The YAWP: Villanova's Graduate English Program Blog

This past Friday, students in this year's Summer Studio program in Dublin got a chance to see Ulysses at The Abbey, Ireland's National Theatre! Current MA students Caitlyn, Lia, Ashley, Angela, Alex, and Michelle

Christie and Nick attended Bloomsday at the Rosenbach celebrating James Joyce's epic novel Ulysses . See what Christie said about the event below! Here are a few photos of the Bloomsday event on Saturday, which included a day-long reading of Ulysses with musical interludes of live traditional Irish music. Ed Rendell and the Irish Ambassador to the US were among the readers at the event. I've been asked to read at next year's event, along with the undergraduate essay contest winner. Each reader did about two pages, and there were short readings from each of the episodes with brief summaries up on the screens. A couple readings were accompanied by professional vocalists, who sang for Simon Dedalus and for the Croppy Boy song. Several people in the audience had their Gabler editions open on their laps. The Rosenbach House was offering free admission, so we got to explore the house a bit and ran into Penn professor Dr. Paul Saint-Amour, who attended the Kevin Dettmar lectu...

It was a vision quest worthy of any of the great road trip narratives, from Don Quixote to Sal Paradise. MA’s Alex Brodin, Christie Leonard and Nick Manai packed up the van and set their sails in a north-easterly direction, making their first stop in Portland, ME to hit the town with local hosts Lia and Sam Mrozinski and fellow English grad Angeline Nies-berger. The next morning the trio left the city to make it out to Wilton to stay at Casey Smedberg’s grandparent’s lake house—thanks Pop-pop and Gram. On the way there were gas-station lobster rolls, roadside PB+J’s, and Vision Quest mix CD’s, along with Appalachian Trail hiking, Lupine foraging, sunset kayaking, and many many late night bonfires. We found some great book deals in little thrift stores, but realized we’d never get a thesis written with the chance to explore the long, tree-encased roads and stay up late with the tall, star-freckled skies of Maine, together. Special thanks to Sam Cooke, Father John Misty and Lucinda Will...

Current students Alex, Christie, and Nick went on a road trip to Maine to visit Casey, a 2018 graduate who is working as a Park Ranger until she heads to Connecticut in the fall to begin her PhD, (and made a stop in Portland to visit Lia along the way)!  Christie, Alex, and Casey Nick, Christie, and Alex

The weather didn't (totally) prevent us from celebrating the Class of 2018 at our Graduation Reception this Saturday! Congrats to all-- and please keep in touch! Some of our graduates and faculty Casey and rising second-year students Christie and Nick One is Brooke, one isn't... Thank you to the cohort for my "Brooke Award" That's a wrap on 2017-2018-- can't wait to see the amazing things you all continue to accomplish!

Michael Berthold: I’ve been teaching Octavia Butler’s  Kindred  for a number of years and look forward this summer to reading through the rest of her fiction. Butler visited Villanova back in 2002, and a number of the English faculty had the opportunity to lunch with her! Joe Drury: Here are the books I'm planning to read this summer: Jenny Erpenbeck,  Go, Went, Gone  - much feted contemporary German author. I've been told the novel to read if you want to begin to understand the current European refugee crisis. Cixin Liu,  The Three-Body Problem  - my sci-fi read for the summer, am told it will blow my mind. Preti Taneja, We That Are Young - highly acclaimed new novel about 21st century India, written by someone I worked with briefly in the grim period between college and grad school. Travis Foster: First up, a page-turner of a memoir that addresses rural white poverty far better than the aw-shucks punditry of  Hillbilly Elegy ...

It has been an awesome year for our MA students! See the 2017-2018 Year in Review Newsletter !

A huge thank you to all of our presenters and guests at our 8th Annual Symposium. Awesome job, and congratulations to William, Stephen, Casey, Michael and Christian!