“Thomas Wolfe and History”
The Thomas Wolfe Society’s Forty-First Annual Meeting
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, May 24-25, 2019
The Wyndham Hotel, Gettysburg
Friday, May 24, 2019
8:30-10:30 Board of Directors Meeting
11:00-12:00 Registration
12:00-12:15 Welcome and Prologue
Welcome: Rebecca Godwin, President, Thomas Wolfe Society; Barton College
Prologue: Mary Aswell Doll, Savannah College of Art and Design
12:15-1:00 Session I (Moderator: Rebecca Godwin, Barton College)
“Beyond Gettysburg, and the Beyond at Gettysburg”
Kent Gramm, Gettysburg College
Break (Refreshments) (1:00-1:15)
1:20-2:40 Session II (Moderator: David Radavich, Eastern Illinois University)
“History Aggrieved: The Lost Prologue of Look Homeward, Angel“
Jim Stokely, President, Wilma Dykeman Legacy; Weaverville, North Carolina
“Asheville People: The Real-Life Connection Between Thomas Wolfe’s Fictional Arthur Family and the Supreme Court of North Carolina”
Hon. J. Matthew Martin, J.D., Ph.D.; Asheville, North Carolina
Clarke S. Martin, J.D. Candidate, UNC School of Law
“Thomas Wolfe’s Great-Uncle Bacchus: The ‘Death-Triumphant’ Westall Prophet”
Deb Borland, Webmaster, The Thomas Wolfe Society
2:40-3:35 Session III (Moderator: Mark Canada, Indiana University Kokomo)
“Thomas Wolfe and Mark Twain in the Critical Writings of Bernard DeVoto”
Edwin Yoder, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
“‘No Place Among the Boy Scouts’: An Invitation to Consider Wolfe from the Perspective of Queer Theory”
J. Todd Bailey, Burnsville, North Carolina
4:00-6:00 Session IV–Bus Tour of Wolf/Wolfe Sites in York County, Pennsylvania
Guide: Steven B. Rogers, Historian/Research Consultant, Washington, D.C.
Saturday, May 25, 2019
8:00-9:00 Breakfast Buffet
9:00-10:00 Session V (Moderator: Amélie Moisy, Université Paris Est Créteil)
“Was Thomas Wolfe Really an Atheist?”
Margie Kashdin, Brevard, North Carolina
“Violence as the Undercurrent of Small-Town Life in Thomas Wolfe’s The Web and the Rock“
Joseph Bentz, Azusa Pacific University
10:00-10:30 Business Meeting
President Rebecca Godwin presiding
Break (10:35-10:45)
10:45-11:50 Session VI (Moderator: George Hovis, State University of New York Oneonta)
“Berlin 1936: The Ambivalence of the ‘German Spirit’ in You Can’t Go Home Again”
Ralf Bickeböller, Frankfurt-am-Main
Vasilije Ivanovic, Pennsylvania State University
“Dark in the Forest: Thomas Wolfe’s 1930 Political Awakening in Freiburg, Germany”
Steven B. Rogers, Historian/Research Consultant, Washington, D.C.
12:00-12:20 Final Words: Rebecca Godwin, President
Epilogue: Ray Walker, Atlanta, Georgia
Lunch on Your Own
2:30-5:30 Special Session: Gettysburg Battlefield Tour (Guided)
6:30-7:30 Cash Bar
7:30 Banquet
Awards Ceremony: President Rebecca Godwin
Introduction of Speaker: James W. Clark Jr., North Carolina State University
Banquet Address: “The Deep Psychology of the Past”
by Terry Roberts
Author, Scholar, Educator
You may register for the conference by mail or electronically. Hotel and parking information is available on the main conference webpage.
