The International Lawrence Durrell Society invites proposals for papers to be presented at a July 2018 conference in downtown Chicago. In a year marking the centenary of Solzhenitsyn’s birth and the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Durrell’s satirical dystopia Tunc, ILDS welcomes papers reflecting on modernist and postmodern writers or artists who challenged the political and cultural ideologies of their time and place. Interrogating conceptions of exile, survival, and dissent, we will explore how the work of these past intellectual dissidents has shaped our critiques of twenty-first century society.<\/p>\n
Durrell, like many of his contemporaries, wrote within and about a world overshadowed by authoritarian regimes that harassed, censored, exiled, and silenced those who did not conform. Having lived through World War II and experienced life in Egypt, Argentina, Yugoslavia, and Cyprus as well as India, Greece, England, and France, Durrell was aware of many varieties of censorship and constraint, a concern that led to his editing of the 1963 PEN anthology.<\/p>\n
Convening in Chicago, a city that has sheltered many exiles, the Durrell Society seeks to promote discussion of twentieth-century writers who, whether by force or aspiration, left their homelands in search of personal, political or artistic freedom. Although papers on any aspect of Durrell’s writing are welcome, the conference organizers particularly encourage consideration of issues of exile, survival, and dissent as inspiration or theme in his works, as well as in those of his British, American, and international contemporaries.<\/p>\n