the visual arts in their cultural and political contexts. 1726, for instance, is the year in which Swift published Gulliver's Travels, Handel's opera Allesandro was first performed in London, a number of Bach's cantatas were first performed in Leipzig, Voltaire left France for exile in England, the Frauenkirche in Dresden was begun and St. Martin-in-the-Fields in London was completed. 1826, for instance, saw the publication of Mary Shelley's The Last Man, Eichendorff's Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts and important works by Heine, Hazlitt, Mickiewizc or Pushkin. That year, too, Le Figaro began to appear in Paris; Telford's Menai Suspension Bridge was completed, Caspar David Friedrich, J.M.W. Turner, Eugène Delacroix or John Constable all painted important works, and Beethoven, Schubert, and Mendelssohn each composed important works of music. As for 1926, crime fiction alone could keep us busy for a semester (with Agatha Christie, C.K. Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle or Edgar Wallace). But this was also the year in which Einstein invented a refrigerator, the Bauhaus Dessau Building was opened, and Max Ernst, Giacometti, Magritte, and Matisse in various ways furthered modernist art. An initial selection of materials will be made available electronically in March 2026. Participants are invited to help decide what we will discuss and how! |
