On Friday, October 11, Rhodes College is hosting a public symposium on the latest developments in book history that dovetails with innovative digital interpretations of Shakespeare.
All events are free and take place in Blount Auditorium (Buckman Hall), 9am—noon
9:00 am: Lukas Erne will discuss “Disseminating Printed Shakespeare in Early Modern England.” Dr. Erne is Professor of English at the University of Geneva. He is author of “Shakespeare as Literary Dramatist” (2003); “Shakespeare and the Book Trade” (2013); “Shakespeare’s Modern Collaborators” (2008); and “Beyond ‘The Spanish Tragedy’: A Study of the Works of Thomas Kyd” (2001). He has won the Hoffman Prize, the Roma Gill Award, and the Robert Harvey Prize.
10:00 am: Michael Witmore will address “Writing Literary and Cultural History at the Level of the Sentence.” Dr. Witmore became the Folger Shakespeare Library′s seventh director on July 1, 2011. He is the author of “Landscapes of the Passing Strange” (2010); “Shakespearean Metaphysics” (2008); “Pretty Creatures: Children and Fiction in the English Renaissance” (2007); and “Culture of Accidents: Unexpected Knowledges in Early Modern England” (2001). He is co-winner of the Perkins Prize.
11:00 am: Robert Darnton will respond to these presentations, and engage in a roundtable discussion with Erne and Witmore. Dr. Darnton is University Professor and Director of the Harvard Library. Among his honors are a MacArthur Fellowship, a National Book Critics Circle Award, and the National Humanities Medal. He has written and edited many books, including “The Great Cat Massacre” (1984, translated into 18 languages) and “The Case for Books” (2009).
Dr. Darnton will also lecture at the University of Memphis on Thursday, October 10 (6:00pm, UC-Theatre): “Digitize and Democratize: Libraries, Books, and the Digital Future”.
