From Virgil’s epic of state-building to Petrarch’s coronation as poet laureate of Italy in the fourteenth century or Langston Hughes’ poem “Let America Be America Again,” writers have always reflected upon, critiqued, and embodied national identities in poetry. Think of how much the Aeneidexemplifies Rome and her history, or Walt Whitman’s exuberant “Leaves of Grass” defines the expansive American landscape and spirit.

Young adult fiction, cable television drama, sportswriting, the Western— all are genres that we’re likely to associate more with leisure entertainment than historical inquiry.  And yet, the parameters and conventions of each provide authors with a particular mode of storytelling through which they can imagine the lived experience of past moments and explore its tensions in ways the historical record might not.

This is a course about people who fall short, plans that go bust, and stories that don’t turn out like you thought they would. Not that you’ll be spending the summer suffering through a series of tragic disappointments. For as we explore the making and unmaking of lofty ambitions, romantic aspirations, prophecies, and personal and collective ideals, we will also be questioning whether they’re all they’re cracked up to be, or even worth pursuing in the first place. Where do these enthralling, often crushing expectations come from?

“Every time I bat my false eyelashes, it’s a political statement.”
–Rupaul