Hello.
I’m Joe Nugent, and I’ll chair/moderate this workshop. I know only some of you, but I’m looking forward to hearing from you and meeting around this round table in Austin. I’m opening this blog hoping you’ll find it an agreeable way to communicate, circumventing as it does all those recirculating emails.
Mainly, I hope you’ll use this to post comments and suggestions about what you’d like the workshop to do. I had no particular format in mind when I came up with this scheme, so I’m perfectly open to any suggestions on form, format, content, issues we need to address, or whatever . Posting a comment here is, you’ll see, very easy. I’ll really appreciate any input.
First, thanks Emily for all your help thus far; as this panel was my idea, I guess it’s time I did some work. So, I’m addressing this, as I hope we’ll address the discussion, to at least three groups:
- to those who have a good group going;
- those who’d like to set one up; and (by no means least)
- to those whose group is faltering or hasn’t quite got off the ground.
We have a title, a time, and a space in Austin.
Gropesearching the Wake: a Workshop (or, how to run a really successful reading group)
Sat. 16th. 2.00 to 3.30
Sinclair Suite
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Format: I see this as an opportunity to exchange ideas. To that end, I imagine that around this “round table” would be a single representative from each of as many reading groups as we can muster. I’ll moderate a conversation that would take place on two levels: a dialogue among the round-tablers, and a dialogue between them and a larger, participatory, audience.
So, round the table, we’ll have for starters….
- John Bishop, (Cal, Berkeley)
- Pat Moran (Boston College)
- Jim LeBlanc (Cornell)
- Emily Bloom (U.Texas)
- Tom Hofheinz (Eastern Oregon)
- David Rando (Trinity)
- Colleen Jaurretche (ClaremontMcKenna)
- Judith Harrington (Independent)
- Mike Rubenstein (Cal., Berkeley)
How does this sound as a format? Opinions? Suggestions? Criticisms? Please comment below….
More names? If there’s anyone who you think should be involved around the table please let’s know, and I’ll speak to him or her….And please pass on this information to any Finnegans Wake people who might be interested.
Thanks,
Joe Nugent Assistant Professor of English, Boston College.
*While you’re here, check out websites associated with our Boston College Irish Studies stuff under “Blogroll” on the upper right box there.
I’m glad to see we’re up and running and am looking forward to the panel. Since I’m currently here in Austin, let me know if anyone needs help with anything conference-related. Also, any thoughts on the format? Simple Q&A, discussion of handling particular passages, group dynamics?
Comment by Emily — March 26, 2007 @ 7:16 pm |
Dear Joe,
Your excellent and energetic mailing reminded incredibly slack me of my unfulfilled promise to provide you with the names other Joyceans who might contribute valuably to a forum on the practice of Finnegans-Wake reading-groups. From the Website http://www.finneganswake.org/ReadingGroups.htm, I was able to remind myself of the folllowing still-living Wakean reading groups, whose co-ordinators you may or not want to contact, depending on whether or not you want more people on your panel.
SUNY Buffalo/ Buffalo, New York. Contact Alphonse Kolodziejczak: akolo@compuserve.com
Finnegans Wake Society of New York. Contact Murray Gross: gross@megapathdsl.net
Marshall McLuhan/Finnegans Wake Reading Club. Venice, California. Contact Gerry Fialka: http://www.jesgrew.org/wake/
Zurich, Switzerland, James Joyce and Finnegans Wake Reading Groups. Contact Fritz Senn:
http://www.joycefoundation.ch
There has also been an on-again off-again Finnegans Reading Group meeting erratically over the last ten years in the Los Angeles area. For info on its history and status, contact Colleen Jaurrestche: CJaurretche@claremontmckenna.edu OR (626) 564-8420.
There was also a longstanding Finnegans-Wake Reading-Group in Philadelphia, though its members have recently dispersed and reassembed. A good person to contact about the Philadelphia group would be te world’s funniest Joycean, Michaelo O’Shea: moshea@uncfsu.edu.
There are also longstanding Wake Reading-Groups in Dublin and London, though I doubt, given the price of airfares, that many of their members will be meeting us in Austin. I’ve also heard of Wake reading-groups in places as remote as Sri Lanka and Japan.
Perhaps the panel could, among all else–not least the theorization of what it means to read as a collectivty instead of as the usually bullet-headed individual–begin to collate shared information and to establish a global network of Wakean reading groups.
These at any rate are my thoughts on this night, the night of March 25, 2007, with all the best.
JB
Comment by John Bishop — March 27, 2007 @ 5:18 am |
Hi all,
I’m happy to be a part of this discussion. I’m looking forward to reflecting with Jim LeBlanc on what made/makes our Wake group at Cornell so successful and fun.
I’m particularly interested in how the Wake modulates the relationships between people in Wake groups. I suppose I’m primarily interested in what kinds of relationships between people the Wake seems (perhaps uniquely?) capable of forming.
Comment by David Rando — March 28, 2007 @ 1:38 am |
Our 21-year-old, weekly FW reading group in Berkeley dis-banded due to what I suppose can be termed the exhaustion of our leader. Let me know if you hear of another. In the meantime, all the best to you in Austin and around the globe.
skleeberk@aol.com
Comment by Susan Klee — March 28, 2007 @ 5:32 am |
Dear all,
Oops. Until now, I had been unconsciously inserting an extra “i” into the theme of our panel: “How to Run a Really Good Finnegans Wake Reading Group.” Oh well, I’ll still do my best…. Can’t wait.
Comment by David Rando — March 28, 2007 @ 10:37 am |
Hello everybody
I’m hoping to join the Nugest roundtable. I participated with
great pleasure in the Berkeley Tuesday Night Wake Group – from
the late ’80′s into the new millenium. John Bishop and others
helped me appreciate the book’s wonders – and – frustrations.
Good humor and patience seem to be the best lenses with which
to wrestle with the Wake.
Cheers to all. See you in Austin. Judith Harrington
Comment by Judith Harrington — March 28, 2007 @ 7:21 pm |
Apologies to Joe Nugent:
My spelling shows I’ve spent too much time reading the
Wake. Judith
Comment by Judith Harrington — March 28, 2007 @ 7:35 pm |
this question from Colleen Jaurretche:
Dear Joe,
Thanks–do I need to make a formal statement, or am I there “roundtable” style? Also, I am giving a paper on Margot’s panel–is there a problem with double participation?
best,
Colleen
and the answer is that no, there’s no problem with double participation.
as for formal statements: the usual form is that i’d ask everyone around the table to say a few words–in a matter of minutes–about their approach to the subject. the answer then is, i suppose, no formal, but perhaps an informal statement
best
j
Comment by jgfnugent — April 3, 2007 @ 3:27 am |
Hello,
Looking forward to the upcoming panel. Some questions I’m interested in hearing from you all (or y’all in Texas-speak) have to do with pre-meeting prep (reading ahead, secondary sources, outside research) and the extent to which the critical apparatus is used in your meetings.
Here is my bio:
I came to UT Austin via Boston College where I completed my Master’s in English. Since arriving at UT I continue to focus on Irish literature, modernism, settler colonialism and women writers and readers. I have had the good fortune to find myself in two Finnegan’s Wake groups and hope to offer some comparative perspective.
Thanks,
Emily
Comment by Emily — June 11, 2007 @ 3:34 pm |
A little off topic maybe, but a plea for you to think about the ethics of buying wetsuits. Do try and think about, for example, the materials your item is manufactured from, the conditions of the factories where they’re manufactured and the green credentials of retailers. Oh, and endeavour to recycle rather than discarding. Thanks!!!!
Comment by Boots Vest — April 17, 2010 @ 8:57 pm |