In keeping with Katherine Philips’s reputation as an exemplary practitioner of friendship and curator of connections, this panel invites papers that put Philips’s work in conversation with writers outside the Society of Friendship, outside coterie poetry, outside the English context, or even outside the early modern period altogether. 

What insights, intimacies, and interpretations might arise if we reacquaint ourselves with Philips amidst new company—or revisit her among old counterparts, such as John Donne or Margaret Cavendish? How does our understanding of her drama or poetry change if we place her in conversation with commercial playwrights (William Shakespeare? Thomas Middleton? John Webster? Aphra Behn?) or closet dramatists (Elizabeth Cary? Mary Wroth?)? Can we accurately call Isabella Whitney and Mary Sidney Herbert her forebears—or Edna St. Vincent Millay and Sylvia Plath her descendents? Might Philips’s place poems help us cast new light on, say, Veronica Franco’s identification with Venice? What happens if we read the ebullient complaints of Orinda to Poliarchus alongside the needling criticisms of Thomas Wyatt’s satires? These prompts are by no means exhaustive; all possible textual companions to Orinda are welcome!

For consideration, please send the following to Arya Sureshbabu (aryasureshbabu@berkeley.edu) by July 20th, 2026:

• Paper title (max 15 words)
• Abstract (max 200 words)
• Condensed CV (max 2 pages)
• PhD or other terminal degree completion year (past or expected)
• Full name, current affiliation, and email address

All applicants will be notified by July 30th.