The , 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听late , 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鈥檚 English, comparative humanities and classical and modern languages departments and the Commonwealth Center for the Humanities and Society in the College of Arts & Sciences.听听
Egan, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 2011 for 鈥,鈥 will read from her latest novel, 鈥溾 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 鈥淭he Nation鈥 and recipient of a 2016 Guggenheim Fellowship for poetry, 5 p.m. Feb. 23 in Chao Auditorium, Ekstrom Library.听
- Spanish poet Fernando Oper茅, professor, historian and critic from the University of Virginia, who will deliver the Hispanic Keynote Presentation, 鈥淧oes铆a y memoria: En el nombre del padre: Cr贸nica de la Espa帽a de Franco a la Am茅rica de Trump. Lectura biling眉e con su traductora Rhonda Dahl Buchanan,鈥 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.听
- Merve Emre, Oxford University professor and 鈥減ost-discipline鈥 theoretician, 5:30 p.m. Feb. 25 in Middleton Auditorium, Strickler Hall.
鈥淭he entire program can be accessed off the and includes free virtual offerings for registered attendees on Feb. 20 and Feb. 21,鈥 said S. Matthew Biberman, conference director.
Among the online-only offerings are:
- Feb. 20, 8 p.m., 鈥淏y Parties Unknown: Lynching in America,鈥 a conversation with , producer/director at WKU/PBS and creator of 鈥,鈥 a documentary about the 1908 lynchings of four black men in Russellville, Kentucky; , assistant professor, University of South Alabama; and , archivist and curator at the West Kentucky African American Museum & Research Center. .
- Feb. 21, 8 p.m., 鈥淣ew Mutants,鈥 a conversation about comics and poetry with poet Burt and , 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 , 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.听
For more information on the conference and its long history at UofL, listen to the LCLC Podcast.
