First-Year Seminar Required Texts

Required texts are available from the College Bookstore. Rely on the ISBN to be sure you are getting the correct edition.

In line with Bard’s commitment to Equity, Access, and Inclusion, the College is in the process of establishing a permanent book fund to assist any student who is having difficulty affording the course materials. 

We have secured a limited amount of funds for Fall 2020-Spring 2021. If you would benefit from accessing this fund, please email fysem@bard.edu by the end of Add/Drop period (Wednesday, February 10).
Campus Bookstore

Spring 2021 Texts

  • Mary Shelley, Frankenstein:  The 1818 Text. Penguin. ISBN 978-0143131847.
  • Frederick Douglass, The Portable Frederick Douglas, ed. J. Stauffer & H.L. Gates, Jr. Penguin. ISBN 978-0143106814.
  • Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto,  ed. D. McLellan. Oxford. ISBN 978-0199535712.
  • Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway, 1st ed. Mariner Books. ISBN 978-0156628709.
  • Rabindranath Tagore, The Home and the World, trans. S. Tagore, ed. W. Radice. Penguin . ISBN: 978-01400449860.
  • Homer, The Odyssey, trans. R. Fitzgerald. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 978-0374525743.
In addition to the above texts, readings from the First-Year Seminar: The Self in the World 2020-2021 course reader will also be used.

Contact Us

Program Directors
Omar Cheta
Lauren Curtis
Daniel Mendelsohn 

The program directors hold regular office hours throughout the semester. 
We welcome the chance to meet with you about the course and your experiences.

Spring Semester Directors' Office Hours:  Mondays 10-11am EST
Instructions for joining: please email one of us (lcurtis@bard.edu, ocheta@bard.edu, or mendelso@bard.edu) for a Zoom link in advance.  If you are unable to meet at this time (for example, if you are working remotely, in a different time zone), please reach out by email and we can arrange a different time to meet.

Please note that this is in addition to your own FYSEM instructor's office hours, which you should attend with specific questions / concerns about your own FYSEM section and your own personal progress in the course.

For further information, contact Program Assistant Julie Cerulli
fysem@bard.edu | 845-758-7514