A. Dickinson and Disaster

Organizer and Chair: Hsu, Li-hsin, National Chengchi University

1. “Dickinson’s Accidental Falls”, Linda Freedman, University College London.
2. “‘Nerve in Marble’: Eotion, Disaster and Geology in Dickinson”, Amanda Lowe, Columbia Univerisity
3. “‘Dread, but the Whizzing’: Emily Dickinson’s Catastrophic Micro-Histories”, Jamie Fenton, University of Cambridge

B. Dickinson's Dimensions

Chair: TBA

1. “Emily Dickinson and the Politics of Time”, Maria O’Malley, University of Nebraska, Kearney
2. “Jian Feng's Translation of Emily Dickinson’s Poetry: A Conceptual Study of Creative Treason”, Muhammad Afzaal (and Liu Kanglong), Shanghai Jiao Tong University
3. “‘As blind men learn the sun’: Emily Dickinson and the queer child”, Bradley Nelson, City University of New York
4. “The Possibility of a Queer Lyric: Reading Difficulty in Dickinson’s Poetics”, Jan Leonard Maramot Rodil, University of California, Irvine

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EDIS MLA panel 2021 – “‘My Splendors are Menagerie’: the Persistence of Emily Dickinson’s Voice in Art Forms Other than Literature”

My Splendors, are Menagerie –
But their Competeless Show
Will entertain the Centuries
When I, am long ago,
An Island in dishonored Grass –
Whom none but Beetles – know. (F319)


The proleptic last stanza of poem F319 presents Emily Dickinson’s “Splendors” as a “Menagerie” whose unrivaled performance (“their Competeless Show”) will persist long after the poet’s death. Dickinson’s “Splendors” are indeed diverse and persistent, since her life and work have inspired other artists (playwrights, choreographers, screenwriters, composers, visual artists, …) to create new works that both celebrate the uniqueness of Dickinson’s voice and allow these artists to find their own. This panel therefore proposes to examine the many ways in which Emily Dickinson’s works and her unique voice persists, endures, through forms of art other than literature. Possible topics for the panels include:

• Emily Dickinson and the performing arts (dance, theatre, opera, music,…)
• Emily Dickinson and visual arts
• persistence through other forms of art as a “Darwinian” evolutionary strategy, changing, evolving to survive in modern times
• persistence as natural continuance: what in Dickinson’s poetry makes her work naturally suited to adaptations into other art forms?
• persistence as resistance: have artists been inspired by Dickinson’s revolutionary style and eschewing of poetic/social conventions to create their own revolutionary works? Which aspect(s) of resistance in Dickinson’s life and work appeal the most to other artistic creators?
• more broadly, papers could consider Dickinson in relation to other writers of the American Renaissance and in the overarching context of the American Renaissance: how has the pioneer spirit of the American Renaissance translated into other works of art? Are there differences/similarities in the ways these writers have inspired visual/performing artists?

Abstracts (250-300 words) must be sent before March 29, 2020, to Adeline Chevrier-Bosseau (achevrier.bosseau@gmail.com)

Call For Submissions to a 2020 Special Issue of The Emily Dickinson Journal

International Dickinson: Scholarship in English Translation

Because English is the dominant language in Dickinson studies, scholarship published in other languages is often overlooked. With the goal of promoting scholarly dialogue across languages and cultures, we invite submissions for a special issue of The Emily Dickinson Journal devoted to translations into English of recent critical work on the poet published in other languages. As Domhnall Mitchell and others have noted, interest in Dickinson’s writing continues to grow in Europe, Asia, Latin America, and other parts of the world: currently there are major translation projects underway in places like Japan, Taiwan, China, and Brazil. Global interest in Dickinson’s work, however, has surpassed global scholarly communication networks, which tend to be restricted by national and linguistic boundaries.

Seeking to represent a nationally diverse range of critical perspectives on Dickinson’s work, the editors invite scholars to submit abstracts in English of no more than 500 words proposing the translation of a peer-reviewed essay or book chapter published in a language other than English in the last five years. This may be work you published or work familiar to you; if the work is not your own, please secure the permission of the author to translate it into English as part of your proposal. We will review the abstracts and extend invitations to scholars to translate the proposed work into English in full or in part for publication in the fall 2020 issue of The Emily Dickinson Journal.

To maximize the diversity of the scholarly work presented in the issue, a second section will feature abstract-length presentations of books, chapters, and peer-reviewed, published articles. We therefore also invite scholars to send 500-word summaries of recently published or forthcoming work, to be published in abstract form. For a third section, we seek abstracts (250-300 words) of PhD dissertations on Dickinson defended in the last five years, or still in progress. It is our hope that this issue will bring new perspectives to an international readership. The issue offers a unique opportunity for international scholars to make their work more widely available, and for English-speaking scholars to enrich their critical perspectives on Dickinson.

Please submit abstracts for all three sections to all 3 editors of this issue, Adeline Chevrier-Bosseau (achevrier.bosseau@gmail.com), Li-hsin Hsu (hsulihsin@yahoo.com) and Eliza Richards (ecr@email.unc.edu). Provide any necessary permissions, the bibliographical information for the original publication or dissertation, and a short cv.

Deadline for submission: January 15, 2020.

“To another Sea”: Dickinson, Environment, and the West

EMILY DICKINSON INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY International Conference 2019

August 8-11, 2019
Asilomar, California

To view the conference program summary overview, click here.

The very exciting 2019 International Conference on the work of Emily Dickinson and the sea will take place on August 8-11, 2019, in Asilomar, California. Known as Monterey Peninsula's “Refuge by the Sea,” Asilomar State Park is located on 107 acres of state beach and conference grounds, within the quaint and scenic town of Pacific Grove. Asilomar is celebrated for its restored dune ecosystem and architectural significance, with cozy, historic structures designed by renowned Arts & Crafts architect Julia Morgan between 1913 and 1928. Dickinson writes she “never saw a moor” or “the sea,” yet she knows “how the heather looks” and “what a billow be,” and also the sea's swells, tides, mysterious and familiar creatures. Indeed, Dickinson explored the landscape of the inner wild. Her poetic and epistolary writings investigate the end of consciousness and the West, as a figure for the unknown and a way to transcend physical and mental boundaries. Her writings investigate this unknown place by transforming her daily experience as she dwells in poetry. As her readers are more than aware, Dickinson welcomes us to take this profound imaginative voyage with her.

The conference features panels by international scholars on a variety of topics, including critical interpretations of Dickinson’s poetry and letters in light of water, environmental criticism, non-human studies, plant studies, creativity and imagination, ecology, geography, landscape, and the like. Topics on unrelated areas of current interest in Dickinson studies are also part of the program. A variety of formats, including traditional panels and roundtables, as well as flash presentations, will fill our days and nights by the sea, facing West.

To register for the EDIS 2019 conference, click here.


Housing information available here!

To access the original CFP, click here.

Is Translation a Loaded Gun? This EDIS-sponsored roundtable invites proposals reflecting on that specific Dickinson poem in translation: Why translate this work now? What is carried over, what's left standing in corners, in transit?

Deadline for submissions: Sunday, March 15, 2019

Antoine Cazé, Université Paris Diderot Paris 7: antcaze@wanadoo.fr