FYS ENLT 112: Mystery Across Time, Space, and Text (3)
Mystery is one of the most enduring features of fiction and nonfiction alike. In this literature
class, we will consider not only how a mystery story functions, but also how it functions
differently across media and time. In particular, we’ll focus on mysteries associated with specific
places, using the lenses of cultural studies and post-colonialism. We will begin in Egypt, by
reading ancient Egyptian myths, studying troubling archaeological history, and then seeing how
Agatha Christie relies on both in her novel Death on the Nile. We will then watch two
adaptations of the novel: the 2004 BBC version with David Suchet, and the 2023 film with
Kenneth Branagh. We will then move closer to home. Our own Jill Hobgood, librarian and
researcher of the College’s mysterious history, will introduce unsolved crimes from the 19th and
early 20th century that have Saint Mary’s connections. Students will gain knowledge of how
mystery functions, how it creates tension, and how it reflects (and can challenge) cultural values
and biases. Building on this, the semester will end with students designing their own mystery
event and the Saint Mary’s community will be invited to identify the culprit … if they can. This course is a First Year Seminar 
FYS ENLT 114: Unreliable Narrators (3)
An unreliable narrator is a narrator who cannot (or potentially should not) be trusted to give an
accurate account of events. In literary studies, such a narrator is often “mad” or mentally ill,
biased, misinformed, or intentionally manipulating information. But as Carmen Maria Machado
reminds us in the excerpt above, characters in both life and literature are often labeled unreliable
by social and cultural forces. In this session of FYS: English Literature 114, we will consider the
archetype of the “unreliable narrator” in novels, short stories, memoirs, and even popular
nonfiction in order to interrogate: what makes a narrator unreliable? How do gender, race,
sexuality, and class influence cultural understandings of who is deemed narratively trustworthy
or objective and who is rendered unreliable? And finally, how might we as storytellers of our
own lives analyze and harness the power of narrative (un)reliability for the sake of critical
thinking, creative expression, and dialogue across difference? In this first-year seminar, students
will read both canonical and contemporary unreliable narrators while also examining their own
narrative reliability as students and subjects of the world. Along the way, they will try their hand
at creative and critical assignments to develop skills in reading, writing, research, and
collaboration that will serve them throughout their college careers. This course is a First Year Seminar 
ENLT 151 Introduction to Literature: Mortality and Beyond (3)
Death is one of literature’s most abiding themes. From ancient Mesopotamia to the present day,
writers have grappled with the fact of our mortality, exploring what it means to live a good life in
the face of loss and of our own inevitable ends. How does an acknowledgment of our finite time
on Earth change our understanding of our ethical, spiritual, and political responsibilities? What
do we owe the dead, and what can we learn from them? Can we really understand death, at once
so ubiquitous and so difficult to imagine? And what, if anything, lies beyond?
In this course, you will study literary works that pose and respond to these questions, examining
the ways that writers working with different literary forms (plays, poems, novels, short stories)
and in different times and places (ancient Greece, early modern England, 20 th and 21 st century
England, Ireland, India, and the United States) have imagined death and its aftermath. In doing
so, you will gain the fundamental reading and writing skills necessary to analyze literary texts.

ENLT 151-02 Intro to Literature: Forgotten Women (3)
In this course we will investigate varied literary works written by women long buried by history. We will learn about social constructions surrounding the exclusion of women from literary canons and archival memory. We will discuss, how have women been relegated to the shadows of their husbands; literary legacies, or dismissed as hysterical or heretical? Who are the women history does not want you to know? This course introduces students to the skills of reading and writing that enable us to appreciate, understand, and enjoy literary texts. This course fulfills the Gen Ed requirement for Literary Inquiry.

ENLT 151W-01 Intro to Literature: Fiction to Film (4)
This course considers how classic works of literature by women have been adapted for TV and
film. We start with the poetry of Emily Dickinson alongside the Apple TV show Dickinson,
before reading three nineteenth-century novels: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Bronte, and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. After reading each of the novels,
we will watch multiple adaptations from the late twentieth century to the present day. We will
compare literary texts to cinematic retellings, and discuss questions of popularity (high-brow vs.
low-brow), narrative form, genre, audience, and more. Why retell these stories and why retell
them in these particular ways? What do the transformations of literature onto the screen say
about the original works of literature and about the contemporary culture that refashions them in
new ways? This course also provides students the opportunity to earn the W.This course fulfills the Gen Ed requirement for Literary Inquiry and gives students the opportunity to fulfill the basic writing requirement.

ENLT 151W-02 and 03 Intro to Literature: Forgotten Women (4)
In this course we will investigate varied literary works written by women long buried by history. We
will learn about social constructions surrounding the exclusion of women from literary canons and
archival memory. We will discuss, how have women been relegated to the shadows of their
husbands; literary legacies, or dismissed as hysterical or heretical? Who are the women history does
not want you to know? This course fulfills the Gen Ed requirement for Literary Inquiry and gives students the opportunity to fulfill the basic writing requirement.

ENLT 151W Introduction to Literature: Mortality and Beyond (4 credits)
Death is one of literature’s most abiding themes. From ancient Mesopotamia to the present day,
writers have grappled with the fact of our mortality, exploring what it means to live a good life in
the face of loss and of our own inevitable ends. How does an acknowledgment of our finite time
on Earth change our understanding of our ethical, spiritual, and political responsibilities? What
do we owe the dead, and what can we learn from them? Can we really understand death, at once
so ubiquitous and so difficult to imagine? And what, if anything, lies beyond?
In this course, you will study literary works that pose and respond to these questions, examining
the ways that writers working with different literary forms (plays, poems, novels, short stories)
and in different times and places (ancient Greece, early modern England, 20 th and 21 st century

England, Ireland, India, and the United States) have imagined death and its aftermath. In doing
so, you will gain the fundamental reading and writing skills necessary to analyze literary texts.
This course also provides students the opportunity to earn the W.

ENLT 151W-05 Intro to Literature: Inherited Tales (4)
This course will examine contemporary literature that focuses on the undergraduate college
experience. In the process, we will tackle a number of questions: What is the value of a liberal arts
education? What is the purpose of college? What makes college a transformative experience? How
are identities formed or changed in a college setting? What is college preparing you to do or to be?
What is the difference between a career and a vocation? Reading texts by a number of contemporary
writers including Fareed Zakaria, Jennine Capó Crucet, ZZ Packer, and Meg Wolitzer, we will
practice reading, thinking, and writing like a literary critic. We will also apply different critical
lenses—including precritical, traditional approaches, feminist, and others—to the primary texts we
read. Writing assignments will focus on building effective arguments, offering textual evidence,
reading literature through different lenses, and communicating ideas clearly and logically. This course also provides students the opportunity to earn the W.

ENLT 238-01 Jane Austen (3)
A study of Jane Austen’s fiction in the context of her life and times. We’ll read several of her major
novels. This course fulfills the Gen Ed requirement for Literary Inquiry

HUST 103 Lives and Times (3 )
This course features lively classroom discussion and introduces you to a wide range of fascinating people throughout history, whether powerful or downtrodden, famous or obscure, free-spirited or strait-laced. To see what makes these people tick, we will read a variety of works taking us to the core of their beings: novels, autobiographies, and memoirs. We try to answer the sorts of questions that we all have to ask ourselves: What makes a good life? How does my ethnicity, gender, geography or historical setting affect who I am? What do I owe my parents? What place does spirituality have in my life? How do I balance the need to be my own person with the need to belong to the group?