This semester, our affiliated faculty and students here at The Ohio State University have been very busy! Take a look at all that they have accomplished!
Hannibal Hamlin - English
- Hannibal Hamlin, ed., The Psalms in English, 1530-1633. The MHRA New Tudor & Stuart Translations. London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 2024.
- Hannibal Hamlin, “Raising the Dead: Catholic Poetics and Biblical Prosopopoeia.” Article, Edited Passages, and Commentary. In The Bible and Western Christian Literature: Books and the Book, Vol. 2, Reformation and Renaissance. General Editors Stephen Prickett and Elisabeth Jay. Volume Editor Sophie Read. London and New York: T&T Clark, 2024. 48-68. 69-113.
- “Something After Death? Hamlet and the Undiscovered Country.” Sixteenth Century Studies Conference. Toronto, Canada, November 2, 2024.
- Chair, Early Modern Literature and Religion: Shakespeare and Scripture: Reading after the Reformation. Sixteenth Century Studies Conference. Toronto, Canada, November 2, 2024.
- Roundtable Participant, Early Modern Religion and the Idea of Literature. Sixteenth Century Studies Conference. Toronto, Canada, October 31, 2024.
- “Let Me Sing, let me tell you: Paul Griffiths’ Hamlet novel becomes song.” Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers. Catholic University. Washington, DC, October 19, 2024.
- “The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost Walk Into a Bar…Does Christianity Have a Sense of Humor?" Center for the Study of Religion Humor and Laughter Symposium, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, Feb. 9, 2024.
Sarah Grace Heller - French and Italian
Professor Sarah Grace Heller has recently published an edited collection featuring new interpretations of troubadour texts and lyrics:
- Troubadour Texts and Contexts: Essays in Honor of Wendy Pfeffer, edited by Courtney Joseph Wells, Lisa Shugert Bevevino and Sarah-Grace Heller (Boydell & Brewer, 2024).
She is also a member of the new working group, Medieval French in the Midwest, a regional professional network of scholars with a shared focus on the literatures of medieval France. The group meets twice annually to offer feedback on members’ work in progress, encourage exchange and dialogue among regional specialists in the field, organize group-sponsored participation in relevant scholarly conferences, and create mentorship opportunities for members and their graduate students within and through their network. Writing workshop colloquia were held at Notre Dame in June 2024, at the University of Chicago in November 2024, and in June 2025 the group will meet at OSU. Email Sarah-Grace Heller.64 for more information, to participate, or to recommend a potential member.
Merrill Kaplan - Center for Folklore Studies, Department of English, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures
Professor Merrill Kaplan, director of the Center for Folklore Studies, has published a book that explores an Old Norse narrative, The Tale of Völsi:
- Kaplan, Merrill. The Paganesque and the Tale of Volsi. Suffolk: D. S. Brewer, 2024.
The Paganesque and the Tale of Völsi analyzes a famously obscene Old Norse narrative. The Medieval Tale of Völsi traditionally has been read as evidence of pre-Christian fertility cult - or simply dismissed as an obscene trifle. This book takes a new approach by leveraging our understanding of folklore genres and commenting on the concept of the "paganesque" - the air of a religious culture older than and inimical to Christianity.
Heather J. Tanner - History
Professor Heather Tanner has published a book chapter and presented a conference paper:
- Heather J. Tanner “Anger, Violence, and the Exercise of Power in High Medieval French Chronicles,” in Gender, Memory, and Documentary Culture, edited by Laura L. Gathagan and Charles Insley, 198-214. Woodbridge: Boydell, 2024.
- Heather J. Tanner “Teresa/Matilda of Portugal, Countess of Flanders: The beginning of the Iberian ‘invasion’ in northern France,” annual meeting of The Haskins Society, November 2024, held at the University of Richmond.
Sarah Neville - English
In November 2024, Professor Sarah Neville directed Lord Denney's Players' production of John Fletcher's The Faithful Shepherdess and organized a CMRS mini-symposium on the play, where she delivered a paper on audience affect.
Dr. Neville also recently published a book chapter titled “Benvolio Must Die: Q1’s ‘Conceited’ Romeo and Juliet” in Approaches to Teaching Romeo and Juliet, 2nd ed, edited by Joseph M. Ortiz. (Modern Language Association of America, 2024): 93-101
With Danielle Rosvally, Dr. Neville also edited issue 20:4 of Shakespeare (the journal of the British Shakespeare Association). This special issue, "Inessential Shakespeare: Contingency, Necessity and Marginalization in Early Modern Drama," engages with questions of essentialism that have structured the study of Shakespeare plays from the very beginning, considering the way that essentialism has marginalized textual, bibliographic, and linguistic variance as well as impacted the day-to-day life of Shakespeare scholars. Her monograph, Early Modern Herbals and the Book Trade: English Stationers and the Commodification of Botany (Cambridge 2022), was just issued in paperback.
Charles Atkinson - Musicology
Professor Emeritus of Musicology Charles M. Atkinson recently presented "On Rhetoric and Change of Mode in Plainchant East and West" at the annual meeting of the German Society for Musicology, held in Cologne, Germany September 11-14. He also presented the paper "On Boethius, Ptolemy, the τόνοι and the Modes" for the meeting of Psaltike, a research group for the study of Byzantine music, sponsored by the Fondazione Hugo and Olga Levi, Venice, on October 25. On October 19 he presented the keynote address "Between harmoniká and grammatica: The Beginnings of Musical Analysis in the West" for the Japanese Section of the International Association for the Study of Gregorian Chant, held in Osaka, Japan.
Tamara Mahadin - English
Congratulations to Dr. Tamara Mahadin, who successfully defended her dissertation, titled "Knowledge-Making in Early Modern Englishwomen's Literary Writings, 1570 -1650." Her committee members included Sarah Neville (advisor), Alan Farmer, and Elizabeth Kolkovich.
Tamara also published an article, "Ocular Power and Female Fascinum in Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis," in Shakespeare Survey 77: Shakespeare's Poetry (Cambridge University Press, 2024), 169-179.
When she wasn't finishing her doctorate she was wrapping up her year-long participation this past summer in Researching and Writing the Early Modern Dissertation at the Folger Shakespeare Institute.
Elizabeth Zeman Kolovich - English
Professor Elizabeth Zeman Kolovich, Sarah Neville, and Tamara Mahadin, (all in the English department) created a documentary, Looking for Mariam, 1613, which premiered on YouTube in April 2024. It was a Lord Denney’s Players production. All three were interviewed on a British podcast called Beyond Shakespeare (episode 344, “Discussing: Looking for Mariam” about this film.
Dr. Kolovich also presented a paper about the documentary at the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Conference in Cleveland on October 24, 2024. The paper was called “Thinking with Shakespeare’s Female Contemporary: Cary’s Tragedy of Mariam and Documentary-Making.”
She also published an article:
- “Chaste, Fair, and Bountiful: Marston, Fletcher, and the Countess of Huntingdon’s Patronage,” Early Theatre 27.1 (2024): 77-104.
Congratulations and well done to all!
If there is anything we might have missed or if you have additional publications, presentations or other announcements, please email cmrs_gaa@osu.edu to have them included in the next newsletter.
