Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · 5d

Coleridge in 1809: 'In the present age (emphatically the age of personality!) there are more than ordinary motives for withholding all encouragement from this mania, of busying ourselves with the names of others, which is still more alarming as a symptom, than it is troublesome as a disease.'

1

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

UofG Fantasy @uofgfantasy.bsky.social · 7d

Call for Papers and Sessions

Fantasy’s Present Pasts

University of Glasgow
Tuesday 23rd – Thursday 25th June 2026

Keynote Speakers: Stefan Ekman, Sofia Samatar and Helen Young

More details on the conference in the post linked below - deadline for proposals is Friday 12th December.

Fantasy’s Present Pasts – Call for Papers and Sessions – Centre for Fantasy and the Fantastic

fantasy.glasgow.ac.uk

8 9

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · 9d

It is a great joke. I think Peter Conradi read the two authors as being divisions of the things Murdoch feared she was or was seen as. There's certainly some very self-aware exaggerations of her quirks.

1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · 10d

I'd really recommend that you read The Black Prince in your Murdoch spree, but (if you haven't read it already) ideally only when you've read quite a few of her others, so you can appreciate what she's doing to herself!

1 3

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · 26d

Congratulations, Adrian! Hope the well-deserved pint was a good one.

1

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

Taylor Driggers(-McDowall) @taylorwdriggers.bsky.social · 28d

I'm so looking forward to this panel discussion on Le Guin in November! Glasgow pals - be sure to get your tickets for this!

@mjrsangster.bsky.social

So Mayer @suchmayer.bsky.social · 28d

Glasgow, we're bringing the forest to you! 🍃

4 Nov: celebrate @silver-press.bsky.social Ursula K. Le Guin titles THE WORD FOR WORLD & SPACE CRONE w @taylorwdriggers.bsky.social, Phil Crockett-Thomas (Abolition Science Fiction!), Matthew Sangster & me in convo.

www.waterstones.com/events/a-cel...

A Celebration of Ursula K. Le Guin | Events at Waterstones Bookshops | Waterstones

Events at Waterstones get you closer to the books and authors you admire most. Find information and tickets about A Celebration of Ursula K. Le Guin today.

www.waterstones.com

1 4 8

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Sep 8

Towards the longer side of novella, but Piranesi and This is How You Lose the Time War? Sofia Samatar's The Practice, the Horizon and the Chain (although that's resistance to serious oppression)? Adrian Tchaikovsky's Elder Race? (Several of his would work.)

1 2

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

British Association for Romantic Studies @bars.bsky.social · Sep 8

Huge thanks to all who attended the BARS 2025 Early Career and Postgraduates Conference! We had a wonderful time!

See you this Friday 12th Sept for the online portion of the conference!

British Association for Romantic Studies ECRs & Postgraduates @bars-ecrs-pgrs.bsky.social · Sep 8

What an inspiring 2 days in Cambridge!

The generosity of thought, depth & breadth of discussion, & the diversity of perspectives created space for truly insightful dialogue at this conference, an inspiring exchange we hope continues well beyond Trinity Hall.

Remember, #BARS2025 is not over yet...

4 15

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

British Association for Romantic Studies ECRs & Postgraduates @bars-ecrs-pgrs.bsky.social · Sep 3

We're delighted to be welcoming you to Cambridge for the start of the PGR & ECR Conference!

We hope you'll join us today at St John's College to view a selection of poetry highlights, with Romanticism at its heart, including treasures from Coleridge & Wordsworth.

@bars.bsky.social
#BARS2025

4 11

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

British Association for Romantic Studies @bars.bsky.social · Sep 2

BARS Members will have received an email entitled "BARS Executive Elections 2025: Voting Information for Members".

Please read the statements of the candidates at the two links below and make your votes via the link in your email.

www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6121
www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=6128

3 4

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Sep 2

I feel like it's a series designed to start a whole series of conversations genre studies really needs, and was in many respects blocked from starting those conversations in the eighties.

1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Sep 2

To be fair, if you were going to do a semester-long course on one Fantasy series, that's one from which students would take a lot away. I have a PhD student working on Nevèrÿon at the moment who keeps finding new interesting angles.

1 1

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

deven parker @devenparker.bsky.social · Aug 29

Glasgow pals, check out my new exhibition at the Mitchell Library on c19 theatre, empire, and celebrity! On display thru October. I'm also giving a talk at the Mitchell on race and c19 theatre on October 4 😊 www.glasgowlife.org.uk/event/1/exhi...

Exhibition: Performing 19th Century Glasgow: Nation, Celebrity, Empire - Glasgow Life

Exhibition on Glasgow Theatres

www.glasgowlife.org.uk

3 8 19

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 29

Will be interested to see what you make of Titus Alone. It's very different, and I think deliberately so. There are some really interesting drafts at the BL where he starts feeling it out in a form that's almost like a Samuel Beckett script.

1 1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 29

So fan fiction is specific, but so is Roman epic. That's not to say that both can't cross cultures in weird and unexpected ways, though, or that some forms aren't more grounded in their specific circumstances than others.

1 1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 29

I think the useful part of the 'Virgil wrote Fan Fiction' thing is that it pushes against a geniuses-and-others model and towards one that recognises all culture is relational - a tissue of quotations, as Barthes puts it - and that's a good thing (and a thing genre's refreshingly honest about).

2 1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 29

The book touches on this at various points - I found Colin Burrow's book on the older sense of imitation illuminating for thinking about how senses of appropriate relationality have changed over time. Will take a look at the Jordan post - I enjoyed your writing on Peake, who's one of my faves.

2 1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 29

I think it's more interesting to say that fan fiction is a form that freely admits its intertextuality (cultural as well as literary), in a way that more self-consciously literary works have been cautious about post-Romanticism, but which is common in older literature and very important in genre.

1 1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 23

I think that's a South Korean subgenre - Dallergut Dream Department Store etc?

1

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

British Association for Romantic Studies @bars.bsky.social · Aug 22

The British Association for Romantic Studies Biennal International Conference 2026 - Romantic Retrospection
In-person: Wednesday 29th–Friday 31st July 2026
Online Conference: Thursday 6th August 2026

Updates & CfP announced:

www.birmingham.ac.uk/events/arts-...

[Image: Birmingham Museums Trust]

19 30

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

Simon Kövesi @kovesi.bsky.social · Aug 18

The Ronald Blythe Fellowship is John Clare Society's new scheme awarding a PhD student focusing on Clare a £1000 bursary to support their work.
Please pass on - &/or contact me or Honorary Secretary of the Society, Karen Lakey, for further information:
johnclaresociety.wordpress.com/contact-us/

31 25

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 11

Congratulations, Rhys! If you fancy doing a Five Questions interview for the BARS Blog to raise awareness, please just drop me an email.

1 1

Reposted by Matthew Sangster

Association for Scottish Literature @asls.org.uk · Aug 11

The University of Glasgow’s Centre for Robert Burns Studies is offering a PhD scholarship on “Robert Burns & the Environment” – part of a new research strand on Burns, the Environment & Sustainable Cultural Heritage

DEADLINE 18 AUGUST
#C18th #Romanticism
www.gla.ac.uk/scholarships...

University of Glasgow - Scholarships & funding - Robert Burns and the Environment Scholarship

www.gla.ac.uk

42 48

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 8

Congratulations!

1

Matthew Sangster @mjrsangster.bsky.social · Aug 4

Adrian Tchaikovsky's Elder Race uses two POVs very effectively.

2