The University of Denver English Department will host the 18th Annual Virginia Woolf International Conference June 19–22.
Hundreds of Woolf scholars from around the world will converge on DU to present their papers on the prolific writer.
“Long after her death, Woolf remains one of the most highly regarded novelists of our time,” says Eleanor McNees, professor of English and conference host.
The conference theme “Woolf Editing/Editing Woolf” will be the focus of panel discussions and a play adapted and directed by Carol Samson, a lecturer in DU’s Writing Program.
Samson spent the last year adapting Leonard Woolf’s edition of the Woolf Diaries, A Writer’s Diary, published in 1952, a decade after Virginia Woolf’s death in 1941.
“I worked by dividing his 390-page version into sections, 1919–25 as Woolf is finding her voice; 1926–31 as she writes some of her best work; 1931–35 as she struggles with health and reviewers; and 1936–41 as Hitler moves across Europe, London is bombed and she sees all lost,” Samson says.
“I worked and reworked each section, finding the dramatic “waves” of each period, then cutting and shaping and finding the thread to hold the lot together.”
The play, After Tea, will take place in the Hamilton Theater at the Newman Center for the Performing Arts on June 20 at 7 p.m. Tea and scones will be served from 6 to 6:45 p.m. prior to the performance and is included in the $10 ticket cost.
The play and conference are open to the public. Daily walk-in rates are $40–$45. Details can be found atwww.du.edu/woolf.