Epistolary Epistemologies: Montagu's Turkish Letters

So many things come to mind when exploring Montagu's famous embassy letters: women in the public sphere, the appropriation of Eastern fashions--textile, textual, the inculcation of Eastern medicine (smallpox inoculation), unsettling orientalism and notions of Enlightenment envoys and voyeurism that service the construction of racial "Others." We will read as much as we can of Montagu's collection of letters--the complete collection is under the project gutenberg link below--but specific famous passages that are considered crucial reads are under the norton link for easy accessibility. We hope to see you on Thursday, October 30th, 2 p.m. at Sweet Claire's on Third Street. We will also be planning our two "Dinner With..." events which will likely center around (Event 1) Swift and (Event 2) The Wordsworths to round out the term.



Readings

Turkish Letters (Complete Edition)
Selections of Turkish Letters (Norton)

Pride & Prejudice, the Play!: A Theatrical Outing

Pride and Prejudice is coming to the IU Theatre! On Thursday, November 6th, our reading group will *NOT* hold a regular meeting. Instead, we will head out on Friday, November 7th, to see a stage adaptation of Austen's most popular novel. Here's the plan:

Dinner and Drinks @ Lennie's on 10th Street, 5:30 p.m.

Walk/Drive over to Ruth N Halls Theatre on Campus @ 7 p.m. for a 7:30 p.m. curtain.

Tickets are $15.00 with student ID, though we can get a group discount if we get more than 10 people to go for $12.00 a piece. Please do not forget your student ID or they will not let you into the theatre with a student ticket.

We are hoping to book as a group so we can get seats together, so please contact us via facebook or via e-mail at raseiler@indiana.edu if you would like to go. Partners / friends welcome to tag along!

Here's a link to the advert: http://www.indiana.edu/~thtr/productions/2014/prideandprejudice.shtml

Radcliffe's The Italian

Thursday, October 23rd, we will be reading Ann Radcliffe's shorter gothic novel, The Italian (1797). Join us at Sweet Claire's at 2 p.m. See below for a link to a free version of the full text!

Link to text:

The Italian

We hope to see you there!

Poetry Week! Smith & Cowper

This upcoming week (Thursday, Oct 16th) we are focusing on the works of two brilliant Romantic British poets, William Cowper and Charlotte Smith.

Click on the titles of the works below for links to full text. As always, read through what you can of the suggested list--but come with ideas and questions nonetheless!

Cowper
Book I of The Task (1785)
"The Castaway"(1799)

Optional:
"Sweet Meat Has Sour Sauce; Or, the Slave-Trader in the Dumps" (1788)

Smith
Beachy Head (1807)
From Elegiac Sonnets (1800):

• "On being cautioned against walking on a Headland overlooking the Sea, because it was frequented by a Lunatic" 
• "The Dead Beggar"
• "Ode to Death"
• "To Dependance" 

Optional: 

The Emigrants ("Dedication: To William Cowper, Esq" and "Book the First") (1793)

We hope to see you on Thursday, October 16th, from 2 - 3 p.m. at Sweet Claire's on Third Street. We will also be discussing our first "Dinner with...." night, discussing which faculty and author we would like to invite to kick-start our most popular (read: populated!) series!

This week -- Descartes & Montaigne

Hi everyone!

Thanks to everyone for last week's excellent discussion of Equiano! For this week, we will be reading selections from Descartes and Montaigne. We'll be looking at three of Montaigne's Essais and Descartes Discourse on Method. You need not read all of Discourse, though it is not terribly long. What's important are his ideas about doubt, so you can read/skim for that topic.

Montaigne's Essais

"That the Soul Expends Its Passions Upon False Objects, Where the True Are Wanting"
"On the Education of Children"
"That it is Folly to Measure Truth and Error by Our Own Capacity"

Optional:
"Of Liars"
"Of Books"
"Of Friendship"

Descartes:
Discourse on Method

You might always be interested in Descarte's Meterology, originally published with Discourse, but I couldn't find a copy online. Feel free to bring it if you have it.

Finally, since what connects Descartes & Montaigne is their rejection of Aristotle, it might be useful to check out the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on Aristotle, and specifically his four causes. 

Once again, we'll be meeting at Sweet Claire's on 3rd street Thursday from 2-3pm. We look forward to seeing you there!

C18 Group next week -- Olaudah Equiano

Hi everyone!

We'll be meeting at 2pm on Thursday, October 2nd at Sweet Claire's on 3rd Street and Grant to discuss Olaudah Equiano's The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African. The link included here will take you to a project Gutenberg site, but you might also consider reading several texts that were published along with Equiano's in an anthology called Unchained Voices: An Anthology of Black Authors in the English Speaking World of the Eighteen Century. The following texts are available through Box:

Unchained Voices, "Introduction"
Belinda, "Petition of an African Slave, to the legislature of Massachusetts"
Benjamin Banneker, "Copy of a Letter from Benjamin Banneker to the Secretary of State, with His Reply"
George Liele "An Account of Several Baptist Churches"
Boston King, "Memoirs of the Life of Boston King, a Black Preacher"

Thanks everyone & we look forward to seeing you Thursday!

Spring Newsletter / Fall Preview

Dinner with Smollett and Dr. Jesse Molesworth

Hello All:

Please join us on Tuesday, April 29th, from 6-7:30 p.m for our last reading group discussion of the term. We will be joined by Dr. Jesse Molesworth (restaurant TBD) for an excellent discussion on Smollett's novel, Peregrine Pickle.

Drinks, snacking, and casual conversation will run from 6-6:30 p.m., so don't sweat it if you're late! Discussion proper begins at 6:30 and runs for an hour.

Please RSVP 24 hours before the event either through Facebook or by emailing Rachel at raseiler@indiana.edu so we know how many to request for a table!


For a link to the text, please see below:

Smollet, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle


Optional/Recommended Text

Molesworth, "Can the Novel Enlighten?" from Chance and the Eighteenth-Century Novel: Realism, Probability, Magic*

*This is the introduction to Jesse's book--I will try to post a PDF about a week before the event for people to read through at leisure.

Vindications with two Marys!

Hi All:

For the month of April, we will be reading Mary Wollstonecraft with our very own Dr. Mary Favret! Dr. Favret has written on Wollstonecraft quite extensively, and teaches Wollstonecraft's works across her undergraduate and graduate courses.

For the venue, Dr. Favret has selected Ami (1500 E. 3rd ST.) as the restaurant and meeting place of choice. While there are a variety of vegetarian, meat, and fish dishes to choose from admist sushi and traditional Japanese dishes, there is also good wine and beer selection, as well as reasonably low priced appetizers if you prefer to sip and snack, rather than feast, during discussion.

We will be meeting Monday, April 7th, at Ami from 6 - 7:30 p.m. From 6-6:30 p.m., we will have casual discussion, snacking, and ordering. Discussion proper will begin at 6:30 and run until 7:30.

Please let Rachel or Kate know if you plan on attending so we know how many to ask for when we get a table! Do show up to support your group and your faculty--especially considering it's a short read this week! For a link to the text, click below.

Readings

Primary: Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Man

Secondary: (not required, but if you can get your hands on Mary Favret's chapter on Wollstonecraft in Romantic Correspondence, you should give it a good read--it's excellent! If I can get my hands on a copy in time, I will post it here!)

Dinner with Godwin

Greetings! For those of you attending dinner with Godwin, here is the information:

Reading: Political Justice Vol. 1 Books 2 & 3
Location: Finch's Brasserie
Time: Wednesday February 26, 6-7 pm
Reservation name: Kate Blake (in case you arrive early)

Thanks to all of those who RSVP'd! We look forward to talking with you!

Drinks and Dinner w/Jane Austen and Her Critics

Please join us for the last leg of this tri-part event: Dinner with Austen and Her Critics
 
Friday, February 21st @ Finch's
Drinks, ordering, and casual chatter begin at 6 p.m. Discussion goes from 6:30 - 7:30 p.m.




Below you will find a list of the readings we will be covering and where to access them for free.




1. Mary Favret, "Everyday War." ELH 72.3 (2005) - Can be found for free on JSTOR via IU Library

2. Claudia Johnson, "Sense and Sensibility: Opinions Too Common and Too Dangerous." Jane Austen: Women, Politics, and the Novel. (Link is to Google Books--this is Chapter 3 in the free preview.)

3. William Galperin, "What Happens When Jane Austen and Frances Burney Enter the Romantic Canon?" Lessons of Romanticism: A Critical Companion. (Link is to Google Books--this is a large but incomplete portion of this essay. No worries, you'll be able to follow. Feel free to stop reading at "Coda: Shelley...")

4. Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, "Jane Austen and the Masturbating Girl." Critical Inquiry 17.4 (1991)


We look forward to seeing you there--don't forget to RSVP on the facebook event or via e-mail to Rachel by Thursday, Feb. 20th at 5 p.m.!

Cheers!

Dinner and Drinks with Austen: The Readings

For those interested in joining us for the Dinner and Drinks with Austen series, please see below for a list of links to e-reader and PDF versions of our readings. Alternative hard copy versions welcome.




Sense and Sensibility

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/161


 Persuasion

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/105

Criticism

(2-3 of them TBA)

Favret, Mary. "Everyday War." ELH 72.3 (2005): 605-33. (Available via IU Libraries)


Galperin, William. "What Happens when Jane Austen and Frances Burney Enter the Romantic Canon?" Lessons in Romanticism. Ed. Thomas Pfau. Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 1998. (PDF will be e-mailed to list of RSVPs two weeks prior to meeting)

Drinks and Dinner with Jane Austen

Welcome back from break! A few people from the Eighteenth-Century Reading Group and the Nineteenth-Century/Victorian Reading Group have decided to co-host three casual meetings over the course of January and February---we're calling it "Dinner and Drinks with Jane Austen." We will be reading and discussing Sense and Sensibility, Persuasion, and some of the most crucial (and some of the most recent) Austen criticism across several delicious Bloomington dining and drinking locations. You need not be a specialist in C18 or C19 British literature to attend! And, of course, if you are in need of transport to any of the events, you may contact me at raseiler@indiana.edu and I will personally send over a phaeton or barouche for your convenience.


The dates and locations are below--while most of the time our respective reading groups do not require RSVPs, we are hosting these events at restaurants, so please contact me (again at raseiler@indiana.edu) at least 24 hours prior to the event so I can have a decent estimate of the headcount for reservations. Reminders will be sent out closer to the dates!


Dinner with Austen: Sense and Sensibility
Friday, January 24th @ Farm
Drinks, ordering, and casual chatter begin at 6 p.m. Discussion goes from 6:30 - 7:30 p.m.


Dinner with Austen: Persuasion
Friday, February 7th @ Uptown
Drinks, ordering, and casual chatter begin at 6 p.m. Discussion goes from 6:30 - 7:30 p.m.


Dinner with Austen and Her Critics
Friday, February 21st @ Finch's
Drinks, ordering, and casual chatter begin at 6 p.m. Discussion goes from 6:30 - 7:30 p.m.