Tea and Mortality

In the past few days more than three hundred visitors to this blog have come seeking information about Jon Lucks, an alumnus of this department whose recent death has left those who knew him in shock and in mourning. I wish I could provide a personal memory, but it was never my privilege to have…

We have at our helm a president who is no longer quite so new. Steven Knapp is beginning to leave an imprint upon the institution, most notably in a reshuffling of important administrators. EVPAA Don Lehman is retiring. A search for a new provost is underway: this person will be responsible for the day to…

Prof. Evelyn Schreiber brought this cake to the department lounge today. It’s one layer of a birthday cake made to celebrate Toni Morrison’s 80th birthday at the Library of Congress last year. (This layer spent a year in Prof. Schreiber’s freezer.) Here is the cake in its original incarnation: This layer represents Morrison’s latest novel,…

Yes we know: the bars are open til the wee hours, and you will be hungover in next Wednesday’s classes. But the inauguration is not just a bacchanal: it is also a literary event, you know. Share on FacebookTweet

Drawing on an argument made by late New York poet Audre Lorde that “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house,” Prof. Greg Pardlo introduced friend and fellow poet Thomas Sayers Ellis to the ample-sized audience in the Marvin Center Amphitheater last Thursday evening. Pardlo continued: Although Ellis doesn’t directly employ the metaphor of…

Professor Margaret Soltan was interviewed last night on the Lehrer News Hour about Nobel Prize winner Doris Lessing. Here’s the interview: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/ . Follow the link on the lower right of the page. For a full account of the adventure, see Professor Soltan’s blog University Diaries. Share on FacebookTweet