New British Fiction: Innovations in Literature & Criticism
A one-day postgraduate conference, School of English, University of Leeds,
Friday 22 June 2007

SUBMISSION DEADLINE EXTENDED TO FRIDAY FEBRUARY 16TH

Looking beyond the legacy of the 'best young novelists' of Granta's lists =
=96
writers who, over the last thirty years, have helped to nurture a new
cultural politics which engages rather than suppresses difference =96 this
conference focuses on the emerging voices of British fiction and the new
critical axes along which we are reading them. What kinds of thematic,
generic, and formal tensions are at play in the fictions of post-1990
Britain? How are its writers negotiating cultural identities, new
ethnicities, notions of the dissident, the subcultural; what narratives of
history, nationness, self are being (re)written? How is contemporary fictio=
n
challenging or extending existing theoretical discourses; and how might we,
as critical readers, respond? Which texts will we still be reading,
theorising, teaching in ten years' time?

Addressing these and many other questions, this day will bring together
postgraduate researchers from across the UK, whose work on contemporary
British fiction is revaluating existing critical frameworks. You might want
to bring to attention an underrated or emerging literary talent, or the rol=
e
of small presses; you might shift the focus on more familiar texts; or set
out alternative approaches to reading and criticism. We invite text- and/or
theory-based papers, but please note that deliberate emphasis is placed her=
e
on new writers (i.e., those who have published all or almost all of their
work in the nineties and noughties). The conference is designed as a
productive forum for the exploration of ideas, and we hope that what will
emerge will be the mapping of some of the innovative new directions for
20th- and 21st-century literature studies in the UK.

Opening address by Professor Ed Larrissy (University of Leeds).
Evening reading by Ali Smith, whose novels and short stories include, most
recently, 'The Whole Story and other stories' (2003) and the Booker
shortlisted 'The Accidental' (2004).

Please email a 300-word abstract plus a short bio (including current
research, level of study, institutional affiliation and contact details) by
February 16th 2007 to newbritishfiction_at_googlemail.com (enquiries to this
address too). Alternatively, write to conference organisers, Paul McGarry o=
r
Emma Smith, School of English, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT.

Website:
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/english/activities/conferences/conferences.php?file=
=3Dnbf

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Received on Sun Feb 04 2007 - 13:29:29 EST