The Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture since 1900, scheduled online and in-person Feb. 20-25, is marking its 50th year at the University of Louisville with notable speakers and a remembrance to a beloved humanities professor.
Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jennifer Egan is among the featured speakers during the conference on Belknap Campus. Additionally, winners of a poetry contest named for the late Annette Allen, UofL professor emerita of humanities, will be announced.
Writers, critics and literary scholars from around the world are expected to attend the annual event, sponsored by UofL’s English, comparative humanities and classical and modern languages departments and the Commonwealth Center for the Humanities and Society in the College of Arts & Sciences.
Egan, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 2011 for “A Visit from the Goon Squad,” will read from her latest novel, “The Candy House” at 5 p.m. Feb. 24 in Middleton Auditorium, Strickler Hall. The reading is free and open to the public.
Other notables giving in person, free, public addresses during the conference are:
- Stephanie Burt, Harvard University English professor, coeditor of poetry at “The Nation” and recipient of a 2016 Guggenheim Fellowship for poetry, 5 p.m. Feb. 23 in Chao Auditorium, Ekstrom Library.
- Spanish poet Fernando Operé, professor, historian and critic from the University of Virginia, who will deliver the Hispanic Keynote Presentation, “Poesía y memoria: En el nombre del padre: Crónica de la España de Franco a la América de Trump. Lectura bilingüe con su traductora Rhonda Dahl Buchanan,” Feb. 24, 3:15 p.m., Bingham Poetry Room, Ekstrom Library. The presentation will include a conversation between the author and his translator about his memoir, with bilingual readings from the original and the translation.
- Merve Emre, Oxford University professor and “post-discipline” theoretician, 5:30 p.m. Feb. 25 in Middleton Auditorium, Strickler Hall.
“The entire program can be accessed off the website and includes free virtual offerings for registered attendees on Feb. 20 and Feb. 21,” said S. Matthew Biberman, conference director.
Among the online-only offerings are:
- Feb. 20, 8 p.m., “By Parties Unknown: Lynching in America,” a conversation with Josh Niedwick, producer/director at WKU/PBS and creator of “By Parties Unknown,” a documentary about the 1908 lynchings of four black men in Russellville, Kentucky; Laura Vrana, assistant professor, University of South Alabama; and Michael Morro, archivist and curator at the West Kentucky African American Museum & Research Center. The documentary can be viewed here.
- Feb. 21, 8 p.m., “New Mutants,” a conversation about comics and poetry with poet Burt and Ben Saunders, professor of comic and cartoon studies at the University of Oregon and editor of the Penguin Marvel Classic Series.
In addition, an in-person seminar dedicated to a celebration of the late Annette Allen, UofL professor emerita of humanities, will be Feb. 23, 1:30 p.m., Room 205, Bingham Humanities Building. Winners of a poetry contest named in her honor will be announced.
For more information on the conference and its long history at UofL, listen to the LCLC Podcast here.
