Marathon Reading of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene

In this three-day event – as far as we can tell the world’s third of its kind (the first two were held in Tampere over the last years) – we will jointly read Edmund Spenser’s epic poem The Faerie Queene (1590/1596) and embark on a wild ride through a world of knights, dragons and magical creatures. We will thereby return poetry to its origins of being recited and enjoyed communally.

The event will begin with a mini-conference on Friday morning, with lectures by Dr Antoinina Bevan Zlatar (University of Zurich) and others. These lectures will introduce you to the literary, cultural and linguistic contexts of Spenser’s work and thereby prepare you for the reading. The reading itself will begin on Friday afternoon and end on Sunday evening. Participants should bring a copy of The Faerie Queene to the event. Recommend edition: Penguin Classics.

Students, staff and other interested people are cordially invited to the mini-conference and the reading. Students wishing to attend the entire event can also book it as a 2-credit-point module (enrolment via Sisu or e-mail to Johannes Riquet).

Programme

Introductory lectures on Friday morning (9.00-11.30):

Antoinina Bevan Zlatar (University of Zurich), "Animal Life in The Faerie Queene"

Kevin McGinley (Tampere University), "Spenser’s Monsters”

Johannes Riquet (Tampere University) , "The Faerie Queene and the Elusive End"

Marathon reading:

Friday 13:00-24:00, Saturday 9.00-24.00, Sunday 10.00-24.00

Attachments

the_faerie_queene_marathon_reading2023.png

the_faerie_queene_lectures2023.png

Organiser

Johannes Riquet / English literature section of the Languages Unit

Further information

johannes.riquet@tuni.fi