“Byron and the Book”

The 36th International Byron Society Conference

Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A.

26-31 July 2010

Keynote speakers:

• Peter Graham, Virginia Tech (The Leslie A. Marchand Memorial Lecture): “Why Should the 21st Century Read Byron?”
• James V. Hart, Screenwriter, Bram Stoker’s Dracula: “Deconstructing Dracula“
• Christoph Irmscher, Indiana University: “Longfellow’s Wicked Byroniana”

Registration Now Open:
https://commerce.cashnet.com/SFBYRON

Registration:

The conference registration fee is $450 ($500 after 15 May; $550.00 after 15 June), or $350 for students ($400 after 15 May; $450.00 after 15 June).  Students must provide documentation of their status no later than checking in at the conference.  The completed registration form and payment must be received by 16 July 2010.  No refunds will be given after 16 July.  Attendance is strictly limited due to venue capacity.  Applications will be accepted on a first come, first served basis.

Note that the Byron Society of America gives travel grants to selected graduate students intending to present a paper at the conference.

Participants and attendees should register online here:  https://commerce.cashnet.com/SFBYRON

Those who wish to register by mail may do so by using this form:  Byron.Boston.Reg.Form

Questions?

Please address questions to the conference organizers: Stuart Peterfreund (s.peterfreund@neu.edu) and/or Peter Accardo (accardo@fas.harvard.edu)

Accommodations

Registrants are responsible for booking their own accommodations for the conference.  Fifty rooms are reserved until 5 July, 2010,  for confirmed registrants only at the Colonnade Hotel, 120 Huntington Avenue, Boston, a short walk from the Northeastern University campus.  These rooms will hold either one or two occupants.  They are priced at $179/night plus tax.  A continental breakfast will be available at $22/person/day.  For those mailing in their registrations and paying by check, the Colonnade’s reservation system may be accessed online (The Colonnade Hotel Reservations – NEU Byron Society) or by telephone (800-962-3030—reference the “Northeastern International Byron Society”).  The reservation information for electronic registrants will appear at the registration site after they have registered and paid the registration fee.

Sixty-five rooms at Northeastern University will also be available.  Every two of these rooms, in Northeastern’s newest student housing facility, International Village, share one bathroom and are designated for single occupancy only.  They are priced at $65/night.  A one-night deposit will be due at the time of registration, and the balance will be due by July 1.  Payment for Northeastern student housing may be made by check (drawn in United States dollars on a U.S. bank), payable to the Byron Society Conference [memo:  Fund # 386388], postmarked no later than 1 July, 2010, to:  Stuart Peterfreund / Department of English—406 HO / Northeastern University / Boston, MA 02115-5000.  Or payment may be made electronically, through the conference website.  (That portal has not yet been set up, but should be by the first week in March.)  There are dining facilities in the building, or those who wish to join other guests for the continental breakfast at the Colonnade may do so for the $22/person/day fee noted above.  Please note that minor children less than eighteen years old may not stay in Northeastern University housing.

Symposium Program

(Times and venues subject to change)

Sunday, July 25th

5:30 – 7:30pm             Pre-Conference Reception, Boston Ballroom, Colonnade Hotel

Monday, July 26th

9:00am – 12:15pm        1st Academic Session (at Northeastern: Alumni Center)

9:00 – 10:30am Panel 1: Rewritings

Chair:  Christiane Vigouroux (Société française des Etudes byroniennes)

1. D. Michael Jones, University of Connecticut

“Clearer than the Tome”: Byronic Afterlife in the Books of the 1880s’ Romance Revival

2.  G. Todd Davis, Kentucky State University

Fictionalized Byron

3.  William Lofdahl, Marquette University

Guilt by Association: Gore’s Cecil and Byron the Regency Villain

Break (15 min)

10:45am – 12:15pm            Panel 2: Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage

Chair:  Christine Kenyon-Jones, King’s College, London

1. Lauren Neefe, SUNY Stony Brook

The Epistolary Hero: Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage and the Authority of Composite Sequence

2.  Matthew Ocheltree, Harvard University

“The Last Still Loveliest”: The Still-Life of Culture and the Poetics of Eventual Renewal in Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage

3.  Elizabeth Rees, Fordham University

“Long Absent Harold Re-appears at Last”: Repetition, Innovation, and Byron’s Impossible Sequel

12:15 – 1:45pm                    Buffet lunch at Northeastern

1:45 – 5:00pm                    2nd Academic Session (at Northeastern)

1:45 – 3:15pm             Panel 3: Editing Byron and His Circle

Chair: Andrew Stauffer, University of Virginia

Roundtable participants: David Radcliffe (Virginia Tech), Neil Fraistat (Maryland), Paul Curtis (Moncton), Juli McLoone (Texas-San Antonio)

Break (15 min)

3:30 – 5:00pm             Panel 4: The Good Book

Chair:  Susan Soroka, Northeastern University

1.  Wolf Hirst, University of Haifa

Byron’s Rewriting of Six Verses from Genesis

2.  Harold Ray Stevens, McDaniel College

“And Bright Eternity Without Disguise”: Byron, Bibles, and Visions of Eternity

3.  Gale Bouchard, Université de Moncton

“A Spirit Passed Before Me: Cain and the Book of Job

6:00 – 9:00pm                    Welcome dinner at Northeastern (Raytheon Amphitheatre, Egan Building)

7:30pm                       The Leslie A. Marchand Memorial Lecture:

Peter Graham, Virginia Tech

Why Should the 21^st Century Read Byron?

Tuesday, July 27th

9:00am – 12:15pm     3rd Academic Session (Northeastern)

9:00 – 10:30am            Panel 5: Cultures of Adaptation

Chair:  G. Todd Davis, Kentucky State University

1.  Arnold Schmidt, California State University, Stanislaus

Uses of History: Byronic Rhetoric and the Italian Political Novel

2.  Sharifah Aishah Osman, University of Malaya

Byron’s Gulnare: A Retrospective Study of the Byronic Heroine in the  Art and Fiction of the 1830s

3.  Jonathan Gross, DePaul University

Byron and the Byronic in Coetzee’s Disgrace

Break (15 min)

10:45am – 12:15pm            Panel 6: Book and Nation

Chair: Katherine Kernberger, Linfield College

1.  Will Bowers, Oxford University

“My gaze of wonder”: Topography, Maps and The Giaour

2.  Stephen Webb

Byron and Books: Informing Nationalism

3.  Drew Hubbell, Susquehanna University

Reading the Book of Nature: Cain and Geology

12:15 – 1:45pm                    Lunch on your own

1:45 – 5:00pm                    4th Academic Session (Boston Athenaeum)

1:45 – 3:15pm             Panel 7: Reception Histories

Chair:  Suzanne Summerville, University of Alaska-Fairbanks

1.  Stephen Nonack, Boston Athenaeum

Byron, Boston, and the Boston Athenaeum

2.  Olivier Feignier, Société française des études byroniennes

“It is enough to answer for what I have written”: Byron in French collective books, 1815-1840

3.  Christiane Vigouroux, Société française des études byroniennes

The Pleasures of Reading and Desires of the Cantos

Break (15 min)

3:30 – 5:00pm             Panel 8: Ideas of the Book

Chair:  Jonathan Gross, DePaul University

1.  Mark Sandy, Durham University

“Accursed Book”: Poetic Recollections, Readers and Reading in Byron

2.  Carla Pomarè, Università del Piemonte Orientale

Proof and Persuasion: Byron’s paratexts and historical writing

3.  Paul M. Curtis, Université de Moncton

Byron and the “Counter”-book: Silent Voicing in the Ottava Rima Poems

5:00 – 6:00pm                     Reception at Boston Athenaeum

6:00pm Dinner on your own

Wednesday, July 28th

9:00am – 12:15pm        5th Academic Session (Harvard)

9:00 – 10:30am            Panel 9: Forms

Chair:  Jack Wasserman, New York City

1.  Jeffery Vail, Boston University

“My Inheritance of Storms”: Byron’s Body and Byron’s Poetry

2.  Charles Mahoney, University of Connecticut

“The Chainless Mind”: Byron’s Forms and Personae in The Prisoner of Chillon

3.  Reiko Yoshida, Ryukoku University

“Close thy Byron; Open thy Goethe”: The Concern with “appearance” in The Deformed Transformed

Break (15 min)

10:45am – 12:15pm            Panel 10: Editing Byron and His Circle II

Chair: Andrew Stauffer

Roundtable participants: Charlie Robinson (Delaware), Alice Levine (Hofstra), Jonathan Gross (DePaul), Gary Dyer (Cleveland State)

12:15 – 1:15pm                    Lunch on your own; Mary Oey talk

1:15 – 4:00 pm                     6th Academic Session (Harvard)

1:15 – 2:45pm             Panel 11: Publishers

Chair:  Robin Hammerman, Stevens Institute of Technology

1.  Terence Hoagwood, Texas A & M University

The Simulation of Song:  Byron, Nathan, Murray

2.  Christine Kenyon-Jones, King’s College, London

“He is a rogue of course, but a civil one”: John Murray, Byron and Jane Austen

3.  Gary Dyer, Cleveland State University

The Later Cantos of Don Juan and the Prosecution of The Vision of  Judgment

3:00 – 4:30pm             Panel 12: New Scholarship

Chair: Allan Gregory, Irish Byron Society

1.  Jack Wasserman, New York, NY

Byron in the Shadows

2.  David McClay, National Library of Scotland

Memorialising and Remembering: Byron’s Vault Visitor Book

3.  Shannon Heath,  University of Tennessee

“Fighting with Pellets of Paper”:  Satire, Dueling, and the Publication of English Bards and Scotch Reviewers

4:30 – 5:30pm             Reception and viewing of the exhibition “Let Satire Be My Song”: English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, Houghton Library, Harvard University, curated and introduced by Peter X. Accardo, Houghton Library, Harvard University

5:35pm                        Coaches depart from Harvard to Tufts University

6:00pm                        Concert at Tufts:

I. From “A Selection of Hebrew Melodies” by I. Braham and I. Nathan, Vol. 1 (1815-16):

1. “If that high world”

2. “Oh weep for those”

3. “On Jordan’s Banks”

II. From the Piano Sonata in D minor, op. 31 nr. 2 (“The Tempest”) by Ludwig v. Beethoven (1802):

1st movt.:  Largo – Allegro

III. Two versions of “She walks in beauty”:

1. by Braham and Nathan (1815)

2. by Thomas Stumpf (2010) – first performance

IV. From the Piano Sonata in B flat major, op. posth. by Franz Schubert (1827):

2nd movt.: Andante sostenuto

V. From “A Selection of Hebrew Melodies” by I. Braham and I. Nathan, Vol. 2 (1824-29):

1. “Francisca”

2. “Herod’s Lament for Mariamne”

3. “The Destruction of Sennacherib”

Scott Hilse, tenor – Thomas Stumpf, piano

6:50pm                        Refreshments at Tufts

7:30pm                        Coaches return to Cambridge/Boston

Thursday, July 29

9:30am – 12:30pm        7th Academic Session (Longfellow House)

9:30 – 11:00am            Panel 13: After Byron

Chair:  Sonia Hofkosh, Tufts University

1.  Matthew Scott, University of Reading

Matthew Arnold, Henry James and Byron’s Posthumous Sublime

2.  Julia Markus, Hofstra University

Henry James and Ralph Lovelace.  A Secret Source for The Aspern Papers

3.  Peter Cochran, Newstead Byron Society [in absentia]

The Phantom Book Sale Catalogue

Break (15 min)

11:15am – 12:45pm            Panel 14: Bookish Histories

Chair:  Arnold Schmidt, California State University-Stanislaus

1.  Halina Adams, University of Delaware

“Let the artist share the palm”: Illustrating Lord Byron’s American Works

2.  Tom Mole, McGill University

Illustrating Generational Change: Nineteenth-Century Editions of Byron’s Poetry

3.  Allan Gregory, Irish Byron Society

Byron and Hours of Idleness

12:45 – 2:45pm                    Lunch and Plenary Lecture (Longfellow National Historic Site)

Christoph Irmscher, Indiana University

Longfellow’s Wicked Byroniana

3:00 – 5:20pm                Screening: Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992, American Zoetrope)

5:20 – 7:00pm             Dinner on your own

7:00 – 9:00pm                        Plenary lecture: James V. Hart, screenwriter, Bram Stoker’s Dracula

“Deconstructing Dracula”

Friday, July 30th

9:00am – 12:15pm          9th Academic Session (Northeastern: Dodge Hall)

9:00 – 10:30am            Panels 15: Sonics

Chair: Joan Blythe, University of Kentucky

1.  Hilary Poriss, Northeastern University

Marino Faliero as Opera

2.  Suzanne Summerville, Fairbanks, Alaska

Byron in Opera

Break (15 min)

10:45am – 12:15pm            Panel 17: Classic and Modern

Chair:  Katherine Kernberger, Linfield College

1.  Itsuyo Higashinaka, Ryukoku University

Byron’s Indebtedness to Martial and Catullus

2.  Matthew Borushko, Stonehill College

Byron and the Books of War

12:15 – 2:00pm                    Lunch on your own

2:00 – 3:30pm    10th Academic Session (Boston Public Library)

2:00 – 3:30pm             Panel 18            Influences

Chair:  Mark Sandy, Durham University

1.  Stuart Peterfreund, Northeastern University

Byron’s Cookbook and the Secret Ingredients in Cantos 15-17 of Don Juan

2.  Joan Blythe, University of Kentucky

Textual Garden Aesthetics and the Reading of Nature in Byron’s Poetry

3.  John Clubbe, International Byron Society President

Byron, Chateaubriand, Napoleon

Break (15 min)

3:45 – 6:00pm Annual General Meeting of the Byron Societies

6:30 – 9:00pm             Conference dinner, The Colonnade Hotel

Menu inspired by Louis Eustache Ude, The French Cook (3^rd ed., 1815), the source for Byron’s menu in Don Juan XV. 62-74:

FROM THE FRENCH COOK (3rd ed., 1815)
BILL OF FARE FOR A DINNER OF FOUR ENTRÉES IN SUMMER TIME.
First Course.
Le Potage printannier.
Les tranches de cabilleau. sauce aux huitres.
2 Relevés.
La poularde à la Montmorencie.
Le jambon de Westphalie, à l’essence.
4 Entrées.
La fricassée de poulets aux champignons.
Les cotelettes d’Agneau sautés, sauce à la Macédoine.
Le sauté de filets de poulets gras, au suprême.
Les tendrons de veau glacés aux laitues, à l’essence:
2 Dishes de Rôt.
Le chapon. 
Les cailles.
4 Entremets.
Les pois à la Françoise, 
La gelée de fraises, 
Les asperges en bâtonets.
Les puits d’amour garnis de marmalade.
2 Remove of the Rôts.
La tart de groseilles rouges. 
Le soufflé au citron.

Transportation

In an effort to aid you in your journey to the conference, here are transport directions to the Colonnade Hotel (120 Huntington Avenue) and International Village (1155-75 Tremont Avenue).  If anyone is contemplating driving to the conference, parking is available in the Renaissance Garage at Northeastern (Building 62) for $15/day and at the Colonnade for $38/day.  For those arriving by airplane or train, both sites may be reached by licensed taxicabs available at cab stands on the luggage claim level at Logan Airport and outside the main entrance at South Station.

Sunday afternoon/evening is a peak period for business travel, and if finding a taxicab proves difficult, it may be easier (and is far less expensive) to make use of public transit.  Here are some ways to do so.

1.  Logan Airport-Colonnade/International Village: Board Silver Line and get off at South Station.  Take Red Line Outbound (marked “Alewife”) to Park Street—change for the Green Line Outbound (“E” car only, marked “Heath Street”))—get off at Prudential (Colonnade) or Northeastern (International Village).

2. Logan Airport-International Village Alternative: Follow Silver Line directions as above.  Take Red Line Outbound (“Alewife”) to Downtown Crossing.  Change for Orange Line Outbound (“Forest Hills”)  Get off at Ruggles.

3.  South Station-Colonnade/International Village: Red Line Outbound (“Alewife”) to Park Street, then follow the directions as in 1 above.

4. South Station-International Village Alternative: Red Line Outbound (“Alewife”) to Downtown Crossing.  Change for Orange Line Outbound (marked “Forest Hills”)  Get off at Ruggles.

The Orange Line stop is much closer to International Village than the Green Line stop is.

You can pay cash for your Silver Line fare, and all transfers are free.  Do not buy a “Charlie Card” to use transit, as you will be issued a one-week, multi-use fare card at registration.  Those taking the Green Line from the Colonnade to Northeastern can pay a cash fare of $2.00 or buy a “Charlie Ticket” for that amount.  For transport from the Colonnade to the Alumni Center on day one, sharing a cab makes a good deal of sense.

Also in an effort to aid you in your journey to the conference, I have supplied you with first-morning dining options, as well as some local travel directions.  For those of you staying at the Colonnade, breakfast is served in the Brasserie Jo, which adjoins the hotel.  For those of you wishing to come to campus first or staying in International Village, I recommend that you go to the following URL:  http:///www.northeastern.edu/campussmap/maps.html.  Under “Campus Maps,” click on “Printable PDF.”  On that map, you will see Stetson East and West (Buildings 14-15), the only student dining complex open during the summer, which serves 7:00 AM-8:00 PM (EDT) on weekdays and 8:00 AM-8:00 PM on weekends.  International Village (Building 77) is a five- or ten-minute walk from there.  There are coffee establishments all over campus, including those in Ryder Hall (Building 24), Shillman Hall (Building 30), Hayden Hall (Building 53), Churchill Hall (Building 54), and Curry Student Center (Building 50).  The next-to-last of these has a cafeteria that serves breakfast and lunch, and the last of these has a food court.

To get to the Alumni Center (716 Columbus Avenue, 6^th floor / 617-373-7045—Building 66), those coming from the Colonnade may take a cab or take the Green Line to the Northeastern stop, turn left on Forsyth Street, and walk through the Ruggles MBTA Station.  Exiting the station, one sees a large parking structure (Renaissance Garage.  Bear to the left of it and walk left on Columbus Avenue.  716 is four blocks ahead on the opposite side of the street.  Those staying in International Village need to make a left out the front door, another left on Melnea Cass Boulevard, and a right on Columbus Avenue.  716 is three blocks ahead on the same side of the street

We look forward to seeing you all at the conference in due course.