10th International Conference on the Short Story In English
The Lonely Voice
University College Cork
June 19-22, 2008
Cork, Ireland
The Society for the Study of the Short Story has elected Cork for the venue of its 10th International Conference on the Short Story in English to be held in June, 2008.
About the Society
The Society for the Study of the Short Story was chartered in 1994, following a first gathering of people interested in the writing and study of short stories which took place at the Sorbonne in 1989. Later conferences were held in 1996 (Cedar Falls and Iowa City, Iowa) and in 1998 (New Orleans, Louisiana). In 2000, the conference returned to Iowa City, and was jointly sponsored by the renowned Iowa Writers' Workshop. The 2002 conference was held in New Orleans, and the 2004 conference took place in Alcalá de Henares (Spain), returning to Europe for the first time since 1989. The 2006 conference was held in Lisbon, Portugal.
Current board members are Clark Blaise (President), Bharati Mukherjee, Maurice A. Lee, Allan Weiss, Claire Larriere, Velma Pollard, Juani Guerra, and Teresa Alves.
If you would like to become a member of the Society for the Study of the Short Story, please visit: http://www.shortstorysociety.com
About the Conference
Every other year the International Conference on the Short Story in English brings together writers and scholars with an interest in the short story, creating an unusual forum for a fruitful debate between the practitioners of the art and critical readers, coming from a diversity of fields and sharing a variety of interests.
Writers and readers, bound by their common love for the short story, convene from all over the world. They are interested in exploring the ways and byways of an art that interconnects with other forms of literature as well as with other fields of art (namely photography, painting, cinema, music, and others). They also approach and discuss the variety of ways in which the short story is (and has been) embodied in history and geography, exploring the multiple interweaving links of production and consumption of literary works with the social, political, economic, and other issues relevant to a given time and place.
Attendees have come from Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America, and the Caribbean. Countries represented include Argentina, Austria, Australia, Bangladesh, Belgium, Canada, the Canary Islands, England, Ethiopia, France, Guyana, India, Jamaica, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sri Lanka, Trinidad, and the United States.
About the Venue and Local Organization
The English Department (incl. Drama & Theatre Studies) in the College of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences, University College Cork (UCC), and Triskel Arts Centre, Cork will organize the 10th International Conference On The Short Story In English in 2008.
Conference Permanent Director: Maurice A. Lee, University of Central Arkansas
Local Directors: Dr. Colbert Kearney, Chair, English Department, UCC and Ms. Ann Luttrell, Education and Community Manager, Triskel Arts Centre.
About the Topic
'The Lonely Voice' echoing the title of Frank O’Connor’s seminal work on the short story. ‘It is a lonely art,’ Frank O’Connor said. Cork City Library, where O’Connor began his professional career, republished this work to mark the centenary of his birth in 2003. Frank O’ Connor was a prolific writer, writing two novels, several volumes of poetry, translations, literary criticism and journalism but his favoured literary form was the short story. He wrote over 200 short stories, many of them published in ‘The New Yorker’. Despite the Irish backdrop to most stories, their appeal was international and many story collections are translated into numerous languages. See http://frankoconnor.ucc.ie
About the Program
This conference will bring together renowned writers of fiction in English * Irish, British, American, Canadian, Australian, Caribbean, South-African, Indian, Sri Lankan, Indonesian, etc. * with writers who have had (or will have for this event) their work translated into English and who will join in reading sessions, roundtable discussions and panels, and translation workshops.
The 10th International Conference on the Short Story in English will also host a number of sessions, both in the more traditional format (with presentation of papers) and in other formats involving performance, dance, art, films, etc., having in mind that the form of the short story is not necessarily confined to the limits of the written page but may open up to manifold fields of expression.
Guest Writers who have already committed to attend in 2008 include:
