BSA at MLA 2022

Byron’s Stanzas: The 1822 Cantos of Don Juan

FRIDAY, 7 JANUARY 8:30 AM-9:45 AM, SCARLET OAK (MARRIOTT MARQUIS)

AV Equipment: Projector and Speakers

Keywords: Byron, Romanticism, British, Nineteenth Century, Poetry

Sponsoring Entity: Byron Society of America


How do we read and teach Byron’s long poems, especially Don Juan, and what reading strategies are most productive and relevant to his work? Panelists center on a discussion of specific stanzas of Byron’s Don Juan, emphasizing the connections among poetics, thematics, and the larger cultural contexts and theoretical concerns of the Romantic era.


Speakers

Celeste G. Langan (U of California, Berkeley)

Deidre Lynch (Harvard U)

Omar F. Miranda (U of San Francisco)

Emily Rohrbach (Durham U)

Mariam Wassif (U of Paris 1, Paris-Sorbonne)

Presiding: Mai-Lin Cheng (U of Oregon)

Michael Steier wins the Elma Dangerfield Award for 2020

We are pleased to announce that BSA member Michael Steier has won this year’s Elma Dangerfield Prize from the IABS for his book, Byron, Hunt, and the Politics of Engagement, published in the Routledge Studies in Romanticism series.  Steir wrote his dissertation with Charles Robinson at the University of Delaware, and the book is based on that project.

The award committee calls Steier’s book “an assured performance…a hugely enjoyable book…This monograph will become the reference book on the Hunt/Byron connection, as well as a very useful resource on Byron generally, and on a large cast of figures, coteries, and literary-cultural phenomena from the 1810s to the 1820s.”

Quoting the Routledge description:

Byron, Hunt, and the Politics of Literary Engagement is the first full-length study of the friendship and literary relationship of two of the most important second-generation Romantic authors. Challenging long-held critical attitudes, this study shows that Byron and Hunt engaged in a creative and meaningful dialogue at each major stage in their careers, from their earliest published volumes of juvenile poetry and verse satire to their most celebrated contributions to Romantic literature: The Story of Rimini and Don Juan. Drawing upon newly recovered letters and unpublished manuscript material, this bookilluminates the surprisingly durable and artistically significant friendship of Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt.”

Congratulations to Dr. Steier on this fine achievement!

Previous winners of the Elma Dangerfield Prize include Roderick Beaton, Peter Cochran, Paul Douglass, Paul Elledge, Caroline Franklin, Peter Graham, Malcom Kelsall, Ghislaine McDayter, Tom Mole, Diego Saglia, Miranda Seymour, Jonathon Shears, Clara Tuite, and Sarah Wootton.

https://www.internationalassociationofbyronsocieties.org/index.php/news

International Byron Conference 2021 (Aristotle Univ. of Thessaloniki)

NEW DATES for the 46th International Byron Conference in Thessaloniki, Greece:
28th June – 4th July 2021

We are happy to announce the new dates for the 46th International Byron Conference which was postponed due to covid-19 concerns. The conference will coincide with the 200th Anniversary of the Greek War of Independence of 1821, a landmark event that will be celebrated throughout the country.

Please note that the Call for Papers has opened again. The new deadline for abstracts is 31 January 2021. The exact format of the conference will be decided in the next few months and relevant information will be posted on the conference website as we go forward.

Delegates who had their proposals accepted are kindly requested to confirm their intention to participate by 31 January 2021 to our dedicated email address: byronthess@gmail.com

We very much hope that you will join us for this rescheduled event!

John Murray Archive: free trial access via Adam Matthew Digital

 Adam Matthew Digital has published a large selection of materials from The John Murray Publishing Archive at the National Library of Scotland:

Nineteenth Century Literary Society

The John Murray Publishing Archive

This resource makes available the most complete archival collection of Byron’s manuscripts and personal papers in a digital, full-text searchable format. Highlights include annotated drafts of Don Juan or letters around Byron’s affair with Lady Caroline Lamb. You can find out more via the brochure available here.

Given the importance of these materials for many any of you, even more so in light of the current limitations on international travel, I’m very excited to announce that Adam Matthew Digital is offering a free 30-day trial for all members until the end of the year. I’d encourage you to make use of this offer and to spread the word about this important collection among your fellow Byronists.

If you’re interested in the trial, please contact us. We will forward on your contact information to Adam Matthew Digital, and they will set you up with a username/password for the trial.

Postponed: 2020 International Byron Conference (Thessaloniki)

From the organizers of the 2020 IABS Conference at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki:

We re regret to announce that it has been necessary to postpone the International Byron Conference in Thessaloniki scheduled for 29 June-5 July 2020 as part of measures related to COVID-19. We hope that it will be possible to run the conference in late June/early July 2021.The new dates will be announced in due course.

CFP for MLA 2021 (Toronto): Byron in 1821

Call for Papers

The Byron Society of America at MLA 2021:
“Byron in 1821: A Retrospective”

This bicentennial panel sponsored by the Byron Society of America will examine Byron’s work written or published in 1821, including Marino FalieroSardanapalusHeaven and EarthCain, and Werner. 250 word abstracts by 26 March 2020.

Organizer: Omar F. Miranda, U of San Francisco (ofmiranda@usfca.edu )

CFP: 2020 International Byron Conference (Thessaloniki, Greece), Jan 31 deadline

http://www.new.enl.auth.gr/ibc2020/

Proposals are invited for the 2020 Conference of the International Association of Byron Societies, “Byron: Wars and Words”, to be held at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki from 29th June to 5th July. The aim of this conference is to look at how war in all its meanings, symbolisms, and manifestations influenced Byron’s words and worlds, and shaped his poetic and political sensibility. Drawing on recent scholarship in Romantic studies, it will also explore Romantic authors’ preoccupations with war, and how these intersected with Byron’s. How are the events of wars transformed into words, images and spectacle? Conversely, how do words become weapons and trigger literary, cultural, and political struggles? What kind of ideological conflicts, dilemmas, and anxieties does the print culture of the time embody when treating the issue of war? How does Romantic-period conflict extend our understanding of modern warfare? 

The conference welcomes 20-minute proposals for papers on topics including, but not necessarily limited to: 

  • Byron as revolutionary fighter and/or critic of war 
  • Byron and Napoleon 
  • Byron and epic 
  • Warfare as inspiring force for poetic subjects, new genres, language forms and styles 
  • Romantic nationalism 
  • “Intellectual war”: newspapers, magazines, reviews and broadsides 
  • The representation of military action and violence in literature and art 
  • Famous critical wars that Byron’s words produced 
  • War and gender
  • Revolution and knowledge production 
  • Science and war 
  • Media and military technologies 

Please send 250-word proposals by 31st January 2020 to byronthess@gmail.com, directing any enquiries to Dr. Maria Schoina. Confirmation of acceptance by 29th February 2020.

CFP: Byron Society of America at CEA 2020: “Tides”

Call for Papers

Byron Society of America at CEA 2020

March 26-28, 2020 | Hilton Head Island, South Carolina

Hilton Head Marriott Resort and Spa

The Byron Society of America and the College English Association welcome proposals for presentations on Lord Byron’s life, works, and/or influences for the 51st annual CEA conference, the theme of which is Tides

Well—well, the world must turn upon its axis, 
     And all mankind turn with it, heads or tails, 
And live and die, make love and pay our taxes, 
     And as the veering wind shifts, shift our sails; 
The king commands us, and the doctor quacks us, 
     The priest instructs, and so our life exhales, 
A little breath, love, wine, ambition, fame, 
Fighting, devotion, dust,—perhaps a name.                                                                        – Don Juan 2.4

We invite papers related to all aspects of Byron’s life and work in relation to the conference theme, e.g. Byron and the sea, the tides of his affairs and passions, self-exile and travel, the shipwreck in Don Juan, mutiny and romance inThe Island, his life on the canals of Venice, and his death near the tidal lagoons of Messolonghi.

The Byron Society of America, an affiliate organization of the College English Association, particularly encourages graduate students and contingent faculty to submit proposals for CEA 2020. Please direct inquiries about proposals to BSA at CEA affiliate liaison Robin Hammerman: rhammerm@stevens.edu

Submit your proposal for the BSA panel at CEA 2020 here: www.cea-web.org

Submission deadline: November 1, 2020

All presenters at the CEA 2020 conference must become members of CEA and BSA by January 1.

Don Juan at 200: Chicago, Oct 18-19, 2019

Byron’s Don Juan: A Romantic Bicentennial Symposium 

October 18-19, 2019

DePaul University

FINAL PROGRAM now available

The spirit of Romantic Bicentennials continues as we celebrate the 200th anniversary of the publication of the first cantos of Byron’s Don Juan.

Join The Byron Society of America and The Keats-Shelley Association for a symposium featuring keynote lectures by Jerome McGann, Clara Tuite, Alice Levine, and Peter Graham. Offering a unique blend of younger and established scholars, the conference converges for two days in Chicago at DePaul University and The Chicago History Museum. The conference will bring together scholars from a wide range of backgrounds––Australia, Greece, and North America––to explore the origin of Byron’s poem and its cultural value in the 21st century. At a time when free speech has become more important than ever, Byron’s Don Juan stands as a monument to the importance of literature in showing that words are things, and that writers can indeed speak truth to power.

Byron’s poem will be interpreted by poststructuralists, New Historicists, feminists, inter-disciplinary and formalist scholars, with essays offered on Lady Byron, Ada Lovelace, Rap music, Opera, and many other subjects. The conference explores Byron’s poem as a conjunction of the high and low brow, blending gossip from Regency Court trials with allusions to Homer’s Odyssey, the Ten Commandments on the one hand, and the dangers of moral self-satisfaction on the other. 

Beyond the conference presentations, music will be performed on Saturday, as the conference moves to the Chicago History Museum, founded in 1856, with its rich array of Chicago lore and an Art Deco theatre. Participants will hear papers presented in a venue opposite the Art Institute of Chicago where Delacroix’s “The Combat of the Giaour and Hassan” is housed (Friday), and listen to Liszt, Chopin, and selections from Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” provided by the DePaul School of Music at the Chicago History Museum (Saturday).

No conference registration fees!

Conference begins 9am 18th October at DePaul University, Daley building, 14 East Jackson Blvd., Room 805

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Hotel Recommendations 

Hotel Lincoln 855-514-8112
1816 North Clark Street, Chicago, IL 60614

Palmer House Hotel 312-726-7500
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