Friday, October 24-25, 2024
- New York University, Palladium Hall 140 East 14th StreetNew York, NY, 10003United States (map)
Organizers: Elizabeth Effinger, University of New Brunswick, Robin Hammerman, Stevens Institute of Technology, and Kaila Rose, Communications Officer for The International Association of Byron Societies
The 2024 Curran Symposium, “Performing Politics,” will honor the bicentennial of Lord Byron’s death by engaging with some of the most pressing public issues in the lives of Byron and his contemporaries that carry through to our own turbulent lives in 2024. We take this moment to examine how such conflicts rage on “dubiously and fiercely,” and to consider how art reacts to and reimagines such acts of theatrics and turmoil (Sardanapalus, Act III.i.198).
This hybrid symposium will be one full day of panels and discussions, taking place on October 25th, 2024 at NYU’s Palladium Hall in New York City & on Zoom. The symposium festivities will also include a special production of Byron’s Sardanapalus at The Red Bull Theater (NYC) on Thursday, October 24th.
Staging Byron’s closet drama enables us to think about the difference between intentions for privacy, audience, and writing narratives of legacy. How might acts or performances (broadly conceived) help usimagine a new time and place? What are our stories of political transformation? And what does the actof going public, of sharing these stories, activate for us as citizens, scholars, and artists, those“unacknowledged legislators of the World” as Shelley famously put it?On the 25th, the symposium, which includes both in-person and virtual components, will feature invited speakers addressing a diverse range of performances and politics in the work of Byron and his Romantic contemporaries. During the evening’s drinks and appetizer reception, we will also feature a digital presentation of the artwork from the special creative project we have designed: “Uncloseting Byron”—a public art project that takes a creative, experimental approach to closet drama by using Byron as its starting point. Beginning with a line from one of Byron’s plays, participants create short mixed-media closet dramas and share them via social media. As we not only get off the stage but also off the page for this project, we tarry with how this act of performance might become a space of freedom.
SCHEDULE
Thursday 24th 2024
7:30 pm Sardanapalus at The Red Bull Theatre — Sheen Center
Post-show Talk-back to follow
Friday 25th 2024, NYU’s Palladium Hall
9am – 9:30am Coffee and Tea
9:30am – 10:45am Post-Sardanapalus Production Roundtable
Panelists: Omar F. Miranda – moderator, Jose Alvarez (Playwright, Rutgers PhD), James Armstrong (City College NY), Michael Gamer (U Penn)
10:45am – 11am Coffee and Tea Break
11am – 12:15pm Panel One: Poetics and Biopolitics, War, Incarceration
Panelists: John Havard (Binghamton), Susan Wolfson (Princeton), Michael Demson (Sam Houston), Mariam Wassif (Carnegie Mellon)
12:15 – 2pm Lunch Break
2pm – 3:15pm Panel Two (Hybrid): Politics of Performing the Future
Panelists: Emily Rohrbach (Durham, UK), David Sigler (Calgary), Marc Gotthardt (Cambridge U)
3:15pm – 3:30pm Break
3:30pm – 4:45pm Panel Three: Our Everlasting Flame: Engaging with
Romanticism’s Enduring Foundations
Panelists: Stuart Curran; Elizabeth Denlinger (Pforzheimer Collection in the NYPL); Marsha Manns (BSA); Alice Levine (BSA); Andrew Stauffer (UVA); Jonathan Sachs (Concordia)
4:45pm – 5:45pm Keynote
Jerome McGann (UVA)
5:45pm – 6:00pm Closing Remarks by Kate Singer (with transition to Reception)
6:30pm – 8:30pm Reception
Closet Drama Showcase
Celebrate Bacchanalia by joining us for drinks and appetizers!
ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES
On Wednesday 23rd October, 4pm EST, the Byron Society of America will be hosting the 14th Leslie A. Marchand Lecture at Drew University, organized by Marsha Manns. Dr. Tom Mole, Principal of Van Mildert College, Durham, will be giving a talk in Drew’s Special Collections Library, where the BSA archives are housed. The lecture will be followed by a reception and tour of the BSA’s Collection.
- Drew University, 36 Madison Ave, Madison, NJ 07940
- https://drew.edu/
HOTEL SUGGESTIONS
As we do not have an official hotel partner for the event, here are some suggestions of affordable options close to Union Square:
The Chelsea Inn: https://chelseainn.com/
The Heritage Hotel NYC: https://www.heritagehotelnyc.com/
Freehand Hotels: https://freehandhotels.com/
Union Square Apartments NYC: https://unionsquareapartmentsnyc.com/
East Village Hotel NYC: https://www.eastvillagehotelnyc.com/
The Holiday Inn: https://www.ihg.com/holidayinn/hotels/us/en/new-york/nycvc/hoteldetail?cm_mmc=GoogleMaps-_-HI-_-US-_-NYCVC
Broadway Plaza Hotel: https://www.broadwayplazahotel.com/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=business-listing