Charles and Mary Lamb: Elia and Beyond

Before Covid struck we had planned to host a day conference to mark the 200th anniversary of the first publication of Charles Lamb's Elia essays in the *London Magazine*. Now that we are finally able to convene in person, we want to expand the focus of this event 'beyond' Elia and showcase recent research on the miscellaneous work of the siblings Charles and Mary Lamb, influentially discussed by Jane Aaron and others in terms of their 'double singleness'. Contributors to the symposium will include Gregory Dart, John Gardner, Felicity James, Jessica Lim, Samantha Matthews, Tim Milnes, Jane Moore, Gillian Russell, Matt Sangster, and John Strachan, and among the topics that they will address are the Lambs and Romantic authorship, their writing for children (including Charles Lamb's abolitionist efforts), their varied afterlives, tribute poems to  Mary Lamb, Charles Lamb and the essay form, his politics, and his engagement with the wider world. Several of our speakers are currently collaborating on the upcoming Oxford University Press Collected Edition of the Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, and our conference will conclude with a round-table at which they will present some of their work to date and reflect on the state of the field of Lamb studies.

 

For more information contact Gillian.Russell@york.ac.uk or Jim.Watt@york.ac.uk