Conferences
The Road Home: Cormac McCarthy's Imaginative Return to the South
April 25-28, 2007
Knoxville, Tennessee
Cormac McCarthy is one of the major authors of contemporary Southern and American literature. After twenty years of novels set in the southwest borderlands, McCarthy has revisited the Appalachian setting of his first four novels in his new work, The Road. In response, this conference will reconsider the relationship of the McCarthy canon to the contemporary Southern and American literary tradition.
Call for Papers
Guidelines for Submitting Paper and/or Panel Proposals
To ensure speedy and affirmative consideration of your proposal, we suggest that:
- You clearly define the topic, scope, approach and significance of your presentation.
- You place your paper within the context of previous literary, cultural
or McCarthy scholarship: how does your work engage, extend or supersede
previous work? In what ways does it constitute an original contribution?
Your individual papers should be readable within 15 to 20 minutes. Panels should consist of three to four papers on a single or related set of topics, and should plan for a session time of 90 minutes. - You specify any audiovisual or IT requirements when you submit your proposal.
Topics and Subjects
- How does the new work affect McCarthy’s standing within contemporary Southern and Appalachian literature? Can The Road even be discussed as a Southern novel? We would especially welcome papers which discuss McCarthy’s role as a Tennessee writer.
- Papers would also be welcome offering comparative analysis between The Road and McCarthy’s new play, The Sunset Limited.
Please identify other secondary texts, theories or sources that you will use in a significant way. Summarize as best you can what you expect your major points, findings, or conclusions will be.
We are happy to hear from scholars, graduate students or general readers of McCarthy who would be interested in submitting paper or panel proposals individually or collectively.
All proposals or completed papers should be sent to the following address:
Dr. Chris Walsh
1108A McClung Tower
University Of Tennessee
Knoxville TN 37916
You may also submit proposals and papers by email to cwalsh2@utk.edu. Please submit all proposals or papers as Microsoft Word attachments only. Please also note that the deadline for submissions is February 15, 2007; the conference review committee will consider all submissions and confirm acceptance within two weeks of that date.
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