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Wash U's Home Page
 
 

Wash U
College of Arts and Sciences
 
 

Wash U's Comparative Literature Department 
 
 

Wash U's Performing
Arts Department
 
 

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This course takes an interdisciplinary approach toward the study of society gone dangerously awry.  By setting them against the idyllic social visions of Plato's REPUBLIC and Thomas More's UTOPIA, we will examine the nightmarish inversion of Paradise found in such fictional and poetic works as BRAVE NEW WORLD, 1984, A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, and THE WASTE LAND.  In addition to its presence in the traditional literary canon, the dystopian vision has infiltrated various forms of media as well as contemporary popular culture. We will explore the course topic through drama, film, television, and the graphic novel (e.g., Karel Capek's R.U.R., selections from the drama of Samuel Beckett, Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS, Terry Gilliam's BRAZIL, Ridley Scott's BLADE RUNNER, and the Japanese sci-fi manga/anime, AKIRA).