The European Society of Jamesian Studies and The American University of Paris are delighted to announce our third international conference, Reading Henry James in the Twenty-First Century: Heritage and Transmission, to be held at the American University of Paris, from October 20th to October 22nd, 2016.
The conference celebrates the centenary of the author's passing and is the final major coming together in this year following those in London and Brandeis.
The vibrant, shifting connectedness of James's work to the cultural and artistic explorations of the last century, and of this, is testimony to the seemingly endless "future feeling" that Gertrude Stein saw in his writing. Our speakers will be looking at the myriad ways and contexts in which James staged and practised the experience of transmitting human value, and at ways in which other artists have been inspired by his work, not just in writing, but in film, drama, visual arts. The special relationship of James with French culture, thought and social space will form one focus of our event. Central to James's work is the figure of the child, and the experience of wonder. We hope our conference will show how alive that experience of wonder always is for those who, to use one of his favourite words, "meet" his work in their lives, and how wonderfully transformative this heritage can be.
Plenary speakers :
Jean Perrot, Emeritus Professor, Paris XIII University Philip Horne, Professor, University College London; General Editor of the new Cambridge Edition of The Complete Fiction of Henry James Eric Savoy, Professor, University of Montreal.