Cost and Registration Information

Early Registration Price (April 17 at 10 am – May 4 at 4 pm): $210
Regular Registration Price (May 4 at 4 pm – first day of class): $231

Members, seniors, and students get a 10% discount.

Excuse our dust!

The Newberry is undergoing an extensive first floor renovation in 2018. This project will be ongoing during the Summer 2018 seminar term. The Adult Education Seminars Program still has use of the basement classrooms, but please check this link frequently for the latest conditions - which exterior doors are open or closed, where to find an accessible entrance, which restrooms are available, etc.

Because of the renovation, the Newberry Bookstore will be closed during the Summer 2018 term. As such, seminar participants will be responsible for acquiring all required texts for their seminars on their own. We apologize sincerely for the inconvenience, and appreciate your understanding. We have put together a list of helpful resources that should make it easy to find the books you need.

Seminar Description

The writer H.P. Lovecraft declared that “the oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” This seminar’s essential question is this: How can we express that which is unknown? Through close reading, supplemental texts, and discussion, we will survey short story selections by three writers of supernatural fiction whose work appeared over three centuries: Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, and Thomas Ligotti. Six sessions.

Aleco Julius holds an MA in English education. He has designed language and writing curricula and has taught literature for over a dozen years.

Materials List

Required:

• Edgar Allan Poe, The Portable Edgar Allan Poe. Penguin Classics, 2006. ISBN#: 978-0143039914
• H.P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories. Penguin Classics, 2016. ISBN#: 978-0143129455
• Thomas Ligotti, Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe. Penguin Classics, 2015. ISBN#: 978-0143107767

First Reading:

• For the first class, please read "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "The Black Cat" of Poe's book.

This class is part of the Newberry’s Adult Education Seminars Program. Learn more about our registration procedures.