Save the date: Celebrating Hester Thrale Piozzi (1741–1821)

Posted on 2 May 2021

Today marks the bicentenary of the death of Hester Lynch Salusbury Thrale Piozzi (27 January, 1741 or 16 January, 1740 – 2 May, 1821).

Please save the date for our upcoming program which will celebrate the life and writings of this Welsh-born diarist, author and patron of the arts. The conference will contribute to the ongoing reassessment of her much-neglected and seriously underestimated writings; illuminate her relationships with the Bluestockings; and explore how she bridged private and public spheres by translating informal conversation, improvisational dialogue, and performative sociability into text. As well as scholarly papers, the conference will feature the debut reading of WITTY WOMAN, a new play about Hester Thrale Piozzi’s life, written by Felicity Nussbaum (Professor of English, UCLA) and directed by Michael Hackett (Professor of Theater, UCLA).

Details

Friday, September 24, 2021, 9:30 a.m.-4:45 p.m.
Saturday, September 25, 2021, 9:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m.

Organized by Felicity Nussbaum (UCLA) and Sophie Coulombeau (University of York)

Hosted by the UCLA Center for 17th- & 18th-Century Studies and William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, and co-sponsored by the Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies and the Department of English and Related Literature at the University of York.

Speakers

Lisa Berglund, Buffalo State College
Sophie Coulombeau, University of York
Elizabeth Edwards, University of Wales Trinity St. David
Emily C. Friedman, Auburn University
Mascha Hansen, University of Greifswald
Devoney Looser, Arizona State University
Kathleen Lubey, St. John’s University
Jon Mee, University of York
Gillian Russell, University of York
Lindsay Rose Russell, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Cassandra Ulph, University of Manchester

Location, full program schedule, and registration details will be provided at a later date. You can visit the conference website here.

Image: Joshua Reynolds (British, 1723-1792), Mrs. Thrale and her Daughter Hester (Queeney), 1781. Oil on canvas, 140.3 x 148.6 cm. Gift of Lord Beaverbrook, Beaverbrook Art Gallery, accession number 1959.178]