{"id":2498,"date":"2019-08-19T08:34:07","date_gmt":"2019-08-19T08:34:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/?p=2498"},"modified":"2021-06-03T22:17:28","modified_gmt":"2021-06-03T22:17:28","slug":"william-blake-at-bars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/?p=2498","title":{"rendered":"William Blake at BARS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today on the Blog is a post from Jodie Marley (University of Nottingham)<\/a>. This is the third in a series of reports from the International BARS conference that took place in July 2019. You can also see pictures from the event if you search #BARS2019 on Twitter. She is part of the committee running <\/i>UoN Romanticism<\/a> with Amy Wilcockson and Ruby Hawley-Sibbett, at the University of Nottingham. This is a Romanticism reading group who run monthly sessions with invited guest speakers. This Nottingham-based group has members and attendees who from across the UK, and organise a field trip every term to a local Romantic area of interest. For more details – follow @UoNRomanticism<\/a><\/em> <\/em>or email uonromanticism@nottingham.ac.uk<\/a><\/p>\n

As I specialise in Blake, it was an absolute delight to experience four Blake panels unfold at BARS 2019. We had one Blake panel per day, which was, to quote Jason Whittaker<\/strong> (University of Lincoln) , \u2018utter bliss\u2019.<\/p>\n

I presented my paper on day one\u2019s Blake panel on \u2018The Fantastical Reception of William Blake\u2019. I spoke on the reception of Blake\u2019s esoteric thought by W. B. Yeats. Jason Whittaker\u2019s paper on Blake discussed Ray Nelson\u2019s Blake\u2019s Progress<\/em> and Angela Carter\u2019s The Passion of New Eve<\/em>, and Luke Walker<\/strong>\u2019s (Roehampton University) paper outlined connections between Blake, Dead Man<\/em> and mid-twentieth-century psychedelia\u2019s interpretations of Romanticism. This panel\u2019s consideration of the expansion of Romanticism\u2019s influence beyond 1790-1830 was particularly useful in broadening Romantic studies\u2019 traditional scope.<\/p>\n

Day two\u2019s Blake panel focused on Blake\u2019 art and illustration. Cl\u00e9mence Ardin<\/strong>\u2019s (University of Kent) paper compared Blake\u2019s illustrations of fallen women and angels in the Book of Enoch<\/em> with Alfred de Vigny\u2019s Eloa ou la soeur des anges<\/em>. Sharon Choe<\/strong>\u2019s (University of York) paper centred around a close-reading images on the The Book of Urizen<\/em> plates to discuss Blake\u2019s representations of darkness, the void, creation and destruction. Elli Karampela<\/strong>\u2019s (University of Sheffield) paper discussed \u2018The Ghost of a flea\u2019, Blake\u2019s \u2018Visionary Heads\u2019 and how we might conceptualise them as Gothic bodies.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Cl\u00e9mence Ardin, Sharon Choe and Elli Karampela on the ‘Fantasising Blake’ panel<\/em><\/p>\n

Day three\u2019s Blake panel, \u2018William Blake\u2019s Hand\u2019, began with Mark Crosby<\/strong> (Kansas State University) and his paper on Blake\u2019s letters and how they illustrated Blake\u2019s (often difficult) journey through the patronage system. Elizabeth Potter<\/strong>\u2019s (University of York) paper, gave an innovative reassessment of approaching Blake\u2019s marginalia, and helped me reassess and realign my current use of Blake\u2019s marginalia. Both Potter and I quoted the same aphorism of Lavater\u2019s (number 532) in our respective papers, an eerie coincidence. The final paper for this panel was Josephine McQuail<\/strong>\u2019s (Tennessee Tech University) on eroticism in the Vala<\/em> illustrations, and its reception in Blake criticism over the centuries. As in the second Blake panel, there was an emphasis in McQuail\u2019s paper on the importance, the necessity of considering Blake\u2019s images alongside his works, which I find increasingly important as I form my own research about Blake.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Elizabeth Potter giving her paper<\/em><\/p>\n

I chaired day four\u2019s Blake panel, \u2018Blake\u2019s Visionary Imagination\u2019. Tara Lee<\/strong>\u2019s (University of Oxford) spoke on the intersection of the natural and the mechanical in Blake\u2019s particular form of epic. Joshua Schouten de Jel<\/strong> (Plymouth University) discussed selfhood and psychoanalysis in The Book of<\/em> Thel<\/em> and Visions of the Daughters of Albion<\/em>. Finally, with perhaps one of my favourite papers of the conference, Camille Adnot<\/strong> (Paris-Diderot University) spoke on Blake\u2019s Four Zoas<\/em>, the influence of medieval mappae mundi<\/em> on Blake\u2019s illustrations, and the question of mapping dreamscapes in Blake\u2019s works.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Camille Adnot presenting her pape<\/em>r<\/p>\n

BARS 2019 was fascinating from start to finish. Although the end of the conference left me feeling deflated that four days of exciting conversations had to come to an end, I am, ultimately, excited for the future of my research area and the connections I\u2019ve made within it.<\/p>\n

Jodie Marley, University of Nottingham<\/em><\/p>\n

16th August 2019<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today on the Blog is a post from Jodie Marley (University of Nottingham). This is the third in a series of reports from the International BARS conference that took place in July… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":""},"categories":[7,16,8,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2498"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2498"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2498\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3715,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2498\/revisions\/3715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}