Week eight: Wordsworth and Blake

This week's a double bill at the same bargain price of £0.00:

Week Eight – Thursday 29th November
The Embarrassment of Methodist Enthusiasm in Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell'
Helen Boyle, Open University

Blake and the Virgin Mary
Michael Farrell, Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford

Meetings will be held from 5:15-6:45pm in the Ferrar Room, Hertford
College.

All are welcome to join us!

Professor Marc Porée: Byron's North-West Passage

Week Seven – Thursday 22nd November, 5.15 Ferrar room, Hertford college.
From Literature to Philosophy: Byron's "North-West Passage" (Don Juan, XIII, 39)
Professor Marc Porée, L'Université de Paris III (Sorbonne Nouvelle)John Sackheouse "First Communication with the Natives of Prince Regents Bay, as drawn by John Sackheouse and presented to Capt. Ross, Augt. 10, 1818." (Colored aquatint)

Professor Porée's interests are incredibly varied. His main research areas are Romanticism and contemporary British and postcolonial literature. In the field of Romanticism he has written a book about de Quincey and worked on Byron, Keats, and Burns among others. In other areas he's written a book on Salman Rushdie and worked on Kazuo Ishiguro and Graham Swift. He has coedited a collected edition of Robert Louis Stevenson translations for the prestigious Pleiade collection and translated texts by, amongst others, Stevenson and Conrad.
All are welcome!

Week Six – Thursday 15th November

JudWeek Six – Thursday 15th November

“Now is the time to cherish a glowing energy that may rouse into action
every nerve and faculty of the mind”: John Thelwall, Radical Anatomist
Mary Fairclough, University of York

Judith Thompson calls Thelwall “the silenced partner” of Wordsworth and Coleridge. As well as writing poetry and generically experimental prose he was one of the most important and prominent radical leaders, and one of those charged with high treason in 1794. His politics took many forms including, arguably, his contribution to medical debate about the “vital spirits”.


All are welcome to join us for discussion.

Ferrar room, Hertford College 5.15, Thursday 15th November

Week five -Charles Lamb and Colonial Australia

Week Five – Thursday 8th November
'Inauspicious unliterary THIEFLAND': Charles Lamb, Barron Field and
Colonial Australia
Dr David Higgins, University of Leeds

David Higgins is author of Romantic Genius and the Literary Magazine: Biography, Celebrity, Politics (Routledge, 2005) and
Frankenstein: Character Studies (Continuum, forthcoming in 2008).

Francis Jeffrey (editor of Ed review) in Carlyle's Sartor Resartus

Week Four – Thursday 1st November
Francis Jeffrey in Carlyle's Sartor Resartus
Dr Will Christie, University of Sydney

Carlyle called Francis Jeffrey the greatest literary critic of his time and a "Scotch Voltaire". Dr Christie will be talking about Carlyle's representation of Francis Jeffrey, founder and editor of the Edinburgh review. Carlyle met and formed a friendship with Jeffrey during the lean-years spent in Scotland from 1826. His quasi-autobiographical Shandean parody of English empiricism, Sartor Resartus, was written in 1831 whilst living in Scotland before the move to London in 1834.
Dr Will Christie is author of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: A Literary Life (Basingstoke, Hants, and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). His current projects include:

• A study of the Edinburgh Review in early nineteenth-century British culture and society
• The life and correspondence of Francis Jeffrey and Thomas Carlyle
• 'Eating Their Words': a study of literary influence
• A literary biography of Dylan Thomas

All are more than welcome to join us for discussion in the Ferrar room, Hertford College, at 5.15 on Thursday of 4th week (1st November).

Week Three- 25th October

Professor John Whale, University of Leeds
"Exploring Romantic Period Masculinities"
Professor John Whale is author of Imagination Under Pressure: Politics, Aesthetics, and Utility 1789-1832 (CUP 2000) , John Keats (Palgrave 2005), and Thomas De Quincey’s Reluctant Autobiography (1984).
His recent work focuses on masculinity and national identity in the Romantic period, with specific reference to Romantic period pugilism.

All are welcome to join us in the Ferrar room at Hertford college at 5.15 on Thursday 25th October.

Week Two -Thursday 18th October

Week Two – Thursday 18th October
A quest for honour in the Age of Reason: the Pre-Byronic experience of
volunteers in the Peninsular War (1808-1813)
Graciela Iglesias Rogers, University of Oxford

Michaelmas 2007

Michalemas 2007

Week Two – Thursday 18th October
A quest for honour in the Age of Reason: the Pre-Byronic experience of
volunteers in the Peninsular War (1808-1813)
Graciela Iglesias Rogers, University of Oxford

Week Three – Thursday 25th October
Romantic Masculinities
Professor John Whale, University of Leeds

Week Four – Thursday 1st November
Francis Jeffrey in Carlyle's Sartor Resartus
Dr Will Christie, University of Sydney

Week Five – Thursday 8th November
'Inauspicious unliterary THIEFLANDS': Charles Lamb, Barron Field and
Colonial Australia
Dr David Higgins, University of Leeds

Week Six – Thursday 15th November
“Now is the time to cherish a glowing energy that may rouse into action
every nerve and faculty of the mind”: John Thelwall, Radical Anatomist
Mary Fairclough, University of York

Week Seven – Thursday 22nd November
From Literature to Philosophy: Byron's "Northwest Passage" (Don Juan,
XIII, 39)
Professor Marc Poree, L'Université de Paris III

Week Eight – Thursday 29th November
The Embarrassment of Methodist Enthusiasm in Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell'
Helen Boyle, Open University

Blake and the Virgin Mary
Michael Farrell, Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford

Meetings will be held from 5:15-6:45pm in the Ferrar Room, Hertford
College. All are welcome to join us for discussion and refreshments
If you are interested in presenting a 30-40 minute paper at the seminar
please email: michael.farrell@ccc.ox.ac.uk,
georgina.green@hertford.ox.ac.uk, or olivia.murphy@worc.ox.ac.uk

Angus Whitehead

Week Eight – Thursday 14^th June

‘Rehabilitating the ‘Bad’ Ancient: The Life and Times of Frederick Tatham, 1805-78’

Angus Whitehead, University of York


The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography has this mention of Tatham:

"Through Linnell, a group of young artists met Blake and came to admire him greatly, both for his character and his art. They looked upon him as a seer or Old Testament prophet come to life; in turn, Blake's peace of mind was enhanced by finding a worshipful audience. [...] This loose brotherhood of Blake followers, one that also included Francis Oliver Finch, Frederick Tatham, and Welby Sherman, called themselves ‘The Ancients’ and often sought their own intense responses to nature in the environs of Shoreham, Kent, which Blake visited in late summer 1825."

Tatham wrote a biography of Blake, and is also known for burning some of his manuscripts when he inherited them.

Room 10, Oxford English Faculty 5-6.30.

June 7th-Emma's Secret Subplot

"So you think you know all the right answers to all the right questions about Jane Austen's Emma?" (OR Emma's Secret Subplot -Ed)
Arnie Perlstein

Why was Rex Stout rereading Emma as he died?
Why does Miss Marple remind us of Miss Bates?
Why did James Joyce, the King of Literary Subtext, call his children Sense and Sensibility?"Emma is, famously, the detective story without a murder...or is there one?

Its aura of mystery has never been adequately explained. This presentation will first summarize, and put in context, numerous discoveries, past and present, regarding the puzzles of Emma, particularly those in Chapter 9.
Then it will demonstrate a method for applying those puzzle answers to their primary, but concealed, purpose: as a Rosetta Stone to demystify the novel's obvious riddle--the vexed relationship of Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill--but also the novel's second, but concealed, riddle---the seemingly straightforward, but actually quite mysterious, Mr. Knightley, acting behind the scenes to orchestrate the actions of others in the novel."

Mr. Perlstein is an independent scholar from South Florida.

Join us at 5p.m. Room 10 Oxford University English Faculty, Thursday June 7th.
All welcome.

http://sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com/

Week Six -Professor Jacqueline Labbe

Week Six – Thursday 31^st May

Crime and Punishment: Jane Austen reads Charlotte Smith.

Professor Jacqueline Labbe, University of Warwick

Professor Labbe's latest book, Charlotte Smith: Romanticism, poetry and the culture of gender was published by Manchester University Press in 2003. She has published Romantic Visualities: Landscape, Gender and Romanticism (Macmillan, 1998), The Romantic Paradox: Violence, Death, and the Uses of Romance, 1760-1830 (Macmillan, 2000), and an edition of Charlotte Smith's novel The Old Manor House (Broadview, 2002). She has also written on Mary Robinson, Priscilla Wakefield, S.T. Coleridge, Lewis Carroll, and other authors.

Week Five -Dr Fiona Stafford on Wordsworth

Week Five – Thursday 24^th May

Wordsworth and the Survival of Pastoral

Dr Fiona Stafford, Somerville College, University of Oxford

Room 10, Oxford English Faculty 5-6.30

Week Four -Thursday 17th May

Week Four – Thursday 17^th May

'Death in So Many Frightful Forms': The Sublime of Terror in the 1790s.

Joseph Crawford, St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford

Room 10, Oxford University English Faculty, 5-6.30 p.m.

Week three -Kristen Ott, University of St Andrews

Week Three – Thursday 10^th May

Sublime landscapes and ancient traditions: Picturesque literary tourism in Scotland

Kristin Ott, University of St. Andrews

Room 10, English Faculty, Oxford University. 5-6.30 p.m.

2nd week: Professor Kathryn Sutherland

Thursday 2nd week -3rd May, 2007

Jane Austen's Manuscripts: or, the real Secret of Style

Professor Kathryn Sutherland, St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford

Room 10 of the English Faculty 5 till 6.30 p.m.

For more information about Professor Sutherland's new book see:
http://www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780199234288

First week: Professor Nicholas Halmi

First week, Trinity term
(Thursday 26th April, 2007)
5pm room 10 of the English Faculty

'There was no such thing as the Romantic symbol', from The Genealogy of the Romantic Symbol, forthcoming from OUP.

Professor Nicholas Halmi, University of Washington

Nicholas Halmi is Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature, University of Washington. He has edited editions of Coleridge and Northrop Frye and is on the editorial board of MLQ. His paper will be drawn from his forthcoming book which offers an historical explanation for the Romantic concept of the symbol.

Trinity term 2007

Romantic Realignments

Trinity Term 2007

Please note revised start time of 5 p.m.

Week One – Thursday 26^th April

'There was no such thing as the Romantic symbol', from The Genealogy of the Romantic Symbol, forthcoming from OUP.

Professor Nicholas Halmi, University of Washington

Week Two – Thursday 3^rd May

Jane Austen's Manuscripts: or, the real Secret of Style

Professor Kathryn Sutherland, St. Anne’s College, University of Oxford

Week Three – Thursday 10^th May

Sublime landscapes and ancient traditions: Picturesque literary tourism in Scotland

Kristin Ott, University of St. Andrews

Week Four – Thursday 17^th May

'Death in So Many Frightful Forms': The Sublime of Terror in the 1790s.

Joseph Crawford, St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford

Week Five – Thursday 24^th May

Wordsworth and the Survival of Pastoral

Dr Fiona Stafford, Somerville College, University of Oxford

Week Six – Thursday 31^st May Crime and Punishment: Jane Austen reads Charlotte Smith

Professor Jacqueline Labbe, University of Warwick

Week Seven – Thursday 7^th June

'So you think you know all the right answers to all the right questions about Jane Austen's Emma?'

Arnie Perlstein, independent scholar from Florida. For more information see: http://sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com/

Week Eight – Thursday 14^th June

‘Rehabilitating the ‘Bad’ Ancient: The Life and Times of Frederick Tatham, 1805-78’

Angus Whitehead, University of York

Meetings will be held from 5-6pm in Room 10 of the English Faculty. All are welcome to join us for discussion and refreshments.

If you are interested in presenting a 30-40 minute paper at the seminar please email: michael.farrell@ccc.ox.ac.uk, georgina.green@hertford.ox.ac.uk, or olivia.murphy@worc.ox.ac.uk