Friday, February 24, 2012
Utz speaks with Medieval Institute Instructors
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Graduate Student Conference, 2/24, Center for Humanities
Graduate Humanities Conference
February 24, 2012 ~ University Center for the Humanities
9:15 Welcome and Introductions
9:20 Keynote Address - Pablo Pastrana, Department of Spanish
10:00 Session 1
11:50 Session 2
1:00 Lunch
2:00 Session 3
[n.b.: this closing session features papers from English Department students as well as a response by our own Dr. Eve Salisbury]
Ph.D. student Glenn Shaheen earns finalist position
The Poetry Society (www.poetrysociety.org) announced Glenn Shaheen as a finalist for the Norma Farber Frst Book Awared. This award was stablished by the family and friends of Norma Farber, poet and author of children's books, for a first book of original poetry written by an American and published in either a hard or soft cover in a standard edition in 2011. Translations are ineligible, as are chapbooks. Winning books are distributed to PSA members at the Second Century Friend level and above. Congratulations Glen !
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Utz prefaces volume on Neo-medievalism in the Media
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
New From Dr. Adam Clay
Dear Friends,
At last I'm happy to announce that my second book of poems, A Hotel
Lobby at the Edge of the World, is now available to order. I've
included links to a few online stores that have the book in stock.
Powell's: http://www.powells.com/biblio/62-9781571314413-0
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Hotel-Lobby-Edge-World-Poems/dp/1571314415/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1
Also, if any of you happen to teach the book in a class, let me know
and I'll be happy to trek out your way for a visit.
Thank you for your support--I hope to see you at AWP!
A
At last I'm happy to announce that my second book of poems, A Hotel
Lobby at the Edge of the World, is now available to order. I've
included links to a few online stores that have the book in stock.
Powell's: http://www.powells.com/biblio/62-9781571314413-0
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Hotel-Lobby-Edge-World-Poems/dp/1571314415/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1
Also, if any of you happen to teach the book in a class, let me know
and I'll be happy to trek out your way for a visit.
Thank you for your support--I hope to see you at AWP!
A
Monday, February 20, 2012
Neville Hoad to Speak on "Wildean Savagery" February 23
Neville Hoad is an associate professor of English and affiliated faculty with the Center for Women's and Gender Studies, the Center for African and African American Studies, and the Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice. He authored African Intimacies: Race, Homosexuality and Globalization (Minnesota, 2007), co-edited (with Karen Martin and Graeme Reid) Sex & Politics in South Africa (Double Storey, 2005) and currently is writing a book on the literary and cultural representations of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Sub-Saharan Africa. His areas of research include African and Victorian literature, queer theory, and the history of sexuality.
In his lecture Hoad locates Victorian origin narratives, both Darwinian ontogeny/phylogeny recapitulation and Freud's theories of psychosexual development, as sites which produced curious and deeply imbricated discourses of the primitive and the homosexual. He proceeds to investigate how racial and imperial rhetorics of savagery and sexual deviance became entrenched in the writings of Oscar Wilde as well as in public declarations about the author, particularly during his infamous 1895 trial.
Friday, February 17, 2012
News from Dr. Perryman-Clark
Thought I would share this article that I co-authored with colleagues. I hope to pass on two more articles scheduled to come out next month in Pedagogy and TETYC.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S8755461511000879
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S8755461511000879
Thursday, February 16, 2012
2012 WMU Directors' Festival
The Western Michigan University Directors Festival is coming to What-A-Do Theatre (4071 West Dickman Road, Battle Creek) on Sunday, February 19.
See the best and brightest of WMU's budding young directing students of Mark Liermann, as they stage the works of G. William Zorn.
The festival begins at 7 p.m.
Admission is a $5 donation. General seating and no reservations required. For more information please call us at 269.282.1953 or e-mail rwolfe@whatado.org.
Students Present Work at Alma College
Undergraduate English students Grace Brockway, Cody Mejeur, and Ben Moran will travel to Alma College on April 24th to present their work at Alma's annual Renaissance literature conference, a forum which allows for the sharing of ideas among Michigan students interested in the early modern period. The Western group's papers, respectively, concern the changes Shakespeare wrought in the Romeo and Juliet story when he adapted it from an earlier sixteenth-century narrative poem; the influence of Calvinist theology on some of Shakespeare's later plays; and the relationship between Shakespeare's The Tempest and the Genesis creation story.
"The Making of Fashion" by Katheine Joslin
'Para Edith Wharton el estilo era mucho más que la ropa. Era una actitud'
Entrevistamos a Katherine Joslin, autora de 'Edith Wharton and the making of fashion' para analizar qué papel jugaba la moda en la vida de la genial escritora
Beatriz García
14 de febrero de 2012
Edith Warthon (Nueva York,1862) fue, además de una de las mejores escritoras del Siglo XX, una especie de trendsetter de su época. Siempre interesada por todo lo que fuera refinado y de buen gusto, la escritora aprovechaba sus viajes a Europa para empaparse de todas las tendencias en ropa y decoración. Aprovechando que se acaban de cumplir 150 años de su nacimiento, charlamos con Katherine Joslin, profesora de la Universidad Western Michigan y autora del libro Edith Warthon and the making of fashion, sobre las claves del estilo de la ganadora del pulitzer por la La Edad de la Inocencia.
¿Cómo era la relación de Edith Wharton con la moda?
Creo que es interesante analizar que la señora Wharton venía de una familia muy adinerada. Formaba parte de la alta burguesía de Nueva York. Su familia era una de las 400 más ricas de la cuidad. Por lo tanto tenía la oportunidad de viajar con frecuencia a Europa. Allí era donde encontraba la inspiración para vestirse. En Francia concretamente, solía ir de compras junto a su madre, Lucretia Jones, a la Rue de la Paix. Allí visitaban los talleres de Charles Frederick Worth y Jacques Doucet, que como sabes son los padres de la alta costura.
Entonces, ¿fue Europa su principal fuente de inspiración?
Totalmente. De hecho, siempre volvía de los viajes cargada de cosas. Es muy curioso pero una vez, cuando regresó de uno de sus viajes, le hizo saber a sus amistades que encontraba la ciudad de Nueva York un sitio muy feo. Ella pensaba que en Estados Unidos no había un interés profundo por el arte, algo que sí ocurría en la Europa de la época.
¿Cómo definiría su estilo?
Para Edith Wharton el estilo era un todo. Era algo universal. No tenía solo que ver con la ropa y los accesorios. Para ella el estilo también eran los autores que lees, la manera en que te comportas, en que hablas, en que escribes, el modo en el decoras tu casa o en el que diseñas tu jardín. Iba más allá de la ropa. Era una actitud.
¿Cuáles eran las claves de su forma de vestir?
Tanto en su propia vida como en la de sus personajes prestaba mucha atención a que la ropa fuese apropiada para el momento. Eso es lo que más le preocupada a la hora de vestir. Se esforzaba por encontrar piezas que fueran apropiadas para cada instante. Siempre decía que lo más importante a la hora de vestirse era el sentido común. Por otro lado, siempre insistía en que había que prestar mucha atención a la forma del cuerpo de cada uno, al tipo de constitución de cada persona. En una ocasión escribió que las claves de la máxima elegancia eran la moderación, la finura y la relevancia.
¿Qué tipo de prendas abundaban en su armario?
Depende de la época de su vida en la que nos fijemos. Al principio usaba ropa más encorsetada. Muchos corsés y sombreros. También le gustaban mucho las pieles. Pero su estilo evolucionó mucho con el tiempo. En la década de los años 30, comenzó a usar diseños de Coco Chanel. Ten en cuenta que la ropa de décadas anteriores no dejaba casi movilidad y la mujer moderna necesita poder moverse con naturalidad. Es por esta razón que le encantaba la comodidad de las prendas de Coco Chanel.
Y ¿qué me dice de los accesorios?
Le gustaban mucho las joyas. Sobre todo las perlas, los diamantes y los zafiros. Y, por supuesto, como accesorio principal usaba los sombreros que son una clave de su estilo.
Portada del libro
Portada del libro 'Edith Wharton and the making of fashion'. Imagen de Wharton
Cuando se fija en la manera de vestir de la mujer de hoy en día, ¿encuentra influencias de Edith Wharton?
Sí las encuentro. Creo que ha sido un personaje muy influyente más allá de la literatura. Los sombreros son algo que a veces cuando se los veo a la gente puestos pienso: 'Wow esto es muy Edith Wharton'. Además, a ella le gustaba mucho mezclar una pieza tradicional y antigua con algo nuevo y eso es algo que se hace mucho ahora. Pero no hay que olvidar que también ha sido muy influyente en el mundo de la decoración y el diseño de jardines.
¿Cómo podríamos aplicar las enseñanzas de Edith Wharton a la decoración de nuestras casas?
Para ella era muy importante la armonía entre la fachada de la casa y la decoración interior. Pensaba que era imprescindible que el estilo exterior estuviera relacionado con el interior. Además, todo tenía que ser bastante simétrico y estar en armonía. Para ella la decoración tenía que tener ritmo para el ojo al igual que la poesía satisface el oído.
Entrevistamos a Katherine Joslin, autora de 'Edith Wharton and the making of fashion' para analizar qué papel jugaba la moda en la vida de la genial escritora
Beatriz García
14 de febrero de 2012
Edith Warthon (Nueva York,1862) fue, además de una de las mejores escritoras del Siglo XX, una especie de trendsetter de su época. Siempre interesada por todo lo que fuera refinado y de buen gusto, la escritora aprovechaba sus viajes a Europa para empaparse de todas las tendencias en ropa y decoración. Aprovechando que se acaban de cumplir 150 años de su nacimiento, charlamos con Katherine Joslin, profesora de la Universidad Western Michigan y autora del libro Edith Warthon and the making of fashion, sobre las claves del estilo de la ganadora del pulitzer por la La Edad de la Inocencia.
¿Cómo era la relación de Edith Wharton con la moda?
Creo que es interesante analizar que la señora Wharton venía de una familia muy adinerada. Formaba parte de la alta burguesía de Nueva York. Su familia era una de las 400 más ricas de la cuidad. Por lo tanto tenía la oportunidad de viajar con frecuencia a Europa. Allí era donde encontraba la inspiración para vestirse. En Francia concretamente, solía ir de compras junto a su madre, Lucretia Jones, a la Rue de la Paix. Allí visitaban los talleres de Charles Frederick Worth y Jacques Doucet, que como sabes son los padres de la alta costura.
Entonces, ¿fue Europa su principal fuente de inspiración?
Totalmente. De hecho, siempre volvía de los viajes cargada de cosas. Es muy curioso pero una vez, cuando regresó de uno de sus viajes, le hizo saber a sus amistades que encontraba la ciudad de Nueva York un sitio muy feo. Ella pensaba que en Estados Unidos no había un interés profundo por el arte, algo que sí ocurría en la Europa de la época.
¿Cómo definiría su estilo?
Para Edith Wharton el estilo era un todo. Era algo universal. No tenía solo que ver con la ropa y los accesorios. Para ella el estilo también eran los autores que lees, la manera en que te comportas, en que hablas, en que escribes, el modo en el decoras tu casa o en el que diseñas tu jardín. Iba más allá de la ropa. Era una actitud.
¿Cuáles eran las claves de su forma de vestir?
Tanto en su propia vida como en la de sus personajes prestaba mucha atención a que la ropa fuese apropiada para el momento. Eso es lo que más le preocupada a la hora de vestir. Se esforzaba por encontrar piezas que fueran apropiadas para cada instante. Siempre decía que lo más importante a la hora de vestirse era el sentido común. Por otro lado, siempre insistía en que había que prestar mucha atención a la forma del cuerpo de cada uno, al tipo de constitución de cada persona. En una ocasión escribió que las claves de la máxima elegancia eran la moderación, la finura y la relevancia.
¿Qué tipo de prendas abundaban en su armario?
Depende de la época de su vida en la que nos fijemos. Al principio usaba ropa más encorsetada. Muchos corsés y sombreros. También le gustaban mucho las pieles. Pero su estilo evolucionó mucho con el tiempo. En la década de los años 30, comenzó a usar diseños de Coco Chanel. Ten en cuenta que la ropa de décadas anteriores no dejaba casi movilidad y la mujer moderna necesita poder moverse con naturalidad. Es por esta razón que le encantaba la comodidad de las prendas de Coco Chanel.
Y ¿qué me dice de los accesorios?
Le gustaban mucho las joyas. Sobre todo las perlas, los diamantes y los zafiros. Y, por supuesto, como accesorio principal usaba los sombreros que son una clave de su estilo.
Portada del libro
Portada del libro 'Edith Wharton and the making of fashion'. Imagen de Wharton
Cuando se fija en la manera de vestir de la mujer de hoy en día, ¿encuentra influencias de Edith Wharton?
Sí las encuentro. Creo que ha sido un personaje muy influyente más allá de la literatura. Los sombreros son algo que a veces cuando se los veo a la gente puestos pienso: 'Wow esto es muy Edith Wharton'. Además, a ella le gustaba mucho mezclar una pieza tradicional y antigua con algo nuevo y eso es algo que se hace mucho ahora. Pero no hay que olvidar que también ha sido muy influyente en el mundo de la decoración y el diseño de jardines.
¿Cómo podríamos aplicar las enseñanzas de Edith Wharton a la decoración de nuestras casas?
Para ella era muy importante la armonía entre la fachada de la casa y la decoración interior. Pensaba que era imprescindible que el estilo exterior estuviera relacionado con el interior. Además, todo tenía que ser bastante simétrico y estar en armonía. Para ella la decoración tenía que tener ritmo para el ojo al igual que la poesía satisface el oído.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Comparative Drama essay wins award
An essay published in the Fall 2010/Spring 2011 special double issue of Comparative Drama has been awarded the 2012 Philadelphia Constantinidis Critical Theory Award for Best Essay. This award recognizes the best comparative essay on any aspect and period of Greek drama or theater published in English in any journal or anthology in any country during the previous year.
The winner is Robert Davis of CUNY for the essay "Is Mr. Euripides a Communist? The Federal Theatre Project's 1938 Trojan Incident." Professor Davis will receive $1000 and a commemorative plaque at the 2012 Comparative Drama Conference, to be held in Baltimore this March.
This special issue, guest-edited by Amanda Wrigley of the University of Westminster, explored the topic “Translation, Performance, and Reception of Greek Drama, 1900-1950: International Dialogues.”
The winner is Robert Davis of CUNY for the essay "Is Mr. Euripides a Communist? The Federal Theatre Project's 1938 Trojan Incident." Professor Davis will receive $1000 and a commemorative plaque at the 2012 Comparative Drama Conference, to be held in Baltimore this March.
This special issue, guest-edited by Amanda Wrigley of the University of Westminster, explored the topic “Translation, Performance, and Reception of Greek Drama, 1900-1950: International Dialogues.”
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Grad Conference Deadline ~ U of M ECGS/NCF
ECSG/NCF Grad Student Conference: "Transporting Bodies and Minds: 18th- and 19th-Century Travel"
SEPT 15
Conference Description/CFP
Transporting Bodies and Minds: 18th- and 19th-Century Travel
Throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, travelers of all kinds documented their experiences in private letters and diaries, official correspondence, life writing, spiritual and religious narratives, and ethnographic accounts. Furthermore, these experiences were often transformed into works of art, with real and imagined moments of contact serving as the inspiration for painting, music, poetry, prose fiction, photography, and other creative ventures. These aesthetic productions transformed the foreign into the national, the known into the unknown, appearing to expand access to other cultures--a model of cultural transportation that recent criticism is troubling.
Scholarship drawing on theories of post-colonialism, gender, material and visual culture, cognitive studies, posthumanism, and other critical paradigms has challenged our understanding of the impact--not just aesthetic, but also commercial, martial, and religious--of travel in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This work has made strides in elucidating a more dynamic picture of the way travel and cultural encounter could transform (or fail to transform) prior understandings of both time and space. Moreover, it has allowed for a more capacious appreciation of how influence happens, extending beyond more uni-directional, Eurocentric approaches.
Continuing this work, the University of Michigan’s Eighteenth-Century Studies Group and Nineteenth-Century Forum will co-host an interdisciplinary graduate student conference on these topics, to take place in Ann Arbor on September 15, 2012. We are pleased to announce that Kate Flint, Provost Professor of English and Art History (University of Southern California), will be our keynote speaker.
Graduate students are encouraged to submit papers that explore the implications of travel, tourism, boundary crossing, exploration, and other related topics--from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. Submissions of either individual papers or full panels are welcome. Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words to Karen McConnell (mcconnka@umich.edu) by May 1, 2012.
Suggested paper topics include (but are not limited to):
mass tourism
emigration/immigration
travel and commercial enterprise
travel and photography
documenting travel/travel as documentation
Roma, Sinti, and other itinerant communities
time-travel
smuggling
travel and war
imaginative or mental journeys
travel and empire
exploration, conquest, contact
depictions in the visual arts (e.g., the natural world, native/foreign peoples, aesthetic judgment)
travel’s effect on genre
contagion/infection
consequences for epistemology (e.g., scientific, spiritual, ethnographic)
Website: http://www.umich.edu/~ecsg/
Contact: rmcadams@umich.edu
SEPT 15
Conference Description/CFP
Transporting Bodies and Minds: 18th- and 19th-Century Travel
Throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, travelers of all kinds documented their experiences in private letters and diaries, official correspondence, life writing, spiritual and religious narratives, and ethnographic accounts. Furthermore, these experiences were often transformed into works of art, with real and imagined moments of contact serving as the inspiration for painting, music, poetry, prose fiction, photography, and other creative ventures. These aesthetic productions transformed the foreign into the national, the known into the unknown, appearing to expand access to other cultures--a model of cultural transportation that recent criticism is troubling.
Scholarship drawing on theories of post-colonialism, gender, material and visual culture, cognitive studies, posthumanism, and other critical paradigms has challenged our understanding of the impact--not just aesthetic, but also commercial, martial, and religious--of travel in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This work has made strides in elucidating a more dynamic picture of the way travel and cultural encounter could transform (or fail to transform) prior understandings of both time and space. Moreover, it has allowed for a more capacious appreciation of how influence happens, extending beyond more uni-directional, Eurocentric approaches.
Continuing this work, the University of Michigan’s Eighteenth-Century Studies Group and Nineteenth-Century Forum will co-host an interdisciplinary graduate student conference on these topics, to take place in Ann Arbor on September 15, 2012. We are pleased to announce that Kate Flint, Provost Professor of English and Art History (University of Southern California), will be our keynote speaker.
Graduate students are encouraged to submit papers that explore the implications of travel, tourism, boundary crossing, exploration, and other related topics--from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. Submissions of either individual papers or full panels are welcome. Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words to Karen McConnell (mcconnka@umich.edu) by May 1, 2012.
Suggested paper topics include (but are not limited to):
mass tourism
emigration/immigration
travel and commercial enterprise
travel and photography
documenting travel/travel as documentation
Roma, Sinti, and other itinerant communities
time-travel
smuggling
travel and war
imaginative or mental journeys
travel and empire
exploration, conquest, contact
depictions in the visual arts (e.g., the natural world, native/foreign peoples, aesthetic judgment)
travel’s effect on genre
contagion/infection
consequences for epistemology (e.g., scientific, spiritual, ethnographic)
Website: http://www.umich.edu/~ecsg/
Contact: rmcadams@umich.edu
Utz Serves the IUF and DFG
Richard Utz recently accepted requests to serve as external reviewer for collaborative research grant proposals to the Institut universitaire de France (IUF) and the Deutsche Forschungsgesellschaft (DFG). These organizations are the French and German equivalents of the NEH and/or NSF.
Friday, February 10, 2012
8 students to present in New Orleans
Eight WMU students have been accepted to present their original scholarly and creative work at the 2012 Sigma Tau Delta International Convention, which will be held February 29 through March 3 in New Orleans. Their work was selected from over 1,200 submissions of which approximately 400 were selected for presentation.
The students who will present this year in New Orleans and the titles of their works are:
The students who will present this year in New Orleans and the titles of their works are:
- Christopher Hart, "Latitude and Longitude"
- Ian Hollenbaugh, “'That Going Shall Be Used with Feet': Rendering King Lear in Old English Meter"
- Christopher Miller, "Bellum Invictum" (original fiction)
- Benjamin Moran, "The Freedom of ‘Not Knowing:’ A.R. Ammons’s 'Corsons Inlet' as an Epistemological Meditation"
- Kathryn O’Brien, "The Candelabra" (original drama)
- Emily Scott, "Bones" and "Blue House on Bass Lake" (original poetry)
- August Smith, "Will the Real T Cooper Please Stand Up?"
- Jacob Swanson, "Anne's Redemption in Austen's Persuasion"
These eight students bring the total number of WMU student presenters at the annual convention to 50 since the Alpha Nu Pi chapter of Sigma Tau Delta was chartered at WMU in December 2005. Its active presence at the annual convention, signature campus events such as the twice-yearly English Studies Conference, and rapid growth to nearly 400 active and alumni members today have led to the international organization's recognition of Alpha Nu Pi as one of the most "active, vital chapters in the country."
Congratulations to these outstanding students!
Thursday, February 9, 2012
new Almodovar film@Little Theater
Dear Film Fan,
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, our February 10-12 feature might cause your heart to skip a beat. THE SKIN I LIVE IN is jam-packed with director Pedro Almodovar’s signature themes of passion, love, comedy and a titillating dollop of sci-fi for spice. It tells the story of Dr. Robert Ledgard, an eminent, but unscrupulous plastic surgeon, who, after his wife is burned in a car crash, becomes interested in creating a new skin which he believes could have saved her. For twelve years he works to cultivate this impervious skin replacement, but to do so he needs an accomplice and a human guinea pig. His faithful and doting childhood caretaker becomes his accomplice, but who becomes (and what happens to) his guinea pig makes a master film maker's latest an over-the-top mix of horror and melodrama.
Showtimes for THE SKIN I LIVE IN will be:
Friday, February 10 – 7:00 and 9:30pm
Saturday, February 11 – 4:30, 7:00 and 9:30pm
Sunday, February 12 – 2:30, 5:00 and 7:30pm
http://www.kalfilmsociety.net/index.html
Cutaneously yours,
The KFS
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Paul Johnston Upcoming Presentations
Mark your calendars all:
A joint conference on English and Germanic linguistics and philology, April 26-28, 2012 Indiana University, Bloomington
“The York Play Cycle and Evidence for Early Stages of the Great Vowel Shift”
"Vowel System Restructuring in the Nineteenth-Century West Midlands of England,”
--
A joint conference on English and Germanic linguistics and philology, April 26-28, 2012 Indiana University, Bloomington
“The York Play Cycle and Evidence for Early Stages of the Great Vowel Shift”
"Vowel System Restructuring in the Nineteenth-Century West Midlands of England,”
--
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Webb gives Keynote Lecture - 2/9 @ 7PM
Keynote Lecture: "Drones, Gunships, and Good Shooting: War or Video Game?”
Prof. Allen Webb, Department of English, WMU
Thursday, Feb. 9, 7 pm, Brown 3025
A reception will follow the talk.
Drawing on his new book, Teaching the Literature of Today's Middle East , Allen Webb will raise questions about teaching and learning about war and war literature, about video games as literary and classroom texts, and about war and the Middle East. The presentation will include viewing clips from the Call of Duty video game series, which has sold more than 55 million copies (approximately $3 billion).
In addition to his three most recent books published this year, Webb has published extensively in the field of English Education, is a frequent keynoter at conferences, maintains 10 websites, and has won five grants totaling $1.5 million. He served on the Executive Committee of the National Conference on English Education, and is one of the authors of the State of Michigan 9-12 Language Arts Content Standards. In 2004 Webb won the Faculty Achievement Award for Teaching from the WMU College of Arts and Sciences.
Allen's webpage: http://homepages.wmich.edu/~acareywe/
McKittrick Presents Papers about Film
Dr. Casey McKittrick presented "An Eye For a Stomach: Appetite-Epistemologies in Rear Window" upon invitation by the Critical Michigan Association of Screen Studies at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor on Friday, February 3.
He will also present an upcoming paper, "Hitchcock's Appetites: Gender, Hunger and Identification," at the International Society for the Study of Narrative conference in Las Vegas on March 16.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Mlive speaks with Dr. Feffer.
KALAMAZOO — Kalamazoo is a theater town, but is it a playwright's town?
"I really think it is," Steve Feffer, Western Michigan University professor of playwriting, said. "I've seen how the playwrights have been able to thrive here."
Created to give playwrights a boost, Theatre Kalamazoo's New Play Festival is expanding in its second year to ten participating theatres, and has added the work of community writers to that of students of Kalamazoo College and WMU. Ten new plays will be given staged readings at the Epic Theatre Feb. 11.
Event producers Feffer and Ed Menta (professor and director of theatre at Kalamazoo College) said the fest is a help for writers who need to see their works on the stage.
It usually takes money and a lot of talented people -- not to mention a supportive audience -- to get a script on the stage. New works by fresh writers don't often get a chance at a full production.
If you go
New Play Festival
Saturday Feb. 11:
11 a.m.: full length, "Take-Off" by Conor McShane, directed by Katy Copeland, presented by University Theatre.
1 p.m.: One-acts, "Tree House for Tom-Tom" by Bonnie Grooters, directed by Ada McCartney, presented by Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College. "Coming Attractions" by Fran Hoepfner, directed by Allison Alexander, presented by Portage Summer Entertainment Series. "Kindness of Strangers" by David Landskroener, directed by Kevin Dodd, presented by Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.
4 p.m.: 10-minute plays, "Natalie" by David Landskroener, directed by Kimberly Dunham, presented by The New Vic. "And the Name of the Killer Is..." by John Thierwechter, directed by Janai Travis, presented by Black Arts and Cultural Center. "Desserted Island" by Jason Lenz, directed by Kyle Waterman, presented by the Center Stage. "A Matter of Taste" by Bill Zorn, directed by Dann Sytsma, presented by Farmers Alley.
8 p.m.: Full length, "Revisionaries" by Jason Lenz, directed by Robert Smith, presented by Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.
Where: Epic Theatre, Epic Center, Kalamazoo Mall.
Cost: Free.
On the Web: theatrekalamazoo.org.
"That's one of the reasons for the festival, to provide the opportunity for the playwrights to see their work done and to have it worked on by different people," Menta said.
The festival won't stage full productions of the plays. Actors will do "script in hand" readings.
"They're not just sit-down readings," Feffer said. Actors will be "moving through space, you're getting a sense of how the play works in the space of the stage, and that's so vital."
A script might have a good story and dialog on paper, but a playwright needs to see how a piece works on stage, worked on by, and in front of, people who had nothing to do with the initial creation.
"It's a solitary experience, you in the room with the computer screen or blank page," Menta said. "But sooner or later it has to be in rehearsal with a director and actors, a stage manager calling the cues. And all these people are contributing to your work. Sometimes the writer may not always agree with what's happening.... But that's part of the process of theatre, it's impossible to do it by yourself."
After the plays Feffer holds a talk-back session, leading the audience, director and actors in a discussion of the work. "He's very good at that in terms of getting everybody involved," Menta said.
Feedback is a needed help for the playwright in fine-tuning the script. "The audience becomes a very important part of the process with these talk-backs," Feffer said.
The festival is part of a theatre community that is more open than most to new work, Feffer said. "This is really extraordinary and unique," Feffer said, "to see a community come together with this many theatres, to support and do work, new work, over a weekend like this, I'm not sure where else that's happening."
"I really think it is," Steve Feffer, Western Michigan University professor of playwriting, said. "I've seen how the playwrights have been able to thrive here."
Created to give playwrights a boost, Theatre Kalamazoo's New Play Festival is expanding in its second year to ten participating theatres, and has added the work of community writers to that of students of Kalamazoo College and WMU. Ten new plays will be given staged readings at the Epic Theatre Feb. 11.
Event producers Feffer and Ed Menta (professor and director of theatre at Kalamazoo College) said the fest is a help for writers who need to see their works on the stage.
It usually takes money and a lot of talented people -- not to mention a supportive audience -- to get a script on the stage. New works by fresh writers don't often get a chance at a full production.
If you go
New Play Festival
Saturday Feb. 11:
11 a.m.: full length, "Take-Off" by Conor McShane, directed by Katy Copeland, presented by University Theatre.
1 p.m.: One-acts, "Tree House for Tom-Tom" by Bonnie Grooters, directed by Ada McCartney, presented by Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College. "Coming Attractions" by Fran Hoepfner, directed by Allison Alexander, presented by Portage Summer Entertainment Series. "Kindness of Strangers" by David Landskroener, directed by Kevin Dodd, presented by Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.
4 p.m.: 10-minute plays, "Natalie" by David Landskroener, directed by Kimberly Dunham, presented by The New Vic. "And the Name of the Killer Is..." by John Thierwechter, directed by Janai Travis, presented by Black Arts and Cultural Center. "Desserted Island" by Jason Lenz, directed by Kyle Waterman, presented by the Center Stage. "A Matter of Taste" by Bill Zorn, directed by Dann Sytsma, presented by Farmers Alley.
8 p.m.: Full length, "Revisionaries" by Jason Lenz, directed by Robert Smith, presented by Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.
Where: Epic Theatre, Epic Center, Kalamazoo Mall.
Cost: Free.
On the Web: theatrekalamazoo.org.
"That's one of the reasons for the festival, to provide the opportunity for the playwrights to see their work done and to have it worked on by different people," Menta said.
The festival won't stage full productions of the plays. Actors will do "script in hand" readings.
"They're not just sit-down readings," Feffer said. Actors will be "moving through space, you're getting a sense of how the play works in the space of the stage, and that's so vital."
A script might have a good story and dialog on paper, but a playwright needs to see how a piece works on stage, worked on by, and in front of, people who had nothing to do with the initial creation.
"It's a solitary experience, you in the room with the computer screen or blank page," Menta said. "But sooner or later it has to be in rehearsal with a director and actors, a stage manager calling the cues. And all these people are contributing to your work. Sometimes the writer may not always agree with what's happening.... But that's part of the process of theatre, it's impossible to do it by yourself."
After the plays Feffer holds a talk-back session, leading the audience, director and actors in a discussion of the work. "He's very good at that in terms of getting everybody involved," Menta said.
Feedback is a needed help for the playwright in fine-tuning the script. "The audience becomes a very important part of the process with these talk-backs," Feffer said.
The festival is part of a theatre community that is more open than most to new work, Feffer said. "This is really extraordinary and unique," Feffer said, "to see a community come together with this many theatres, to support and do work, new work, over a weekend like this, I'm not sure where else that's happening."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)