Comparative Lit

In comparison to the abundant offerings in other fields, the University is unusually sparse in its course offerings for undergraduates in Comparative Literature. While any comprehensive concentration in Comparative Literature is, perhaps, too broad and requires an inordinate amount of background and study for College students, individual courses based on literature from more than one country are a necessary part of any full curriculum.

The present courses tend both to be too narrow for the general student and to include discouraging language prerequisities. While translations always fall short of readings in the original language, there is little nonpoetic literature that cannot be studied with profit in English. The fact that only one language is required where works in both, say, French and German are read, is tacit admission that neither is really necessary. It would be better merely to recommend a language and require it only of graduate students in the field, as is regularly done in Slavic courses.

Literature is taught at Harvard according to a system designed for the convenience of concentrators, with other students treated as second-class citizens. They are blocked from literature courses by the language problem and discouraged by the highly specialized period-covering character imposed for the systematic concentrator. Courses arranged without regard to country--on such topics as romanticism or naturalism in different literary genres, or treatment of recurrent themes and myths--would be an important addition to the undergraduate offerings, greatly strengthening the general education aspect of the liberal arts program.