The dangerous woman has been a fixture in literature from Eve and Helen of Troy to the ruthless protagonists of modern film and television. Who is she? What makes her dangerous? How should we, as readers and viewers, respond to her? How do depictions of her change over time and across geographic, cultural, and gender borders? This class will introduce European and Latin American fiction from the eighteenth century to the present day through a series of dangerous women, some of whom incited controversy from the second they first appeared in print. Some of the works we will explore include Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, Laura Esquivel’s Like Water for Chocolate, and Isabelle Allende’s The House of the Spirits, as well as selections of short fiction and film. Class projects will include creative as well as critical writing, and the opportunity to rework and adapt class texts.
