cfp.english.upenn.edu

http://www.univie.ac.at/flannobrien2011

To celebrate Flann O'Brien's centenary year, the Department of English Studies at the University of Vienna invites panel and paper proposals for 100 Myles: The International Flann O'Brien Centenary Conference (July 24-26, 2011) by the new deadline of February 21.

We are honoured to announce that keynote addresses will be given at the conference by esteemed Irish poet and author Anthony Cronin (author of the biography No Laughing Matter: The Life and Times of Flann O'Brien), Keith Hopper (author of Flann O'Brien: a Portrait of the Artist as a Young Post-Modernist), Frank McNally (Irish Times columnist of "An Irishman's Diary"), Austrian filmmaker Kurt Palm (director of In Schwimmen-zwei-Vögel, a film adaptation of At Swim-Two-Birds), and Harry Rowohlt (German performer and translator of O'Nolan's works).

Vienna provides a beautiful and fitting location for such a celebration of O'Brien's life and works – and not only through a de-Selbyesque understanding of geography. The Austrian capital has a rich tradition of adapting the work of Brian O'Nolan/Flann O'Brien, offering numerous theatrical renditions (such as “Der Pooka MacPhellimey, ein Angehöriger der teuflischen Zunft”), and, with Kurt Palm's In Schwimmen-Zwei-Vögel, the only film adaptation of O’Brien’s novels to date. In this picturesque setting, the conference also boasts a rich and varied social programme, with film screenings, performances, and much more in the offing.

Proposal topics may include, but are not limited to, the following areas of interest:

• Flann and his peers/heirs (Flann & Joyce, Flann & Beckett, Flann & Synge, etc.)
• Translating Flann
• Flann O'Brien & Popular Culture
• Flann O'Brien & Literary Tradition
• Reassessing Flann O'Brien's Legacy/Influence at 100
• Appropriations/Adaptations of Flann (Cultural, Textual, Theatrical, Film)
• Flann O'Brien between Modernism and Post-Modernism
• Flann O'Brien and Theories of the Comic / Theories of Genre
• Self-Plagiarism as Style / Pseudonymy as Literary Technique
• Flann O'Brien and Science (Physics, Pataphysics, Human Biology, etc.)
• The Plain People of Ireland: Flann, the Politics of Culture, & the Culture of Politics.

Abstracts: If you wish to propose a paper (in English, not exceeding 20 minutes), please submit your title and an abstract of 250 words accompanied by a short biographical sketch. In addition to the presentation of papers we invite proposals for alternative forms of discussion: e.g. debate motions (and debaters), themed panels, poster sessions (esp. for PhD students).

Extended Deadline for submission of proposals and abstracts: 21 February 2011.

Please address all correspondence to the organisers at: viennacis.anglistik@univie.ac.at