Popular Cultures Research Network Newsletter

Popular Cultures Research Network Newsletter
June 2015
ISSUE 13
Editorial
San-Antonio conference
Welcome to the latest edition of
the PCRN newsletter. This issue
reflects the busy programme of
events of the International Crime
Fiction Research group, with
updates on some of their latest
activities, including the SanAntonio conference (see right).
There is also a profile on founding
PCRN member David Looseley, who
tells us what he has been up to
since his ‘retirement’, and a
French-language
feature
on
Médias19, a journal dedicated to
19th century journalism, as well as
details of recent publications by
PCRN members.
The publication months of the
newsletter
are
changing
to
September and January to coincide
with the start of the academic
semesters, so our next issue will be
in January 2016. Please send us
details of your events and activities
at any time for us to include.
The
San-Antonio
International
conference
took
place in May at
Queen’s University,
Belfast, under the
aegis
of
the
Institute
for
Collaborative
Research in the
Humanities and the
School of Modern
Languages, bringing
together a variety
of people from
around the world.
They came to discuss (in French, mostly) the
immense body of work left by one of France’s
most famous popular writers, Frédéric Dard,
aka San-Antonio. Genuinely multidisciplinary,
the conference relied on expertise from various
fields (from American Studies to Linguistics,
from Cultural History to Literature studies), on
public and private collections, and on new
digital tools.
Alana Jackson and Emma Bielecki,
newsletter editors
More details and photos from the conference
can be found on page 7, and information on a
related publication on page 8.
-
[email protected]
[email protected]
Inside this issue:
Editorial
1
Les mystères urbains au XIXe siècle
San-Antonio conference
1
International Crime Fiction Research events 6-8
Member Profile: David Looseley
2-3
New publications
4-5
8
1
Member Profile
David Looseley
A few years after my inaptly named
‘retirement’ from teaching, I seem to be
(almost) as busy as ever, though more
enjoyably and relaxedly so. My recent
activity has taken three broad directions.
On the research and publication front, my
latest book, Édith Piaf: A Cultural History
(Liverpool UP) is due out this autumn in
theory, though I’m still only at the copyediting stage as I write. Despite that word
‘history’, the book actually sets out from
what I call the ‘imagined Piaf’ of 2015, the
centenary year of her birth. Having come
close to being forgotten by the late 1960s,
she is probably more famous today, and
more polysemic as a cultural signifier, than
she has ever been; and the book sets out to
explore why, examining her evolving social,
cultural and even political meanings over the
years, in life and in death. LUP also wanted
me to write for a somewhat more generalist
audience, which has been a new and
challenging experience, after so many years
writing in academic mode, and I’m not
entirely sure I have succeeded. I’ve been
trying to track my progress in a blogpost on
the Culturethèque website (see link to blog
post on Edith Piaf project, below) but I’ve
been reprehensibly lax about posting lately as
the book was being finished. Another
publication this year has been a contribution
on French popular music to the Cambridge
Companion to French Music (CUP, edited by
Simon Trezise), though, to be precise, my
chapter was written eight years ago, as the
book as a whole, a massive enterprise,
became seriously delayed. I’m also making a
small contribution to a ground-breaking series
of books that aims to bring research on
popular music carried out in non-Anglophone
contexts to the attention of the largely
anglo-dominated field of popular music
studies. The edited series, published by
studies. The edited series, published by
Routledge under the generic heading, ‘Made
in… Studies in Popular Music’ (Made in Italy
appeared last year) publishes work by nonanglophone scholars translated into English,
though the format always includes a coda by
an English-speaking scholar. I was asked to
write the coda for the latest volume Made in
France, edited by Catherine Rudent and
Gérôme Guibert, which I believe is due out
this year.
My second line of activity has been
translation, though in truth there’s been
another big time lapse here. My translation of
the play Araberlin, by Tunisian playwright
Jalila Baccar, is currently in rehearsal in New
York City by HTR (Horizon Theatre Rep) but
was actually completed a full decade ago,
then published in a 2008 collection, Four
Plays From North Africa, edited by Marvin
Carlson (New York: Martin E. Segal Theatre
Center Publications). One result of this delay
is that I have absolutely no recollection of
how the translation goes, but at any event
it’s opening on 2 July at the 4th Street
Theatre in downtown New York (very much
off-Broadway).
Thirdly, I’ve continued doing speaking
engagements of various kinds. Last year, I
spoke on rock music in France and Britain at
the Université de Bourgogne (Dijon), a reprise
of a paper I’d done at a Lille conference the
previous year. In Spring 2015, I was guest
speaker at a Prince’s Teaching Institute event
held in London for newly qualified teachers
of French; and shortly after, I was invited to
speak on Piaf at the University of Hull.
2
Meanwhile, and despite some pressing family
commitments (I’m a classic instance of babyboomer-turned-sandwich-generation),
I’ve
managed some more leisurely cultural
activities. If you get the chance, I
recommend celebrity French playwright
Florian Zeller’s two plays at the Ustinov
(Theatre Royal), Bath, The Father (starring
Kenneth Cranham) and The Mother (starring
Gina McKee), both translated by Christopher
Hampton.
Lastly, I’m just a little proud to note that
2015 is the tenth anniversary of the creation
of the PCRN… As the French might say: ça
s’arrose, non?
Professor David Looseley
Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques
Emeritus Professor of Contemporary French Culture, University of Leeds
Honorary Research Fellow, University of Bristol
Associate Fellow of the Centre for Cultural Policy Studies, University of Warwick
Email: [email protected]
Forthcoming book: Edith Piaf: A Cultural History, Liverpool University Press, late 2015.
Latest book (edited with Diana Holmes): Imagining the Popular in Contemporary French Culture, MUP
2013. http://www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?product=9780719078163
New publication: ‘Speaking of impact: languages and the utility of the humanities’, in E. Belfiore and
A. Upchurch (Eds.), Humanities in the Twenty-First Century: Beyond Utility and Markets, Palgrave
Macmillan, July 2013, pp.91-108.
http://us.macmillan.com/humanitiesinthetwentyfirstcentury/EleonoraBelfiore
Blog post on Edith Piaf project: http://culturetheque.org.uk/blog/edith-piaf
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Les mystères urbains au XIXe siècle: Circulations, transferts,
appropriations
Dominique Kalifa et Marie-Eve Thérenty (dir.), Medias19, 2015
Entre le 19 juin 1842 et le 15 octobre 1843, la
France vit avec la parution des Mystères de
Paris d’Eugène Sue dans le Journal des débats
une véritable déflagration médiatique. Pour
donner une idée du succès, on rappellera la
célèbre boutade de Théophile Gautier: « Des
malades ont attendu pour mourir la fin des
Mystères de Paris; le magique « la suite à
demain » les entraînait de jour en jour, et la
mort comprenait qu’ils ne seraient pas
tranquilles dans l’autre monde, s’ils ne
connaissaient pas le dénouement de cette
bizarre épopée ». Le romancier saisi par
l’abondant courrier des lecteurs qu’il reçoit,
pris par le succès de son œuvre, fait
considérablement évoluer son récit et enrichit
le roman des bas-fonds urbains et de la pègre
destiné à la bourgeoisie d’une véritable
réflexion sociale et politique. Le roman est
publié en de multiples éditions, adapté sur
scène et décliné en produits dérivés. Mais ce
premier succès de masse de la littérature n’est
pas seulement le phénomène médiatique le
plus important que la France ait jamais connu à
cette époque, c’est aussi un premier
phénomène de globalisation culturelle. Dans les
mois qui suivent sa parution en France, le
roman est traduit dans de multiples langues et
connaît un succès international de l’Europe du
Sud à l’Amérique du Nord, de l’Europe du Nord
à l’Amérique latine, en Russie, dans le
Commonwealth et même finalement au
tournant du siècle au Japon et en Chine. Ces
traductions sont d’ailleurs très souvent déjà des
adaptations. Mais surtout ce roman déclenche
l’écriture sur tous les continents de centaines
de romans dérivés, dont l’intrigue varie
considérablement suivant les contextes locaux.
On trouve bien sûr les Mysteries of London par
Reynolds (1844-1848), Los misteríos de Madrid
de Juan Martínez Villergas (1844), The
mysteries and miseries of New York de Ned
Buntline (1848), Antonino y Anita ó los nuevos
mysterios de Mexico d’Edouard Rivière (1851),
Os Mistéros de Lisboa de Camilo Castelo Branco
(1854), I Misteri di Roma contemporanea de B.
Del Vecchio (1851-1853)… Au-delà de la reprise
du titre, dans chacun de ces pays, apparaît une
nébuleuse de romans articulant la question
urbaine, la représentation du crime et
l’exploration sociale. Ces romans participent
aussi de la démocratisation de la littérature en
étant généralement diffusés sur des supports à
bon marché (journaux, penny blood, dime
novels…) qui créent la possibilité de cultures
véritablement nationales. Car beaucoup de ces
romans en adaptant la matrice initiale de Sue à
la situation du pays de réception et en
l’hybridant aux traditions génériques de la
littérature locale participent d’une réflexion
sur la question de la nation.
Cette publication constitue les actes d’un
colloque international qui s’est tenu à
Montpellier et à Paris du 14 au 16 novembre
2013. Elle propose une réflexion transversale et
transdisciplinaire sur les processus de
circulation, de transferts et de transformation
des objets, des supports et des textes dans le
contexte
des
premières
circulations
médiatiques mondiales. Elle est en plusieurs
langues (français, anglais…) et les articles sont
reliés à une carte qui permet de prendre
conscience du phénomène mondial que
constituèrent
les
mystères
urbains.
Website: http://www.medias19.org/index.php?id=17039
4
TABLE DES MATIÈRES :
INTRODUCTION
Dominique Kalifa et Marie-Ève Thérenty, Les Mystères urbains au XIXe siècle : circulations, transferts,
appropriations.
LA SOURCE : LES MYSTERES DE PARIS
Filippos Katsanos, Réceptions croisées : les enjeux de la traduction des Mystères de Paris en Angleterre et en
Grèce.
Article disponible en français et en grec.
Guillaume Pinson, Les Mystères et le feuilleton : aux sources d’une culture médiatique francophone
transatlantique
Laura Suárez de la Torre, Une notoriété sans égale parmi les lecteurs mexicains : Les Mystères de Paris
d’Eugène Sue
Article disponible en français et en espagnol.
Paul Bleton, Les Mystères de Paris : échangeur générique
Corinne Saminadayar-Perrin, « L’effet-titre »
MYSTERYMANIA
Santiago Diaz Lage , Pour une histoire des mystères urbains espagnols
Article disponible en français et en espagnol
Paul Aron, Les Mystères des mystères de Bruxelles
Kirill Chekalov, Les mystères urbains en Russie durant les années 1840 : la réception contradictoire de l’héritage
de Sue.
Article disponible en français et en russe
Françoise Genevray, Trois décennies de mystères urbains en Russie : de la peinture du peuple à l’inventaire des
bas-fonds.
Article disponible en français et en russe
Sándor Kalai, « Tout voir et tout savoir de ce qui se passe dans les rues », Les Secrets hongrois d’Ignác Nagy.
Article disponible en français et en hongrois
Nelson Schapochnik, Mysterymania, de Paris au Rio de la Plata.
Article disponible en français et en anglais
Yvan Daniel et Lo Shih-Lung, « Mystères urbains » en France, en Chine, des perspectives incomparables ?
Article disponible en français et résumé en chinois
POETIQUE DES MYSTERES
Anaïs Goudmand, Economie et socialité du suspense dans les mystères urbains.
Nicolas Gauthier, Un masque derrière un masque : la note de bas de page dans les mystères urbains.
Article disponible en français et en anglais
Laëtitia Gonon, Stylistique du vengeur dans les Mystères de Paris et quelques-uns de ses avatars (1842-1847).
Article disponible en français et en anglais
POLITIQUE DES MYSTERES URBAINS
Amy Wigelsworth, Sex and the City : représentations du féminin dans les mystères urbains.
Article disponible en français et en anglais
Yoan Vérilhac, Les mystères urbains, un réflexe républicain ?
Rebecca Powers, Charles Testut and Les Mystères de la Nouvelle-Orléans : Journalism in Exile ?
LE DEVENIR DES MYSTERES URBAINS
Matthieu Letourneux, La disparition du genre des mystères au début du XXe siècle.
François Amy de la Bretèque, Les Mystères de Paris, film de Jacques de Baroncelli :
l’art d’accommoder les restes.
Guillaume Boulangé et Prisca Grignon, « To be continued » ou l’aventure infinie des Mystères de New York au
cinéma.
Andrea Goulet, Chorégraphies criminelles : combat, chahut et danse apache, des Mystères de Paris à The Wire.
Article disponible en français et en anglais
5
RECENT EVENTS FROM THE INTERNATIONAL CRIME FICTION
RESEARCH GROUP
Symposium: Towards a Digital Atlas of European Crime Fiction?
British Library Conference Centre
April 10, 2015
This
Symposium
brought
together
researchers from a group of universities in
the UK, France, Hungary, Sweden and the
Czech Republic, all involved in the AHRCfunded project ‘Visualizing European Crime
Fiction: New Digital Tools and Approaches
to the Study of Transnational Popular
Culture’. In the last decades the
astonishing speed in the global circulation
of cultural works and the unprecedented
opportunities to gather and analyse large
amounts of data through electronic
resources have opened up new possibilities
for researchers in all disciplines. At the
same time, the spatial turn in the
Humanities has prompted scholars to
consider the benefits of using maps and
graphs to investigate the transnational
history of cultural phenomena. Visualizing
European Crime Fiction is a pioneering
attempt to adopt this approach to crime
fiction studies. It is an exploratory project
in collaboration with the Paris-based BILIPO
aimed at testing a number of strategies and
possibilities in order to envision a larger,
longer-term initiative to conduct extensive
studies on the transnational circulation of
popular fiction at the European level.
Scholars involved in this project gathered
at the British Library to present work
carried out so far in the field at the
conference in April, talking about future
perspectives, reflecting on how they might
address their research questions, take
advantage of the most useful technological
resources as well as disseminate their
results in innovative ways. The strengths
and the weakness of quantitative and
digital approaches, the ideas to take this
challenge to a new level, and the potential
of new partnerships was discussed with a
group of other scholars invited to present
their own experience in the study of crime
fiction.
A list of presentations can be found here:
For further information on the project see:
http://internationalcrimefiction.org/2015/03/19/symposi
um-towards-a-digital-atlas-of-european-crime-fictionbritish-library-conference-centre-april-10-2015/
http://www.internationalcrimefiction.org/ahrcproject/
6
San-Antonio International Conference
Queen’s University Belfast
May 15-16, 2015
The San-Antonio International conference took
place in May at Queen’s University, Belfast,
under the aegis of the Institute for
Collaborative Research in the Humanities and
the School of Modern Languages. It gathered
specialists, scholars, collectors and members of
the public from around the world. They came
to discuss (in French, mostly) the immense
body of work left by one of France’s most
famous popular writers, Frédéric Dard, aka SanAntonio. Joséphine Dard, his daughter,
attended the conference and took part in the
discussions. People came together who don’t
normally get to talk together. Genuinely
multidisciplinary, the conference relied on
expertise from various fields (from American
Studies to Linguistics, from Cultural History to
Literature studies), on public and private
collections, and on new digital tools. The
multiplicity of approaches and expertise
enabled the conference to tackle precise
research questions on a defined and contained
(if vast) corpus of texts.
The study of San-Antonio’s oeuvre in its
international dimension had never been
undertaken before. Studies in literature still
tend to obey (and reproduce) a national
paradigm. They rarely look beyond borders.
Studies
in
comparative
literature
and
translation studies, when they don’t discount
popular literature, tend to focus on a small
amount of comparators, usually two or three.
Undertaking a global cultural comparison is
more than onerous: it adds more than 700
foreign books to the already huge body of texts
by
San-Antonio
(all
different
editions
considered, French and foreign, this amounts to
some 3000 books). This necessitates time,
resources, technology and a wide range of skills
which can only be attained collectively. Digital
tools are needed, in order to master the wealth
of metadata publicly accessible; and reading
Dominique Jeannerod
fluency in a number of Modern Languages, in
order to understand these data; and a network
of international experts and informers to
analyse, interpret and supplement them.
While San-Antonio is too often seen as a
Franco-French phenomenon, his work has
actually been translated into 35 languages.
Dozens of titles were translated in Italy, Spain,
Romania, but also in Russia, and in Germany.
There have been more than a hundred of his
novels translated into Italian. Approached in a
systematic, global way, San Antonio’s work
presents an international dimension at all
stages of its creation and dissemination. Its
models are international, and especially British
and American. San-Antonio has engaged with
many writers, directors and artists from other
countries. Many French, francophone and
foreign writers, from Georges Perec, to
Yasmina Khadra and Massimo Carlotto have
enjoyed his work as readers, and some of them
claimed that it was inspirational for their
writing.
Conference programme:
http://internationalcrimefiction.org/2015/05/1
4/san-antonio-in-belfast/
7
Representations of Rurality in Crime Fiction and Media Culture
Queen’s University, Belfast
June 15-16, 2015
This two day Symposium in June was supported
by the Institute for Collaborative Research in
the Humanities at Queen’s University and its
2014/15 theme of ‘Creativity in Imagined and
Material Worlds’. Interdisciplinary in nature and
international in scope, it brought together
scholars from Europe, North America, South
Asia and Australasia to consider how cultural
constructions of the rural often ‘set the scene’
for crime fiction.
Keynote addresses were delivered by Benoît
Tadié (University of Rennes), Paul Cloke
(University of Exeter) and Rob Kitchin (NUIM).
visit:
http://internationalcrimefiction.org/2014/10/2
6/cfp-representations-of-rurality-in-crimefiction-and-media-culture-queens-universityjune-15-16-2015/
Consuming Crime: Consumption, Commodification and Consumerism in Crime
Fiction, Film and Television
The University of Limerick, Ireland
June 26-27, 2015
The Sixth Interdisciplinary Conference of the
International Crime Genre Research Network,
Ireland, explored the ideas of consumption,
commodification and consumerism as they
feature in the crime genre. It brought together
scholars from around the world working on
literature, television and new media. The
keynote address was delivered by Evelyne
Keitel (TU Chemnitz) and the true crime writer
and novelist Niamh O’Connor also talked about
her work.
visit:
http://internationalcrimefiction.org/2015/03/1
2/consuming-crime/
NEW PUBLICATIONS
Les salauds vont en enfer, Pièce en 2 actes de Frédéric Dard, Edition présentée et annotée par:
Hugues
Galli,
Thierry
Gautier
et
Dominique
Jeannerod,
EUD,
2015,
238
pp.
http://lpcm.hypotheses.org/9459
Vincent Dubois, “Cultural Policy Regimes in Western Europe”, International Encyclopedia of the
Behavioral and Social Sciences, 2nd ed., 2015, pp. 460-465.
— “What has become of the ‘new petite bourgeoisie’? The case of cultural managers in France”, in Ph.
Coulangeon, J. Duval, Eds., The Routledge Companion to Bourdieu’s ‘Distinction’, Milton Park-New
York, Routledge, 2014, pp. 78-93.
— “The Political Uses of Cultural Participation Statistics in France: from Legitimization to Critique
(1960-1990)”, in Making Culture Count: The Politics of Cultural Measurement, Palgrave MacMillan,
forthcoming, September 2015.
8
Neither the Popular Cultures Research Network nor the University of Leeds is responsible for the
content of any of the websites referred to in this Newsletter.
9