ACLA 2006 Annual Meeting: The Human and Its Others

Since the Enlightenment, the issue of the existence of gods has been a topic of debate. Many have flatly denied the divine. Others have tried to defend the existence of gods in traditional ways against the flow of modern and contemporary speculation. Perhaps more interesting, however, are those positions which attempt to reconstruct arguments for the existence of divinity outside of traditional ontological modes of thinking. Poetry and fiction have always been happy companions of this effort at reconstruction. This seminar explores the manner in which poetry and literature afford means for imaginatively reconceiving the existence of the divine.

Friday, March 24

Mark Brown, Spalding University
“Rilke’s The Book of Hours: Love Poems to God: Instructions for ‘God-Making’”
Mira Sakrajda, SUNY-Westchester Community College
“Re-Positioning the Divine: Donald Barthelme’s Short Fictions”
Lewis MacLeod, University of Alberta
“God’s Presence in a Pint Glass: Pub Rituals and Sacramental Rites in Graham Swift’s Last Orders”
Kyle Anderson, The Pennsylvania State University
“Wang Wei and Dante: Writing the Poet as Divine”

Saturday, March 25

Amy Gates, Des Moines Area Community College-West Campus
“Syncretization and Self-Determination in Dona Flor and her Two Husbands”
Brendan Mahoney, SUNY Binghamton
“Rilke’s Encounter with the Silent God “
Andrew Taggart, University of Wisconsin-Madison
“Against Modern Theodicy: Courage and Hope in Beckett’s How it is”
W. David Hall, Centre College
“A Poetics of the Divine: God as Otherwise than Being”

Affiliated Seminar(s):

• Writing the Divine: Literary Meetings of Humans and Gods