The c19 seminar celebrated the 40th Dickens Universe, featuring Charles Dickens’ most adapted novella, “A Christmas Carol,” with a Christmas feast at Emi’s beautiful home. This year, the c19 seminar and the University of Tennessee is sending graduate students Rochelle Davis, Josh Dobbs, Emi Gonzalez, Eliza Wilcox and Professor Nancy Henry to the virtual universe.
We are especially excited for Emi and Eliza’s first experience at the Universe! At the Universe, Emi and Josh will be co-teaching a graduate student led seminar on the novel as form to Universe attendees. Rochelle will be attending a seminar on conference presentation, and Eliza will be attending a Writing workshop
Emi is most looking forward to the the panel “Marley was dead; to begin with’: Dickens, Death and Christmas” featuring Robert Patten (Rice), John Jordan (The Dickens Project/UC Santa Cruz) and Catherine Waters (University of Kent), “mainly because [death] is not something that you usually equate with Christmas time, but I know it is so central to the story, and I’m really excited to hear the speakers’ perspectives.”
Eliza is most looking forward to working with Dr. Ryan Fong (Kalamazoo) in her writing workshop; likewise, she is looking forward to “the panel on Black Adaptations of a A Christmas Carol [as it] seems like a wonderful opportunity to continue thinking about ways to re-invigorate and un-discipline the Victorian era and Victorian studies.”
Josh is excited to update his knowledge of contemporary research on A Christmas Carol: “…What I was looking forward to was learning what the more recent voices had to say concerning the novella and Dickens as an author. The Universe has done an amazing job of connecting Dickens to the current academic discussions, which has helped to keep Dickens as relevant as he has been through the years, and this year is no exception.”
Rochelle, Eliza, and Emi both are looking forward to the networking opportunities that is unique to Dickens Universe. As the conference started, Emi says she has been “enjoying the conversations that have been generating in both the graduate session [she is] leading, and the faculty led session [she is] attending.” As this is Rochelle’s second time attending the Universe, she has been glad to see graduate students from other institutions that she met at her first Universe and catch up on what new research they have been generating.
“I will live in the past, the present, and the future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me.”
― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
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