UPDATE: Four Centuries of Sir Thomas Browne 1605-2005 (Netherlands) (7/30/05; 10/26/05-10/28/05)

SECOND CALL FOR PAPERS

Four centuries of Sir Thomas Browne 1605-2005 (please note extended
deadline)

"No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man
truly knows another"

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-82) is one of the most intriguing and polymathic
figures of the seventeenth century. His interests and learning were both
prodigious and curious: he is an early proponent of inductive science;
he is fascinated by religion, antiquarianism and a sense of the past,
esotericism and the occult; he is an extraordinary and at times
unrivalled prose stylist of the Stuart century; and he is also obsessed
with what we (but not he) might call "trivia", such as marginalia,
fragmentariness, odd and arresting facts and details.

Browne's life, studies and interests took him not only to Winchester and
Oxford, but also elsewhere in Europe and principally to the University
of Leiden, then and for much of the remaining century or more one of
Europe's chief centres of learning for the study of medicine. Leiden's
anatomical museum still exists as among the finest of its type from
early modern Europe. Much of the last part of Browne's life was spent in
Norwich as a scholar and antiquary, where he was knighted by Charles II
in 1671.

To celebrate Sir Thomas Browne's quatercentenary, the October conference
held annually under the auspices of the English Department at the
University of Leiden will take place from the afternoon of Wednesday 26
October through Friday 28 October, with the opportunity for a guided
tour of Leiden and (it is to be hoped) the anatomical museum on Saturday
29 October 2005. In the Julian calendar still in use in the England of
Browne's lifetime 29 October would have been 19 October, Browne's 400th
birthday.

We have secured three keynote speakers: Claire Preston (Sidney Sussex,
Cambridge), Brooke Conti (Yale), and Reid Barbour (U of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill). We are interested in soliciting and selecting between 12
and 15 twenty-minute papers on any aspect of Browne's life and work as
indicated above (and many more, as appropriate). We should like to make
this conference as interdisciplinary as possible, in keeping with and
respect for Browne's astonishingly wide interests.

The present posting is a revised call for papers. Titles (however
provisional), abstracts (no more than 100 words), and a (draft) paper,
not to exceed 8 pages double-spaced A4 or US 11-inch paper are welcomed.
Title and abstracts should arrive by 30 July 2005 and (draft) papers by
1 September. Please note extended deadlines. All material should be sent
to Richard Todd at r.k.todd_at_let.leidenuniv.nl by 30 May 2005.

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Received on Wed May 11 2005 - 15:11:24 EDT