22 November 2013

Dr Andy Hamilton (Durham University, philosophy) will be speaking at the Staff-Postgraduate seminar on Wednesday November 27.

Dr Andy Hamilton (Durham University, philosophy) will be speaking at the Staff-Postgraduate seminar on Wednesday November 27. The title of his paper is: “The Autonomy of Art and the Heteronomy of Entertainment: Louis Armstrong, Charles Dickens, and Howard Hawks” and he has supplied the following abstract:

Louis Armstrong was a very great musical artist, who always thought of himself first as an entertainer: “My life has been music, it’s always come first, but the music ain’t worth nothing if you can’t lay it on the public”. But he knew that his clowning and crowd-pleasing were compatible with being an artist: “…it’s got to be art because the world has recognised our music from New Orleans, else it would have been dead today”. This lecture argues that, like the modern Western system of the arts, the modern system of entertainment – music-hall, circuses, professional sport… – did not assume definite shape till the 18th or 19th century, though its ingredients were found in classical, medieval and Renaissance periods. It argues that the highest humane art seeks a broad audience, in a way often deemed unique to entertainment. The examples of Louis Armstrong, Charles Dickens and Howard Hawks are contrasted with the more hermetic high art of Lennie Tristano, Marcel Proust and Andrei Tarkovsky.

21 November 2013

Dr Marilynn Richtarik (Georgia State University) at Staff PG seminar

Just a reminder that Dr Marilynn Richtarik (Georgia State University) will be speaking at the Staff-Postgraduate seminar today on the subject: Northern Irish drama in the context of the political 'Troubles’.

Dr Richtarik was educated at Harvard and Oxford University and has been an Associate Professor at Georgia State University since 2001. She has teaching and research interests in Modern and contemporary Irish literature, twentieth-century English literature, drama, world literature. Her most recent publication, Stewart Parker: A Life (Oxford UP, 2012), won the 2013 SAMLA Studies Book Award from the South Atlantic Modern Language Association and the 2012 Robert Rhodes Prize for Books on Literature from the American Conference for Irish Studies.

The seminar will be chaired by Professor Stephen Regan and take place in Hallgarth House seminar room at 4:30, followed by drinks in The Victoria. You are all very welcome.

9 November 2013

Dr Tom Mole (University of Edinburgh; IAS Fellow, Durham), ‘Scattered Odes’ in ‘Shattered Books’: Romantic Poems in Victorian Anthologies

On Wednesday 13 November, Dr Tom Mole (University of Edinburgh; IAS Fellow, Durham), will address the Staff and Postgraduate Research Seminar. The title of his paper his:

‘Scattered Odes’ in ‘Shattered Books’: Romantic Poems in Victorian Anthologies

Tom Mole is currently Reader in English Literature and Director of the Centre for the History of the Book at the University of Edinburgh. From 2005 until July 2013 he was Associate Professor and William Dawson Scholar in the Department of English at McGill University in Montreal. He specializes in the Romantic period in Britain, especially Lord Byron. His research focuses on three areas: the cultural history of celebrity, print culture and book history, and reception history. His monograph, Byron's Romantic Celebrity (Palgrave, 2007), won the Elma Dangerfield prize from the International Byron Society. Professor Mole edited Romanticism and Celebrity Culture (Cambridge University Press, 2009, paperback 2012), which brings together twelve contributors to assemble the most complete account of Romantic celebrity available. Arguing that celebrity emerged in several areas of cultural production almost simultaneously, the book includes case studies from literature and the theatre, music and visual culture, fashion and boxing.
The seminar will be chaired by Professor Michael O’Neill and take place in Hallgarth House seminar room at 4:30, followed by drinks in The Victoria.