The Edith Wharton Society is thrilled to join forces with the Transatlantic Literary Women (TLW) to host the fourth Edith Wharton Birthday Talk. This year, Professor Gary Totten (University of Nevada, Las Vegas) will be the speaker.
Gary Totten is a renowned Wharton scholar, a Past President of the Edith Wharton Society and the Theodore Dreiser Society, and the current Editor-in-Chief of MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States. His work has made a true mark not only on Wharton studies but also on studies of material culture, travel writing, ethnicity and race in American literature and culture. He is the author of African American Travel Narratives from Abroad: Mobility and Cultural Work in the Age of Jim Crow (2015), coeditor of Politics, Identity, and Mobility in Travel Writing (2015), and editor of Memorial Boxes and Guarded Interiors: Edith Wharton and Material Culture (2007). His most recent edited book Companion to the Multiethnic Literature of the United States (Wiley-Blackwell) is forthcoming in 2024. He is currently the volume editor for Volume 9: Travel Writings of the series The Complete Works of Edith Wharton, from Oxford UP.
Gary’s talk, titled ‘Edith Wharton’s Geographical Imagination: Notes from the Travel Writing,’ will reflect on the synergies of natural and built environments, and the animating force of such settings for Wharton’s characters in the island biomes of the Aegean, the verdant hills and valleys of Italy and France, and the deserts and oases of Morocco. In his talk, Gary will reflect on Wharton’s travel narratives to unpack how the combination of her geographical sensibility and mobility as a traveler produces a cultural vision reflecting the privileges of her race and class while also offering insights into women’s travel experiences and compelling moments of engagement with and understanding of the natural world.
Details and Zoom link:
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
Thomas Constantinesco (16 janvier 2024). Wed. Jan 24, 6pm (ONLINE): Fourth Edith Wharton Birthday Talk. Prof. Gary Totten (University of Nevada, Las Vegas): “Edith Wharton’s Geographical Imagination: Notesfrom the Travel Writing”. A19. Consulté le 22 avril 2025 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/vm03