Academic Year 2010-11
Robert von Hallberg
Helen A. Regenstein Professor in English Language & Literature
University of Chicago
About Professor von Hallberg, in his own words:
"I study poetry. I have written about avant-garde American poetry (Charles Olson: The Scholar’s Art [1978]) and more generally about U.S. poetry since 1945 (American Poetry and Culture, 1945-1980 [1985] and Poetry, Politics, Intellectuals [1996]). I have an interest in the culture of intellectuals generally, but especially that of literary intellectuals (Literary Intellectuals and the Dissolution of the State [1996]), and a related interest in the sociology of literature, particularly in the institutions that mediate its production and reception (Canons [1984]). My theoretical interests derive from concern about the relations between political history and literary culture and focus on particular critical problems, such as evaluation (Politics and Poetic Value [1987]).
I teach courses in German poetry (“Rainer Maria Rilke,” “Paul Celan and Emily Dickinson”) and in theories of modernity (“Bloch, Benjamin, Bataille,” “Benjamin and Simmel”) in the Comparative Literature Department, and in poetics (“Elements of Poetry and Poetics”) and U.S. poetry of the 20th century in the English Department. I am beginning to explore the relations between poetry and song and expect to teach courses in song lyrics as a genre of popular poetry. I also direct an ongoing graduate workshop in Poetry and Poetics and participate in the Program in Poetry and Poetics.
I am writing two books now: one, a literary critical examination of African American poetry; the other, a short book in defense of lyric poetry. I have encouraged scholarly work on the historical contexts of modernist writing, and will continue to work with students interested in American and European modernism. But my courses are now concentrating less in historical fields than in general problems in poetics."
Professor von Hallberg will teach a seminar in the Spring 2011 semester on "Popular Song Lyrics." For more details click on "Gould Center Seminar" at left.
Academic Year 2009-10
Angus Fletcher
literary scholar and critic
2009-2010 Podlich Fellow
Professor Fletcher is the Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Graduate School at the City University of New York. His research interests include theory of literature, comparative literature, allegory, the literature of nature, Edmund Spenser, and postmodernisms. Professor Fletcher is the author of several works, including Allegory: The Theory of a Symbolic Mode; Time, Space, and Motion in the Age of Shakespeare; A New Theory for American Poetry: Democracy, the Environment, and the Future of Imagination. In 2005 he was awarded the Truman Capote Prize in Literary Criticism, recognizing his New Theory for American Poetry. Professor Fletcher also is the recipient of a 2007 Senior Fellowship from the Endowment of the Humanities.
Academic Year 2008-09
Mort Sahl
2008-2009 Gould Center Distinguished Visitor in the Humanities