University of Nottingham Ningbo China
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Why study Literature? if, as Oscar Wilde famously said, 'All Art is quite Useless'

Date(s)
09 April 2014 (18:30-19:30)
Description

The Centre for Research in Applied Linguistics in China(CRALC), the School of English, is pleased to invite you to the following Public Lecture presented by Prof Josephine Guy, the School of English, UNUK

Title:  Why study Literature? (if, as Oscar Wilde famously said, 'All Art is quite Useless')

Beginning with Oscar Wilde's famous paradox about the utility of art, this lecture explores the reasons why the study of literary art matters. Drawing inspiration from a variety of writers, including Walter Pater, Henry Miller and Marcel Proust, and from some surprising sources and disciplines, including economics, evolutionary biology and anthropology, it aims to persuade you that far from being an entertaining luxury, the study of literature should be considered absolutely indispensable; as one of the sources that will be discussed has suggested, no less than the survival of our species may depend upon it.

About the Speaker

Professor Josephine Guy is Head of English at the University of Nottingham. She has published widely on Victorian literature and culture (with a particular interest in Oscar Wilde), as well as on the history of English as a discipline of knowledge, and on text-editing and theories of textuality. Her most recent publications (co-authored with Ian Small), are: A Concise History of Nineteenth-Century Literature (2011) and The Textual Condition of Nineteenth-Century Literature (2012). She is a member of the editorial team working on the OUP edition of The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde for which she is currently editing some of Wilde's plays.

All are welcome!