FYSP 157 - Plague Literature and Medicine

FC ARHU WINT

4 credits
This course examines the medical and literary history of major plagues, from the Plague of Athens (431 BCE), the Black Death (1348), the Great Plague of London (1645), the 1918 Influenza Pandemic, to COVID-19. For each period, medical practices of the times will be studied alongside artistic, literary, and political responses to pandemics. Primary texts by Thucydides, Boccaccio, Defoe, and Camus. Scientific readings will includeEpidemics and Society by Frank Snowden and an in-depth study of the immune system. This interdisciplinary course will include guest lectures by scientists and medical authorities, as plagues and pandemics are viewed from multiple points of view.