The Second Plague Pandemic inflicted unimaginable hurt and triggered multiple crises (demographic, spiritual, political, socio-economic), whose impact informed new artistic and literary modes of expression such as the danse macabre or the carnivalesque. 

This panel examines how writers and artists processed pandemic experiences, both in terms of actual outbreaks and long-term repercussions (such as peasant revolts or multi-generational trauma). Where do we find traces of ‘long plague’ (analogous to ‘long Covid’), and what form do they take? How do pandemic experiences affect collective memory and shared narratives? And what theoretical frameworks might be helpful for studying (post)pandemic discourse in literature and art?

This virtual panel welcomes contributions that examine postpandemic traces in a wide range of late medieval (and possibly early modern) literary and artistic texts, including but not limited to:

• epic poetry

• lyrical poetry

• prose narratives

• dramatic and performative texts

• visual texts (religious or secular)

Deadline for Submissions: September 15, 2024

Official proposals to ICMS sessions must be made through the Confex proposal portal.Proposals to this session can be made using this direct link to the session: https://icms.confex.com/icms/2025/paper/papers/index.cgi?sessionid=5818

Please follow the ICMS guidelines and instructions for submission: 

https://wmich.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/u3004/2024/PaperProposalGuide%202024-05-21.pdf

For information about the International Congress on Medieval Studies (May 8-10, 2025), see https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress.