I have mixed feelings about Pedatella's class. I enjoyed the class discussions very much, and perhaps what also made me enjoy the class so much more was the fact that after our discussions I came to actually appreciate the texts we were covering, which in the past I always remained disinterested in them.
However, I didn't feel he managed the short time span of the semester too well, considering we didn't get through all the reading and he ended up assigning a paper rewrite along with a final research essay at the same time within the last week of the semester. I also couldn't follow his grading procedure to well- sometimes it seemed as though I simply lost points because I wasn't generating ideas along the lines of the ones he was expecting to see.
Regardless of his disorganization, his class was still probably my favorite last semester. I would recommend his class to those interested in completely rediscovering the literature of the mediterranean.
Workload:
very manageable readings, three papers (two 4-5pgs, one 8-10) and a final