We invite proposals for conference papers that examine the theme, “Locating Elizabeth Bowen.” Bowen had passionate attachments to places, especially her family home, Bowen’s Court, but also to Dublin, London, Paris, and Folkestone, although the many upheavals in her life meant it became one often dominated by exile. Her characters are often temporarily located: Portia in The Death of the Heart staying uneasily with her brother and his wife; Leopold and Henrietta in The House in Paris caught, as it were, on the move between places; Lois and the Naylors poised on the moment of their expulsion from Danielstown in The Last September; Emmeline’s facilitation of “dangerous” travel in To the North; Eva Trout’s time in America. Bowen’s non-fiction writing also often focuses on specific locations, for example Bowen’s Court, the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin, or Rome.  There are many examples of spatial locations, but both temporal and emotional forms of location and dislocation also run throughout Bowen's work.

Proposed papers might explore, but need not be limited to, Bowen’s relationship with:

• specific geographical locations (Dublin; Paris; London; Ireland; England; America; Rome)
• the physical and built environment (Bowen’s Court; the Big House; the Shelbourne and other hotels/ pensions; houses; villas; shops; rooms)
• travel (modernist travel; children on the move; leave taking)
• the spectral
• exile
• domestic spaces
• dis/inheritance

Please send proposals of 250-400 words for 20-minute conference papers, together with a short biography, to the conference organisers, Ann Rea, Nicola Darwood and Nick Turner, at bowen@beds.ac.uk by 31st December 2023.  Decisions will be sent by 31st January 2024.