[I just sent the following email to all currently-registered students…]
I know that the autumn semester is barely over (indeed, some of you may well have exams coming up in the next week or so), but I thought I would briefly introduce myself, welcome you to RMST 495/520, and ask you to do one little task over the holidays…
I am Jon Beasley-Murray, Associate Professor of Hispanic Studies. I see that I know a couple of you, because you have already taken courses with me, but if you want to know a little more about where I am coming from any my approach, a couple of years ago I made a video introducing myself.
I am teaching you for RMST 495 (if you are taking the course as an undergraduate) or RMST 520 (at graduate level). We will not be using Canvas, but we do have a dedicated website (this one!), which already has a bunch of information on it.
You may notice that over the semester we are essentially reading two long books (plus one short one, and then some other much shorter pieces). Details are here. One of these long books is Roberto Bolaño’s The Savage Detectives. Here’s the thing, however: the other is one that you choose for yourself.
So this is your task: Ideally I would like you to turn up on the first day of class (January 8) with your books in hand. (Note that I very much recommend you have physical copies of the books.) This means that ideally you would have chosen and purchased your second long book. As you may have to order it (you could even put it on your Christmas list…), this is something to get going on sooner or later.
At https://blogs.ubc.ca/longbooks/texts/, I provide some suggestions for long books you may choose. But you can pick another if you wish. Here are the requirements:
- It should be fiction (a novel, rather than, say, history or biography).
- It must originally have been written in a Romance language (i.e. one of French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Catalan, etc.), though you are welcome to read it either in the original or in English translation. (Not, however, in a translation to any other language.)
- It should be long, by which I mean at least 400 pages.
Note that if, whether by accident or design, more than one student chooses the same book to read alongside The Savage Detectives, that is fine by me. (It may even be a good thing… we’ll see!) I also encourage you to write to me (at jon.beasley-murray@ubc.ca) to check if I think that your choice is suitable.
Otherwise, that’s it. In fact, my suggestion would that you do not start reading the book before the semester begins! That way we will all start our books together.
I am very much looking forward to this course, and to seeing you in January.
Until then, I wish you very happy holidays!