I have always loved reading, and I loved learning more about the world especially when I was little. In high school, it felt like I couldn’t read for pleasure any more after being consumed by all my school textbooks. But now, in college, that love for reading has been resurrected, and I’m here to tell you why!
The first comparative literature (CompLit) class I took at UMass was CompLit 141H-Good and Evil. When I first enrolled, it seemed like an interesting class, but I was also looking for a good class to satisfy one of my honors GenEDs and this seemed like a good choice.
On my first day of class, I learned what we would be studying and was immediately excited to read classic works and provide my interpretations of the material. The class encompassed the notions of Eastern and Western thought and how each side are related to good and evil. The first third of the class dealt with theological perspectives on the foundations of good and evil, so we examined these works in the scope of good and evil. Additionally, some of the more theological-based works are also related to the concepts of free will.
The second part of the class went more deeply into Western thought and used works such as Dante’s Inferno, Paradise Lost, and Frankenstein to examine those concepts. The third part of the class explored Eastern Literature, and we learned about the teachings of works such as the Bhagavad Gita and Siddhartha, relating it to our discussion of good and evil. Overall, this was an incredibly enlightening class, and I was able to learn a great deal about the theological and philosophical perspectives of literature throughout human history.
The second CompLit class I took at UMass was CompLit 121-International Short Story. It was a class that explored the different genres of short stories and featured authors from all over the world. Each story touched on matters relevant to the country the story was published in, and so the subject matter was deep and provided insight into the nuances of different cultures. We did a world tour in the form of literature, which made the concepts feel introspective in nature as we would dive into the deeper meaning of each text and how that pertains to the state of the world.
This class was very interesting as I was able to learn about the power a writer can hold when they produce literature. I also made this class an honors colloquium, and so on the side, I was researching how women were using their voices to fight patriarchal oppression in the US and Puerto Rico. I analyzed two texts and was able to learn more about the role literature played in transforming the political landscape.
Overall, I highly recommend taking a Comparative Literature class at UMass! It was a refreshing, yet eye-opening experience that taught me more perspective on how to perceive the world.
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