Blog Apologies and General Life Update

Hello!  I realised with some shame that it has been two months (ish) since I've updated this blog!  Partly it's because I've been busy, and then because I wasn't sure I had anything to say.  So, I've decided to break the ice with a quick update on the Easter vacation and Trinity Term have been like for me.

In the last two months, I've...

• Gone to Paris, the Loire Valley, and Avignon on vacation (see obligatory Eiffel Tower photo above - with more pictures to come!)
• Finished another section of my thesis, this time discussing domestic violence and other forms of male dominance in the Bronte novels.  Next up is a short section on male relationships (primarily on how they can be damaging when they impinge on domestic/family life).
• Read many books for fun, including some that I plan to review on the blog in the near future.
• Given the Michael Mahoney Graduate Seminar at my college - a one-hour lecture on my research, which was actually really fun, especially as it was followed by a fancy dinner in the chapel (which is currently serving as our dining hall).
• Completely rewrote the end of my novel for the first time.  The ending is different from what I originally intended, but it fits better with my expectations for and conception of the book now.  I hope to start submitting it really, really soon - after one more proofread and a couple small changes.
• Helped to organise this year's Oxford English graduate conference, "Object", which went really, really well.  I chaired a fantastic panel on Victorian material culture; there was an fabulous panel discussion on the Book as Object, featuring Nick Cross, Digital Products Manager at the Oxford University Press and fellow SCWBI member, Paul Nash, the University's printing tutor, and Stephen Walter, text/map artist.  The day was capped off by a fantastic keynote address on the construction of the author as "object" by acclaimed children's author Frances Hardinge.  (Her most recent novel, A Face Like Glass is amazing and Frances is absolutely lovely in person to boot!)
• Went up to London to see The Book of Mormon (amazing, with brilliant music, and much blasphemy - not for the easily offended) and finally visit the Tate Modern (loved the first floor Surrealists, then became increasingly bored by the abstract art and installations - I am a bit of a traditionalist, I suppose)
• More recently, went up to London to see Neil Gaiman talk about his most recent novel, The Ocean at the End of the Lane.  Amazing.  Also snagged a signed first edition, which is very good so far.
• Plus, I attended the seminars for the Developing Teaching and Learning course run by the Humanities Division and am working on a teaching portfolio to submit in hopes it will gain me Associate Fellow status with the Higher Education Academy.  As part of my teaching training, I ran revision classes and tutorials to prepare first-year Mansfielders for their exam on Victorian literature, which was a rewarding experience.  It was great to really dig into the Victorians with friendly, enthusiastic, and hard-working students.

Okay, I think that's it.  I will try to update more frequently, and will definitely post pictures from our France trip.  The next big thing is that we're going home for two weeks on Saturday, which is shockingly only two sleeps away!  Yikes.

Going to Liverpool!, or Neo-Victorian Cultures: The Victorians Today

Hello, sad, neglected blog.  Today I have a revivifying post full of good news.

I found out a few days ago that I'll be giving a conference paper at the Neo-Victorian Culture: The Victorians Today conference running from 24-26 July at Liverpool John Moores University.  This is exciting because 1) I've never been to Liverpool and 2) I'll get to talk all about Alison Croggon's novel Black Spring, Wuthering Heights, adaptation, fantasy, and feminism!

I reviewed Black Spring here - well worth a read for Bronte fans and fantasy lovers.

In the draft programme, I see I've been placed on a panel called "Fantasizing the Victorians"; one of the other panelists is going to be talking about Terry Pratchett's Discworld.  Clearly this is going to be a great experience.

In other news, I had a really productive Hilary Term after a de-motivated and quite stressful Michaelmas and I think I'll write about some of the strategies I used that I found helpful in the next bit.  Now that the vacation has hit, I'm struggling to get some of my research and writerly get-up-and-go back, but I hope to blog soon on academic matters.  (PS - I also decided to completely restructure my thesis last term - very exciting!)

And in other, other news, Tim and I are heading off to France for a bit over a week in April.  I'm deep in the midst of booking places to stay and figuring out transport, but we're hoping to stay in Paris, Amboise (in the Loire Valley), and Avignon.

Three Newsy Things

Today's post comes to you in three parts: 1) Great Writers Inspire, an Open Educational Resource Project; 2) the 2012 Oxford University English Graduate Conference; and 3) University College London's English Graduate Conference, which I'll be speaking at!

1)  Great Writers Inspire

I've recently had the good fortune to become a student ambassador for the Great Writers Inspire project, which is based out of the University of Oxford and funded by JISC.  This is an open educational resource highlighting great writers and overall literary themes.  The website (when live) will put together introductory essays, podcasts by Oxford faculty, e-texts, and other resources that can be reused in educational settings.  I think this is a great way to share a love of literature.  At the moment, new content is being released on the blog, where you can find my very first post on why poor, overlooked Anne Bronte is a great writer.


2)  2012 Oxford University English Graduate Conference: Return to the Political: Literary Aesthetics and the Influence of Political Thought

As some of you may know, I'm on the organizing committee for the English Faculty's graduate conference, taking place on June 1st.  The deadline for submission of abstracts is speedily approaching (March 1st), so if you happen to be an English graduate student, please do send along a proposal.  I need to write mine up too...  More information on the lovely website.  If you aren't interested in giving a paper, consider registering to attend the conference: our keynote speaker is Booker-winner Ben Okri and there will be a lively panel discussion around the question of "What is a Classic?".  Plus, graduate student papers, of course.

3)  2012 University College London English Graduate Conference: Intersections

I'm going to be giving another paper at this conference, on March 9th as part of a student panel on Collaboration and Allusion (which begins at 4:30 pm if you are interested in attending).  My paper is called "Homosocial Bonds and Sibling Rivalry in the Collaborative Early Writing of Charlotte and Branwell Bronte."  Thankfully, this material will end up in the first chapter of my thesis as well, so that relieves some of the stress of working up a conference paper.  Also, this means I will get to speak at Senate House, which is a gorgeous and huge early 20th century building, quite close to the British Museum.

Giving a Paper!

I found out about this back around Christmas, but hadn't thought to mention it yet.  I'm going to be giving a paper titled "Africa, Empire, and Masculinity in the Early Writings of Charlotte and Branwell Bronte" at the February 10th meeting of the Interdisciplinary Nineteenth-Century Culture Forum here at Oxford.  The theme for Hilary Term is Childhood, and I'll be talking primarily about writing Charlotte and Branwell did between the ages of 12 and 17.  The Brontes' early writing about Glass Town took place in a central African setting, likely influenced by their reading in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine about exploration and the search for the source of the Niger and also the Ashantee wars of the 1820s.

If you are part of the university community and happen to be interested, please do come along.  :)

Here is the poster, which gives the rest of the talks and excursions for the term.  Looks like an interesting line up!