BLAKE AND CONFLICT
A Two Day Conference at University College, Oxford
22-23 September, 2006
Call for Papers

For the majority of William Blake's life, Britain was a nation at war.
Countries, individuals, and ideologies clashed in the ferment of the
American, French, and Industrial Revolutions. Britain experienced
unprecedented levels of mobilisation, chronic food shortages, mass
demonstrations, and the repression of civil liberties.

Blake recoiled with horror from armed conflict, and the consequences of
living in a militarised state. Yet he was also situated within religious
milieux in which intellectual conflict was a valued mode of social
interaction and the production of knowledge. For the combative Blake,
'mental war', the collision of contraries, was integral to the creative
process.

This conference will seek to examine the diverse ways in which Blake
engaged with "fightings and conflicts dire" as both productive and
destructive forces. Our focus is sharpened by its relevance to the
global, cultural, and ideological turmoil of the present day.

Each paper will last 20 minutes. Abstracts of 200 words and enquiries
should be sent
to blakecon_at_univ.ox.ac.uk

Details are available at the conference website.
<http://users.ox.ac.uk/%7Euniv2145/Blake%20and%20Conflict.html>

Possible topics might include:

• Blake and war, corporeal and mental
• Conflict as a mode of knowledge-production
• Concords and discords between genders and constructions of gender, or
between races and constructions of race
• Blake's collaborations, friendships, and animosities
• Blake's engagement with religious, aesthetic, and scientific disputes
• Blake's conversations with other writers and artists
• Rival discourses or conflicting aesthetics within Blake's works
• Struggles with engraving, etching, and painting materials
• The collision of verbal and visual
• Formal dissonance
• Prophecy as an oppositional discourse
• Competing interpretations of Blake and his work

The deadline for proposals is 01 May 2006

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Received on Sat Mar 18 2006 - 13:37:56 EST