Welcome to the Andrew Marvell Society!
We’ve just wrapped up a wonderful SCRC conference in Berkeley, organized by our own past president Joanna Picciotto. It was great to be back in person, meeting old friends and new, and engaging with some absolutely terrific work on Marvell, as well as a moving talk by Alfredo Vea Jr — some of which may soon appear in a documentary about his life and work.
Another highlight: the editor of Marvell Studies, Ryan Netzley, announced the Annabel Patterson Essay Prize-winning essay, “Confused Tears” by Diana C. Wise.
You will find a great account of our annual meeting in the minutes, taken by our outgoing secretary Anita Sherman, and posted to our website here.
Briefly, I’ll note that we had a robust discussion about our relationship with SCRC, which all members agreed has provided a collegial, flexible, and nurturing environment for students and scholars. We did also note some difficulties, such as travel to less central locations (the upcoming SCRC will be held in Savanna, Georgia). For the coming year, we agreed that AMS would focus our organizing energies on the RSA annual conference, to be held in Chicago. Please look for our calls for papers for that conference soon, as we’ll want to assemble our panels in by June, with final submission deadlines by mid-August of this year. Here is some basic information about the conference: https://www.rsa.org/page/RSAChicago2024
We maintain strong links with SCRC, however, especially through our newly elected secretary, Brendan Prawdzik, and nothing about our focus for the coming year will present us from proposing panels at SCRC. We also deferred discussion of where to hold our annual meeting, on the suggestion that we should perhaps “decouple” it from either conference, and hold it online. I will be exploring this option with you over the coming year, but it seems a promising way to serve both members who may want to continue to present papers at the SCRC, and those who will find it easier to travel to the RSA, as well as our growing international membership of members who may have no institutional affiliations, but who would like to participate in the life of the society online (and who were at the mercy this year of a spotty conference wifi connection).
Blaine Greteman
President, Andrew Marvell Society
April 2023