ASLE, the third day (my big day)
Jun. 23rd, 2005 09:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve_primeToday I started with a paper session on European lit. The first was a completely fascinating talk about the role of giants in medieval literature (Chretien de Troyes, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, etc.), which I plan to write more about later. Next was a talk about the greening of the "Heimat" or "homeland" theme in German literature, with reference to the works of Wulf Kirsten of Saxony and Peter Handke of Austria, which was pretty cool since I'd read a short book by Handke just last weekend (Once Again for Thucydides). Then we learned about Lady Gregory, who'd collected lots of Irish folklore about a hundred years ago. I'd sat next to the Proust scholar from yesterday and chatted with him a bit afterwards, about Eugene, and then I talked to the medievalist, mentioning that Skaði, the Norse goddess of wilderness, had been the daughter of a giant, which she found interesting and wrote down.
Then I got lunch at Holy Cow again. I didn't find anyone to sit with so looked briefly at a Thoreau book in the courtyard then took some pictures of the koi, which kept thinking I was about to feed them. It was still four hours 'til poster time, and everyone else was going on field sessions (like to the raptor center or the wetlands), so I went by the office and optimistically made more copies of my handouts, then came home and read a chapter of A Year in Provence in my sunny and overgrown garden, then showered again and returned to campus. I'd heard of the former UO English professor who was assigned to help us set up our posters, but the amazing thing was that he'd gone to high school with my (rather short-term) college boyfriend Randy!
At 5 p.m., people started coming in and touring the posters. I concluded that showing a poster was much better than reading a paper -- you reach more people (I talked with 34!) and can get more direct feedback. People were enthusiastic! A number asked about the larger project, and those who did were generally very encouraging! The fact that I'm not an academic seemed to go over as interesting but irrelevant, which was also very cool. R. brought D. to see the poster and took my picture:
Afterwards, once the others had left, the poster presenters looked at each other's work and conversed quietly, then we all packed up to go. On my way out, John Tallmadge saw me and hailed me by name (!), agreed to sign my copy of his book (which I'd brought along today), and chatted with me a bit about his current career status. I gave him a copy of my poster handout too.
Oh! Oh! Earlier today, on my way to lunch, I toured the book publishers' room again and came across a flyer seeking contributions to an anthology on "trash animals," and I actually have an old essay I wrote for my own amusement maybe 10 years ago that could be brushed off and fancied up for it. The deadline's in October.
Anyway, after that I stopped at Hana's for some beef udon for dinner. I was her last customer of the day. Very hot soup seemed like a funny choice for such a warm day, but it soothed my throat a bit and felt indulgent and celebratory, and that's what counts. Tomorrow I'm going to listen to a few more papers, go to a talk by Gary Snyder (!), and see if I can interest more people in my poster handout. Now that my big event is done, I can just hang out and enjoy the rest of the conference.
Then I got lunch at Holy Cow again. I didn't find anyone to sit with so looked briefly at a Thoreau book in the courtyard then took some pictures of the koi, which kept thinking I was about to feed them. It was still four hours 'til poster time, and everyone else was going on field sessions (like to the raptor center or the wetlands), so I went by the office and optimistically made more copies of my handouts, then came home and read a chapter of A Year in Provence in my sunny and overgrown garden, then showered again and returned to campus. I'd heard of the former UO English professor who was assigned to help us set up our posters, but the amazing thing was that he'd gone to high school with my (rather short-term) college boyfriend Randy!
At 5 p.m., people started coming in and touring the posters. I concluded that showing a poster was much better than reading a paper -- you reach more people (I talked with 34!) and can get more direct feedback. People were enthusiastic! A number asked about the larger project, and those who did were generally very encouraging! The fact that I'm not an academic seemed to go over as interesting but irrelevant, which was also very cool. R. brought D. to see the poster and took my picture:
Afterwards, once the others had left, the poster presenters looked at each other's work and conversed quietly, then we all packed up to go. On my way out, John Tallmadge saw me and hailed me by name (!), agreed to sign my copy of his book (which I'd brought along today), and chatted with me a bit about his current career status. I gave him a copy of my poster handout too.
Oh! Oh! Earlier today, on my way to lunch, I toured the book publishers' room again and came across a flyer seeking contributions to an anthology on "trash animals," and I actually have an old essay I wrote for my own amusement maybe 10 years ago that could be brushed off and fancied up for it. The deadline's in October.
Anyway, after that I stopped at Hana's for some beef udon for dinner. I was her last customer of the day. Very hot soup seemed like a funny choice for such a warm day, but it soothed my throat a bit and felt indulgent and celebratory, and that's what counts. Tomorrow I'm going to listen to a few more papers, go to a talk by Gary Snyder (!), and see if I can interest more people in my poster handout. Now that my big event is done, I can just hang out and enjoy the rest of the conference.