Faculty Presenter:
David Stern, Harry Starr Professor of Classical and Modern Jewish and Hebrew Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature
Title: The Difference A Page Layout Can Make
The Talmud, the foundational document of classical Judaism, has an unusual page format which has also become the iconic page format for canonical Jewish literature more generally. This talk will trace the surprising history of this page format, its impact on the study of the Talmud and, in the process, show how page layout can have a profound impact upon meaning.
Graduate Student Respondent:
Dalia Wolfson, PhD Student in Comparative Literature
***
Graduate Student Presenter:
Mary Bradford, PhD Student in Comparative Literature
Title: “The sins of our legislators!”: Public and Private Morality in María Amparo Ruiz de Burton’s The Squatter and the Don (1885)
María Amparo Ruiz de Burton’s 1885 novel, The Squatter and the Don, was the first novel to present the perspectives of the Mexican American Californios in their battle against the land claims of U.S. settlers. In this talk, I demonstrate how the legal language surrounding the fight against these land claims constructs an understanding of morality in the text that hinges upon an affective experience of sympathy.
Faculty Presenter:
Verena Conley, Visiting Research Professor of Comparative Literature and Romance Languages and Literatures
Event open to all.
Founded as a graduate program in 1904 and joining with the undergraduate Literature Concentration in 2007, Harvard’s Department of Comparative Literature operates at the crossroads of multilingualism, literary study, and media history.
© 2023 President and Fellows of Harvard College
Sign up to receive news and information about upcoming events, exhibitions, and more