Month: July 2022

New Chaucer Society 2022 Congress: Wrap Up

by Candace Barrington

Vindolanda: destination for one of three NCS excursions and excellent reminder of the many peoples involved in the Roman colonial project.

The 2022 NCS Congress featured an inspiring number of sessions with a global or multi-cultural perspective. And a good number of presenters were from non-Anglophone backgrounds, though many were unable to attend in person because of visa, funding, and pandemic restrictions.

Because there’s still a chance for you to view the Congress sessions and uploaded presentations–here’s a quick list of the papers/sessions dealing with Chaucer’s reception, global and otherwise, that I attended.

Papers

  • Jacqueline Burek, “Translating Troilus: The Welsh Troelus a Chresyd“
  • Louise D’Arcens, “The Kangaroo Kelmscott: Chaucer’s Sydney Afterlife and Australian Deep Time”
  • Aistė Kiltinavičiūtė, “Reimagining the Dream Poet: Edward Burne-Jones’s Dantean Chaucer”
  • Usha Vishnuvajjala, “Feminist Medievalisms and Chaucer in Jane Austen Fanfiction”
  • Wajid Ayed, “Chaucer in Tunisia: 50 years”
  • Raúl Ariza-Barile “From Southwark to the Citee of Mexico: Producing the First Ever Mexican Translation of The Canterbury Tales”
  • Lian Zhang, “Translation as Remembering: Canterbury Tales in Chinese”
  • Yoshiyuki Nakao, “How to Translate Chaucer’s Multiple Subjectivities into Japanese: Ambiguities in His Speech Representation”
  • Amy Goodwin, “Chaucer in the New York Times”

  • Jonathan Hsy, “Racial Displacements: Chaucerian Poets of Color and Critical Refugee Studies”
  • Jamie Taylor, “Indigenous Studies and a Global Middle Ages”
  • Candace Barrington, “Comparative Translation: Possibilities and Limitations”
  • Jonathan Fruoco, “Is there an Embargo on Chaucer in France?”
  • Marion Turner, “The Wife of Bath’s European Lives”

Plenary Sessions

  • “Where Medieval Studies Joins Up,” a plenary conversation chaired by Jonathan Hsy featuring
    • Anthony Vahni Capildeo
    • Wallace Cleaves
    • Ananya Jahanara Kabir
  • The Refugee Tales, with Patience Agbabi
  • The Polyglot Miller’s Tale Reading

If you were a registered participant at the Congress, you can view the sessions and individual papers.

  • Go to ncs2020.net
  • Click on Attendee Hub and log in just as you did during the Congress
  • Select “All Sessions” on Schedule pull-down menu (upper)
  • Search for the speaker’s name, then follow the links to replay either the session or watch the uploaded presentation.

These links will remain available until mid-October.

2022 New Chaucer Society Congress, Durham, UK: Polyglot Reading of The Miller’s Tale

by Candace Barrington

In a happy reprise of the spontaneous (but very jolly) Polyglot Reading of The Miller’s Tale at the 2014 NCS Congress in Reykjavik, 14 Global Chaucerians gathered to read the tale in 9 languages (in addition to Middle English).

  • 1.3109-3135, Middle English, Candace Barrington and Jonathan Hsy
  • 1.3136-3166, Welsh, Jacqueline Burek
  • 1.3167-3220, Spanish, Amanda Gerber
  • 1.3221-3287, Lithuanian, Aistė Kiltinavičiūtė
  • 1.3288-3338, 19c French, Juliette Vuille
  • 1.3339-3398, German, Lucy Fleming
  • 1.3399-3467, Arabic, Wajih Ayed
  • 1.3468-3525, Italian, Sarah McNamer
  • 1.3526-3588, Hebrew, Noa Nikolsky
  • 1.3589-3656, German, Lucy Fleming
  • 1.3657-3726, French, Jonathan Fruoco
  • 1.3727-3785, Korean, Mariah Min
  • 1.3786-3854, Italian, David Wallace

Some special highlights include

  • the premier of Jonathan Fruoco’s new French prose translation of the tale,
  • the first ever translation into Welsh thanks to the intrepid Jacqueline Burek,
  • the introduction of Korean slang and dialect into Mariah Min’s reading,
  • Lithuanian (need we say more?),
  • a sequenced chorus of Alisoun’s “Tehee” (3740), and
  • a recording, now streaming and available through mid-October to those who registered for the congress (either in person on online).

And, of course, lots of laughter.

In addition to thanking our fabulous readers (both new ones and repeat participants) for their full-hearted participation, we owe our deep gratitude to

  • Mary Flannery for initially inviting us to resume the reading at the soon-to-be postponed 2020 Congress,
  • Julie Orlemanski and Phil Smith for juggling schedules to ensured the reading happened in 2022,
  • Patience Agbabi and other members of our audience for supporting us with their presence and laughter,
  • Annette Kern-Stachler, Lian Zhang, Raúl Ariza-Barile kept away by the complications of pandemic-era travel, and
  • Durham University’s excellent tech staff who smoothly orchestrated the recording and transmission of the event.

If you were a registered participant at the Congress, you can view the streaming broadcast of the reading.

  • Go to ncs2020.net
  • Click on Attendee Hub and log in just as you did during the Congress
  • Select “All Sessions” on Schedule pull-down menu (upper)
  • Search “polyglot,” then click on “Polyglot Miller’s Tale Reading”
  • Click on “replay”
  • After lots of preliminaries, the actual reading begins at 17 minutes and ends at. 59.30

Plans are already brewing for 2024. Let us know if you’re interested in participating at globalchaucers at gmail dot com.