#TotalTudormania2023!

            Submissions are invited for a session on 21st-century Tudormania at the South-Central Renaissance Conference / Queen Elizabeth I Society, to be held April 27-29 at the University of California-Berkeley.

A bit over four centuries after the death of Queen Elizabeth I in 1603 ended their reign, the Tudors are enjoying a moment. Across genres and platforms, this most media-savvy of dynasties is emphatically back. Two of the most prominent, award-winning representations are the musical Six, about King Henry VIII’s wives, and the Wolf Hall trilogy of novels by Hilary Mantel, set at Henry’s bloody but dazzling Court and centered around Sir Thomas Cromwell. There have also been several films, plays, and prestige television series, such as The Tudors. Queen Elizabeth has, furthermore, played a significant role in movies, shows, and historical fiction that depict Mary Queen of Scots. Besides all that, the Tudors have anchored blockbuster museum exhibitions like the recent ones on the court painter Holbein and “The Tudors: Art and Majesty in Renaissance England” at the Met in the fall of 2022. Well-received, lesser-known books, from the young-adult alternative history My Lady Jane, to a bevy of mysteries set in sixteenth-century England or involving English agents in Europe, also abound at present.

            This special session for the Queen Elizabeth I Society, part of the South-Central Renaissance Conference to be held April 27-29, 2023 at the University of California-Berkeley (see southcentralrenaissanceconference.org for details), invites proposals for presentations that seek to explicate or interrogate peak Tudormania, or that aim to elucidate how these historical figures are portrayed in various works by specific authors or directors. Besides works about Henry VIII and his daughter Elizabeth I, submissions on the other regnant Tudors, women in their orbit, or artists and courtiers directly connected to their spheres are encouraged too, as are talks that explore connections to other contemporary dynastic dramas, for instance the House of Windsor and its depiction in The Crown. It is devoutly to be wished that this will be a fun and enlightening examination of the enduring legacy, fame, and rockstar appeal of the Tudors.

            Please submit abstracts of 200-300 words along with a short biographical note of about 100 words via the portal at southcentralrenaissanceconference.org.