Fresh Threads of Brontës

1. A scholar alert with several Brontë-related talks at the University of Iowa, Iowa City:

The 17th Eighteenth- and Nineteenth- British Women Writers Conference 2009
Fresh Threads of Connection
(April 2-5)

Hosted by The University of Iowa Department of English

Thursday, April 2:
2A: Weaving Together History and Fiction (Senate Chamber)
Moderator: Charles H. Hinnant, University of Missouri—Columbia
• Cynthia Huff, Illinois State University: “Cross-stitches of the family: Familial discourse in Wuthering Heights and the Victorian diary”

Rewriting Literary Traditions: Adaptation and Translation (Ballroom A)
Moderator: Mary Ann O’Farrell, Texas A&M University
• Hanna A. Jan, Kansas State University: “A Text Between Two Cultures: Problems of Translation in the Arabic Version of Jane Eyre”

Friday, April 3
5E: The Politics of Plumage: Textiles and the Text (Lindquist Room)
Moderator: Sukanya Gupta, Louisiana State University
• Christie Peterson, Brigham Young University: “‘The Home I Had Never Had’: Imperialism and Domesticity in The Professor”

6E: The Empire’s New Clothes (Lindquist Room)
Moderator: Joyce Kelley, Auburn University, Montgomery
• April Pelt, University of Delaware: “The Fabrication of Englishness in Jane Eyre”

7A: Mommy Dearest (Ballroom A)
Moderator: Joshua Gooch, University of Iowa
• Brooklynn L. Lehner, Illinois State University: “What Bad Mothers Can Teach Us: The Benefits of Bad Mothering in Jane Eyre”

7C: National Identity and National Difference (Ballroom C)
Moderator: Elizabeth A. Raschke, Loras College
• Lanya Lamouria, Albion College: “Charlotte Brontë’s Villette: The French Connection”
• Anne Longmuir, Kansas State University: “The French Connection: Understanding the Role of Belgium in Charlotte Brontë’s The Professor and Villette”

10E: Raising Britain: Education Techniques and Reforms (Lindquist Room)
Moderator: Jodi L. Wagner, Marian University
• Cecily Hill, University of Southern Mississippi: “Composing Jane Eyre: Ellenor Fenn, Mary Lamb and the Making of a Governess”
• Sandra Hagan, Vancouver Island University: “Untying the Knot: Charlotte Brontë and Amy Levy Co-Write a Happy Ending for Single Women in Villette (1853) and The Romance of a Shop (1888)”

11E: Snapshots of Subjectivity (Lindquist Room)
Moderator: Deborah Manion, University of Iowa
• Marty Gould, University of South Florida: “Jane Eyre, Revisioned”
• Beth Shane, University of Iowa: “Charlotte Brontë’s Scare Show: Gothic Spectacles in Villette”

Saturday, April 4

Seminar 4: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Fresh Threads for the Classroom (Ballroom D)
If you long for the days of graduate seminars and a spirited discussion of a good book, look no further! University of Iowa’s James O. Freedman
Professor of Letters Garrett Stewart will lead the group through a discussion of Anne Brontë’s novel. The reading for the seminar will be taken from
Professor Stewart’s most recent book, Novel Violence: a Narratography of Victorian Fiction, due in the spring from the University of Chicago Press.

2. At the Guildhall Arts Center, Grantham, UK.

Literature at Lunchtime
Charlotte Bronte's 'Jane Eyre'
April 2, 12 noon

More prolific and longer lived than her two writer sisters, Charlotte produced four novels but it is her 'Jane Eyre' which has become an immense classic, studied the world over and filmed with regularity.
It is much more than its basic 'Mills and Boon' plot of the poor plain girl marrying the boss! The final union of the heroine with her beloved Rochester has held an enduring fascination for generations of readers.
Come and enjoy a novel about courage, endurance and final triumph.

More information in the Grantham Journal.

3. At the Brentwood Branch Library, Springfield, Missouri:

Thursday, April 2, 2009
Let's Talk About It: Love and Forgiveness in the Presence of the Enemy
Brentwood Branch Library 6:30 pm.
"Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte. Explore the theme of "Love and Forgiveness in the Presence of the Enemy" through classic and contemporary literature during this five-part book discussion series moderated by Dr. Randall Fuller, associate professor of English, Drury University. This series continues through July and is supported by a grant from the American Library Association and the Fetzer Institute, as part of its Campaign for Love & Forgiveness. Registration starts March 17; call 883-1974.

More information in the Springfield News-Leader.

4. In Bradenton, Florida:

LIBRARY SCHEDULES

Rocky Bluff Branch: 7016 U.S. 301 N., Ellenton; 723-4821

“Jane Eyre” book discussion, 10:30 a.m. April 3. (Bradenton Herald)

Categories: Alert, Jane Eyre, Scholar, Talks