History of Literary Criticism

Prof. Spivak is famous. She is a bumbling old woman who wears a sari and tells stories like your grandmother would. She has a rotator cuff problem that makes it impossible for her to open doors, so she just stands in front of doors until someone comes by and opens them. She's absolutely nuts. But her class was fine; not great, but definitely not unbearable. The course material was so boring that all I wanted to hear were here anecdotes, which came pretty often so that was fine. Guest lecturers were great for the most part, only 2 bombs in my opinion. This class is worth taking because of Spivak's unique insight into EVERYTHING.

I absolutely love Kathy Eden. I was a little daunted coming into this class because the syllabus was loaded with the same texts that fill CC: Plato, Aristotle, etc.. All of those Greek guys. But Prof. Eden made them exciting, distilling them for us. Her lectures were very organized and she encouraged discussion even though the class had about 50 people in it. Not one usually prone to discussing philosophy, I found myself contributing regularly in class. Prof. Eden gives a new spin to classic texts and shows how they function in modern culture. I developed a friendship with Kathy and whenever I see her she greets me with a hug and tells me to come by her office so we can gossip. She is the best.

Professor Eden is probably the most well-organized, effective professor I've had here at Columbia. She, unlike so many professors, obviously has a precise idea of what she's going to do in every class, and she gets it done. Her lectures are clear and well organized, and she keeps things going at a fairly relaxed pace--occasionally she's a bit too slow, but this usually happens when she tries to involve student comments, for better or for worse. The only objectionable things here are the sometimes very dull texts (not that they're not worthwhile). In any case, certainly a recommended professor.

I really enjoyed this course. The class is primarily a lecture although students have plenty of opportunity to ask questions and Prof. Spivak herself tries to gauge the understanding of the students by asking questions during the lecture. Her lectures are always informative and take you beyond a merely superficial understanding of the text to a questioning acceptance of the texts.
Spivak was very well organized and always prepared but that's probably due to her immense erudition more than anything else. Sometimes her lectures can be a little difficult to follow, though.
By including non-European literary criticism along with the texts that are more widely accepted as forming a history of literary criticism, Spivak gives this course an interesting flavor, linking thoughts and ideas across geographical boundaries. I found the content challenging and exciting. I took this class primarily because of the professor and I was very happy with my decision.