The 2nd meeting of the Modern Seminar at the University of Tartu takes place on Wednesday the 3rd of April at 18.15 at Skandinavistika (Ülikooli 17, 3rd floor, room 305).
A few words about the idea of the Modern seminar: Following the example of the already existing pre-modern seminar organized by Prof. Daniel Sävborg (Scandinavian Studies) the main idea of the modern seminar is to gather scholars from different fields of literary, cultural and historical studies whose research is based on texts from the 18th century until the present. Of course those colleagues who concentrate in their research on the ancient, medieval or pre-modern times, are kindly invited as well.
The aim of the planned network is to bring scholars from different departments and institutes closer together in order to listen to each others lectures and to discuss current research questions. The modern seminar is supposed to take place approximately once a month on Wednesday evenings (18:15 o'clock) in the library of Skandinavistika (Ülikooli 17, third floor, room 305).
Our lecturer on April the 3rd will be Monika Reif-Huelser (University Konstanz) who will talk about
Re-writing the Canon: Perspectives on History and Memory. Charlotte Bronte's "Jane Eyre" and Jean Rhys's "Wide Sargasso Sea".
Monika has prepared us the following abstract:
"Re-writing a canonical novel from a different perspective is a cultural comment on a particular world view presented in the original text presented in the aesthetic medium. Postcolonial writers formulated their critique on cultural dominance, on silencing other voices, on being denied their own interpretation of the world. I want to show a particularly successful and original paradigm of negotiating the canon and its contextualized system of values presenting a comparative reading of Bronte's Jane Eyre and Rhys Wide Sargasso Sea."
I'm looking forward to the lecture, the discussion and the meeting next week at Skandinavistika.