‘In modern society the main cause of drug addiction…is a literary tradition of romantic claptrap, started by Coleridge and De Quincey, and continued without serious interruption ever since’, declares Theodore Dalrymple in Romancing Opiates (2006). This course explores the origins of addiction in the poems of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (‘Kubla Khan’, ‘The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere’, ‘Christabel’, and ‘The Pains of Sleep’), the autobiographical essays of Thomas De Quincey (Confessions of an English Opium-Eater and its sequel, Suspiria de Profundis), and the tales of Edgar Allan Poe (from ‘Ligeia’ and ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’ to ‘A Tale of the Ragged Mountains’ and ‘Hop-Frog’).
Readings
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Selected Poetry
Thomas De Quincey, Confessions of an English Opium-Eater and Other Writings
Edgar Allan Poe, Selected Tales
Assessment
1 essay (possibly in-class), a series of unannounced quizzes, class participation, a final exam.
