This Week in English | October 30, 2023
English Majors Volunteer for Admissions Open House
Nicole LeBlanc, Finlee LeBouef, and Gabriella Shetreet sacrificed the better part of a warm sunny late-October morning to the good cause of welcoming prospective students with an interest in English to the University of Maine on Saturday, October 28. All three are current students in ENG 271: Act of Interpretation with Steve Evans, who was also on hand, and Gabriella just happened to have her volume of Swann’s Way on hand, so we used it to supplement our depleted stock of swag. “Worried about wasting your life? Consider the alternative—English!”
Fogler Library Hosts Halloweekend Horror Author Panel Tonight
This Halloween Eve, October 30 from 7-8pm, come to Fogler’s second floor Salon to listen to some of the scariest stories Maine has to offer, and to meet the minds responsible! Emma J. Gibbon, Peter Dudar, and Morgan Sylvia are published authors of horror living in Maine. They’ll be visiting Fogler Library to read excerpts of their books, sign some copies, and for a Q&A. Snacks will be provided. Space is limited and registration is required; you can register here!
Moxley and Evans Remember Poet Keith Waldrop This Week at Brown
The poet, translator, and small-press publisher Keith Waldrop passed away this summer at the age of ninety. His wife of sixty-five years, Rosmarie Waldrop, was at his side. This week friends, colleagues, fellow writers, and former students—including Jennifer Moxley and Steve Evans—will celebrate his life and career at Brown University, where he taught for four decades. The memorial festival borrows its title from his autobiographical novel Light While There Is Light, which was recently republished by Dalkey Archive Press.
Waldrop was a keynote poet in the international conference on North American Poetry in the 1960s hosted at UMaine in the summer of 2000. He was featured in the New Writing Series in the spring of 2004, reading with poet and translator (and former student) Rosa Alcala. Obituaries in the New York Times and Washington Post noted his achievement in verbal and visual collage formats, his teaching, the efforts in translation that earned him the title of Chevalier of Arts and Letters from the French government, and his bemused skepticism about literary prize culture. Neil Genzlinger concludes his obit in the Times with the following anecdote:
Professor Waldrop, whose wife survives him, published his first poetry volume, ”A Windmill Near Calvary,” in 1968; it was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1969. When he finally won the award four decades later, he and his wife were low-key about it. They traveled to New York for the ceremony, but his wife went to the opera instead of the presentation.
”I almost went to the opera myself,” Professor Waldrop told The Christian Science Monitor.
Most of the events on October 31 and November 1 are in-person in Providence but they will also be available via Zoom. The event on Wednesday at 3pm is online only and will feature many poets who have read in Orono over the years, including Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, Susan Howe, Aaron B. Kunin, and Marjorie Welish.
New English Majors Meet Future Writing Center Tutors
Last week, students in Ben Friedlander’s section of LAS 150: College Success, which is designed for first semester students at UMaine who intend to major in English, paid a visit to the Writing Center to meet with the advanced students currently training to be peer tutors with Paige Mitchell. The first-year students and Writing Center consultants paired up to share writing and experiences. English Graduate Teaching Assistant Michelle Hoeckel-Neal covers another of the twelve sections of LAS 150 being offered this fall.
This Week in English 135 was sent to students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends of the department on October 30, 2023. If you would rather not receive these weekly bulletins, please reply with <unsubscribe> in your subject line. Earlier installments are archived on our website. If you’re on Facebook, please consider joining the English Department Group. To learn more about faculty members mentioned in this bulletin, visit our People page.
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