Welcome to the 27th Annual IAPL Conference, and Writing Aesthetics

Hugh J. Silverman, IAPL Executive Director

As the International Association for Philosophy and Literature begins to define new intellectual frameworks for the twenty-first century, I am delighted to welcome you to IAPL 2003 in Leeds, England!

Why did we choose to focus on WRITING AESTHETICS for this year's theme? One might have thought that in the year following September 11th, 2001, it would make sense to take up a political theme. And even as events have unfolded since the theme was identified during the summer of 2002, so many more issues have confronted every corner of international experience. Have we survived the events of the Spring 2003? Some even asked whether we would be able to hold our conference this year. Fortunately, we have forged ahead. Here we are deeply engaged in questions surrounding the "aesthetic" and the "writing of the aesthetic." But writing aesthetics is not just a matter of articulating aesthetic theory -- what it is and where it is going, what it has to do with the sublime, the beautiful, the representational, the expressive, the dynamic, the emotive, the intuitive, the immediate, the transcendental and the transcendent, the excessive, and the liminal.

Writing aesthetics also asks us to think the question of the perception and experience of writing. And writing, as we have learned from Derrida, is multiform, marginal, indecidable and neither on the side of speech nor on the side of what is opposed to speech (namely the written). But just as Derrida has turned to the matter of responsibility -- in witnessing, in perjury, in hospitality, in friendship -- we too must come to understand what compels the aesthetic in the political, the ethical, the international, as well as in the interpersonal. The postmodern underwrites the aesthetic without unity, univocity, singularity. And as the media and the polls write our sense and perception of what is, namely, the aesthetic, we cannot take the media -- written, cultural, electronic, modal -- as a simple surface phenomenon. We must ask whether there is anything beneath the media, underlying the codes, the texts, the writings that we write and read? Contemporary theory -- art theory, literary theory, cultural theory, architectural theory, filmic theory, and so many other theoretical practices -- compels us to re-read and re-think what comes to us directly and immediately. In the course of IAPL 2003, we shall explore the aesthetics of Plato, of Bataille, of Francis Bacon, of Deleuze -- to name a few -- but as we travel through the days of our conference, we shall unfold many layers and traces of aesthetic experience -- in its cultural, political, philosophical, medial, and filmic senses. And in order to enhance that experience, we have prepared a variety of events that should make your stay an extraordinary one.

You will have the opportunity to attend a Shakespeare play by one of the premiere British theatre companies produced in the land of the Bard, to wander through the medieval world of Fountains Abbey and the wonderfully delightful and invigorating Yorkshire Dales, to delve into the life and strategies of Jacques Derrida in a new and groundbreaking film created by Amy Kofman (who will help us to fathom the production of this exciting textuality), to an exploration of the Leeds City Art Gallery along with the masterful musicologist and philosopher of aesthetic experience Daniel Charles -- who will scintillate and charm with his wit and insight, to be enticed by the concern for the precariousness of political and social life that Judith Butler, one of the leading thinkers of the contemporary age, sees for philosophy and feminist theory, to the question of aesthetic ideology and the legacy of Paul de Man. We will conclude the week with a very special opportunity to dine in the context of and to explore the life and world of Bradford painter David Hockney (even though he returns only occasionally to his home region near Leeds and the galleries of Salts Mill). We hope that all of you will want to join us for this unusual finale event in such an unique location.

The week carries so many wonderful and intriguing features -- we have done everything we can to make this an opportunity not only to exchange views about the writing of the aesthetic and the aesthetics of writing but also to experience the charms of West Yorkshire and the industrial city of Leeds, with it shops, historical buildings, and the University of Leeds -- to which I am especially delighted to return after nearly fifteen years when I was visiting professor of philosophy for a term. Martin McQuillan, IAPL 2003 conference coordinator, has offered his own historical account of the arts and the cultural studies that were already burgeoning in Leeds in the late 1980s in his official welcome on behalf of the university.

All of the concurrent sessions during the week from Tuesday to Saturday will be in the Leeds Town Hall. I suspect you will find this extraordinary building itself worthy of exploration and savoring. And the Victoria Hall, where we will hold the Book Exhibit, the Book Exhibit Cafe (where you can find a continental breakfast and refreshments throughout the day), and the Registration Desk, is a gem unto itself. Victoria Hall, imbedded within the Leeds Town Hall and the site of operas and major musical events, is a jewel of northern English industrial achievement. And although we will hold only one session on the University campus up the hill, please do find time to walk up to the university, past the Merrion Centre, and to wander around the campus grounds.

Be sure to join us for the Monday evening Welcoming Reception in Dysons (located in the Marriott Hotel, where most of us will be staying for the week). The hotel is opening up this charming space just for us on Monday night at 9 p.m. -- so don't miss this unique opportunity to find yourself transported into a past that is no more.

I hope you will like the totes we have produced for you, the IAPL 2003 pencils, the new IAPL brocure (newly designed by Kristen Oehlrich), and do purchase a T-shirt to take home with you. Lunch tickets for the Quo Vadis (across the street from the Town Hall) can be purchased at the Registration desk. The management of Quo Vadis has agreed to offer different buffet lunches each day of the conference -- this will also help you to get back to afternoon sessions without missing anything.

You are cordially invited to read through this book carefully -- use the Summary of Sessions and Events as your guide. The Index of Participants should help you to find your way to particular sessions and speakers. The IAPL Registration Staff will be glad to answer any questions concerning IAPL, and the Local Information Desk will provide details about the city of Leeds and what it has to offer.

The Conference Book -- along with the calligraphied "Writing Aesthetics" which appears on totes, pencils, nametags, and T-shirts has been designed and charted by Esther Chambers. Esther has had to work not only under inordinate time-pressures, but also through many fits and starts during the year. She has persevered and I trust you will be pleased with the result. Josine Opmeer -- herself a medieval historian -- is looking forward to guiding you through the delights of Fountains Abbey. She has organized many of the local arrangements for our stay here in Leeds. We are very grateful to her for all her help. And Martin McQuillan has found some time in his busy schedule to help us get this whole conference into place. We had a late start this year, but we have kept you well informed at all times of conference developments through the IAPL website. By now, you already know that the IAPL website <www.iapl.info> is available at all times for you to register for the conference, pay membership dues, purchase IAPL Textures series books (published by Continuum), and to discover many other aspects of IAPL, its conferences and activities.

I do not want to conclude this welcome without my deepest thanks to the many people who work for IAPL and who make it a success each year -- Claire Goberman spends many more hours than you can imagine not only keeping your memberships and registration payments in order but also constructing conference nametags and offering insight as to how to improve the funtioning of IAPL services. Apostolos Vasilakis, now into his tenth year on the IAPL staff, has taken even more responsibility for ensuring he success fo the IAPL Book Exhibit. I am also grateful to the IAPL Book Exhibit Staff (Peter Fristedt, Angela Hunter, Sean Kieninger, William Marderness, and Tim Ryan -- all of whom are back again this year -- along with Julie Sushytska and Kristen Oehlrich who join us for the first time). Peter Gratton and Jen Kester have become regulars at the IAPL Registration Desk since the IAPL turn of the century conference in Vico Equense and Naples, Italy in January 2000. Robert Shane and Ann Taylor are back for a second year helping Claire Goberman and Peter Gratton at Registration. Aleks Pjevalica has been extraordinary in changing gears from serving as the IAPL assistant last year to the AV Coordinator (and now with the help of Jakob Lorentzen from Copenhagen). New to the IAPL Staff term is Sabrina Hom, who has helped me get through the year organizing submissions, program details, index, communications, and so much more. She will also be posting session times and participants on conference rooms as they unfold during the week.

The IAPL Executive Committee has been working hard to make this an excellent conference. Stephen Barker will orchestrate the new Derrida movie with its director Amy Ziering Kofman. He has also put together a special celebration of Gary Shapiro's work. Gary Shapiro, who served on the IAPL Executive Committee in the 1980s, also attended the second annual conference in Minneapolis in 1977 when J. Hillis Miller was a plenary speaker. Ewa Ziarek has been a valuable and resourceful member of the Executive Committee and has organized a special Close Encounter on the work of Judith Butler this year. Drew Hyland and Henk Oosterling also have contributed their wisdom and experience as former conference coordinators. Roy Martinez has maintained kierkegaardian irony within the frame of the aesthetic.

Now that IAPL has come of age, we must also face the sad thought that our members move from actual and real presences to virtual, theoretical, and memorial ones. A couple of years ago, Antony Easthope, who participated in IAPL 1983 at Stony Brook, confided as we walked through the fields of Stafforshire University (during a conference organized there by Martin McQuillan) that he did not expect to survive the year. I am grateful to Angelica Michelis for putting together an Antony Easthope memorial session. And who would have thought that Dominique Janicaud -- one of the major figures in last year's Round Table and the subject of a Close Encounter in Rotterdam -- would not be around even two months later. He died coming out of the Mediterranean sea after his habitual swim at the site of the writing of Nietzsche's Zarathustra. We will celebrate the shadow of his thought on Thursday afternoon. And many will remember the extraordinary presence of Teresa Brennan for the Close Encounter on her work in Vico Equense in January 2000. She died unexpectedly of a car accident -- she was so dynamic, vital, and theoretically energetic -- it is hard to imagine that she is no longer with us. Kelly Oliver has graciously agreed to put together a memorial session for Teresa. These memorial sessions are not designed to make us sad, but rather to give us an opportunity to rethink and reassess the achievement of each of these colleagues and friends of IAPL.

Be sure to note the upcoming IAPL 2004 in Syracuse (NY) which is already well underway for May 19-25. Note that the conference will span the weekend from Wednesday to the following Tuesday -- an experiment of sorts as we delve into Virtual Materialities (with the coordination of Tom Brockelman at Le Moyne and Gregg Lambert at Syracuse). Be sure to send in your abstracts for papers or proposed sessions no later than October 1st. Further details will, as usual, be available on the web.

Speakers this year should read the note to Conference Speakers which also concerns submission to the volume to be published in the IAPL TEXTURES series. Chairs of sessions should follow the guidelines indicated carefully.

I hope you will enjoy the conference -- it is a maze of charms and delights. And I trust you will all help to make this a memorable and exciting rhizome of events...