Cervantes and Shakespeare: A Transnational Conversation

  • Literature
  • Chicago
  • Thu, April 14 —
    Sat, April 16, 2016
Cervantes and Shakespeare: A Transnational Conversation

A Joint Cervantes Symposium / Early Modern Studies Symposium.

To commemorate the lives of Cervantes and Shakespeare, two towering figures of European literature, on the occasion of the four hundredth anniversary of their shared death date in April 1616, the Center for Renaissance Studies at The Newberry, Chicago Independent Research Library, will host a three-day public symposium to spotlight their achievements and examine the parallels and intersections of their work.

Thursday, April 14

3 to 4:45 pm – Session 1: The Worlds of Cervantes and Shakespeare

  • Chair: Anne J. Cruz, University of Miami.
  • Speakers: Mercedes Alcalá-Galán, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Steven Hutchinson, University of Wisconsin-Madison; James Knapp, Loyola University Chicago; Scott Sowerby, Northwestern University.

4:45 to 5:45 pm – Reception

6 to 7:30 pm – Session 2: Dialog on Cervantes and Shakespeare

  • Moderator: Liesl Olson.
  • Speakers: William Egginton, Johns Hopkins University; James Shapiro, Columbia University.

Friday, April 15

10 am to noon – Session 3: Selections from Cervantes’ Eight Interludes

  • Introduction: Bruce Burningham, Illinois State University
  • Dramatic reading by The Shakespeare Project of Chicago. Directed by David Skidmore

Noon to 2 pm – Lunch Break

2 to 3:30 pm – Session 4: Cervantes, Shakespeare, and Performance, A Roundtable Discussion

  • Chair: Glen Carman, DePaul University.
  • With Rosilie Hernández, University of Illinois at Chicago; Javier Irigoyen-García, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; David Skidmore, The Shakespeare Project of Chicago; Will West, Northwestern University.

Saturday, April 16

Related program: The Shakespeare Project of Chicago will perform a staged reading of the play Cardenio, by Charles Mee and Stephen Greenblatt, inspired by a lost play of Shakespeare’s that was based on a story from Don Quixote. The performance begins at 10 am, with an introductory talk fifteen minutes beforehand.

Venue

Venue map

The Newberry, 60 West Walton St, Chicago, IL 60610

Admission

Free and open to the public, but space is limited and registration in advance is required.

More information

The Newberry

Credits

Organized by Anne J. Cruz, University of Miami, Rosilie Hernández, University of Illinois at Chicago, and Carla Zecher, Renaissance Society of America, and co-sponsored by the Cervantes Society of America, the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at DePaul University, and the Instituto Cervantes of Chicago. Image: The Cobbe portrait of William Shakespeare.

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