J.R.R. Tolkien fans everywhere were no doubt ecstatic when "The Lord of the Rings" made its way from the page to the screen; now, with the final installment of the trilogy ending with "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King," which opened in theaters December 17, a new Tolkien fix might be hard to come by for most people - but not everyone.
To the benefit of the 38 UB students enrolled on COL 150 - a comparative literature course being offered for the first time this semester - one LOTR aficionado thought the novel held enough substance to dedicate an entire course to examining it.
Barish Ali, a Ph.D. candidate and an instructor of comparative literature, fell in love with the novel upon first reading it. He carried his sentiment in the forefront of his mind and when the opportunity arose he suggested a literature course that reviewed Tolkien's famous work.
"This novel is what introduced me to fantasy which is what brought me into literature which then brought me into studying literature all my life," said Ali, a look of appreciation crossing his face.
The class meets Mondays and Wednesdays from 9:30 to 10:50 and if Ali's new students are as affected by LOTR as he, it is easy to imagine the buzz of excitement that might have permeated the classroom on Monday, although a slight mishap put a damper on the first day of class.
"The first day didn't go too well, the classroom was flooded and we had to change places," said Ali who seemed disappointed that the circumstances did not afford him the opportunity to have a complete first day.
Despite the fact that the elements were against a full class on the first day, if Ali has his way the course will be an enriching aspect of his students spring semester line-up.
"I'm hoping that I provide them with a different way of looking at the text," he said. "I want to introduce them to what we do with literature in the Comparative Literature Department - how we analyze it with critical theory and view it in comparison to the literature of other nations."
"Literature of other nations," is also a source of admiration for Ali who appreciates Tolkien's novel because of the way "people from other places come together and accomplish a very important goal and a very important quest."
Though the everyday workings of life in the 21century may not be as exciting as saving the world from the evil and omnipresent eye of an ancient enemy as the characters in the novel did, Ali believes that there is something to be learned from the way Tolkien presents the participants in the quest on which his novel centers.
Having "lived in many places" and growing up in Canada, Ali's view of the world as having the potential to be united despite differences was affected by Tolkien's novel.
While mention of the movie might be made during the class, Ali points out that the focus of the course will be the novel itself.
"Usually undergraduate courses are more survey type courses so they wouldn't take just one novel as the material so I think this course is quite rare in the sense that it is tackling one text," he said.
Very much unlike Ali's single text course that brings a rarity to the Comparative Literature Department, the Department of Art has opened a few courses that they hope will add diversity to their students' course load.
According to Becky Koenig, assistant to the chair of the Art Department and an art instructor, the department is offering three new courses that focus on bringing variety to beginning art students.
Foundations - the name of the program under which the new classes are being offered - are courses that are inclusive of the basic prerequisites that art students need to complete their programs.
"It is a major change in philosophy, the courses are much more interdisciplinary," said Koenig, " they are not just all design or drawing or three-D, each course might do some drawing, some design, some courses do some new media."
Koenig said the variety offered within these courses is particularly helpful to new students.
"(Freshmen) end up using every department by the time they've finished The Foundation which leaves them a little more open-minded," she said.
Each semester brings something new to a few departments in UB, be it a new line-up of survey courses or a course dedicated solely to a novel that happens to have a cult following. Instructors are constantly finding new ways to engage the student population and according to some, they are - for the most part - successful.
"That's cool," said Sonya Simpson, a junior economics major, of the LOTR course. " It's interesting how they incorporate stuff people would actually read into academics."
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
