The Humanities Department and the Department of Spanish and Portuguese are hosting Professor Jacques Lezra, professor of comparative literature and Spanish and Portuguese, New York University for two events:
鈥淭rade in Exile鈥�
Date: Thursday November 4
Time: 5 p.m.
Place: Humanities 1B90
Professor Lezra鈥檚 lecture examines exile as a structural element of theatre.听 He will discuss two relations to exile: the Virgilian conceptualization of exile through which memory of the past is carried to a foreign land and an exile which lacks any physical displacement but which defines the structural possibility of an individual鈥檚 relation to society.听 These two modes of exile will be analyzed in reference to a 1580鈥檚 Spanish play, the听Auto de la destruycion de Troya. This play, first performed in Aragon before an audience of听moriscos, Muslims who had been required to convert to Christianity but who still adhered (or were suspected of adhering) to Islam, was placed in the files of the Inquisition after this performance where it remained until its rediscovery in the mid-twentieth century.听 The status of exile for this audience as well as how the play distinguishes a sense of exile in relation to the west鈥檚 mythical account, formed in the destruction of Troy, provide the basis for Professor Lezra鈥檚 argument that, in this moment in the 1580s, the mythology of Troy and its exile had a radically different function from the one that has been diffused through the political history of the west.
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Wild Materialism and Terror
Date: Friday November 5
Time: 11 a.m.
Place: Old Main Conference Room (1B-85)
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At this seminar, Professor Lezra will be discussing his most recent book,听Wild Materialism: The Ethic of Terror and the Modern Republic听(Fordham UP, 2010). With:
- Moderator:听 Professor David Ferris 鈥� Comparative Literature and Humanities
- Participants: Professor Javier Krauel 鈥� Spanish and Portuguese
Professor Ruth Mas 鈥� Religious Studies
Professor Henry Pickford 鈥� German and Slavic
鈥淛acques Lezra鈥檚听Wild Materialism听combines the close reading of cultural texts with detailed treatment of works in the radical-democratic and radical-republican traditions. The originality of its closely argued theses is matched and complemented by the breadth of its focus鈥� encompassing the debates over the 鈥渢icking bomb鈥� scenario; the circumstances surrounding ETA鈥檚 assassination of Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco in Madrid in 1973; the films of Gillo Pontecorvo; Sade鈥檚 republican writing; Marx鈥檚听Critique of Hegel鈥檚 Philosophy of Right; and the roots of contemporary radical republicanism in early modern political theology (Bodin, Shakespeare, Parsons, Siliceo).鈥�
This is a seminar with limited seating. If you plan on attending please听 RSVP to听Humanities@Colorado.edu. It is recommended that you read the听introduction to听Wild Materialism听prior to the seminar.
Professor Jacques Lezra is a specialist in the literary, visual and philosophical culture of the early modern period and publishes on contemporary political philosophy, psychoanalysis, and the theory and practices of translation. He has taught at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, at Yale, Harvard, and at the Bread Loaf School of English.
Lezra鈥檚 books include
- Wild Materialism: The Ethic of Terror and the Modern Republic听(2010),
- Unspeakable Subjects: The Genealogy of the Event in Early Modern Europe听(1997)
- Spanish Republic听(2005), editor
- Depositions: Althusser, Balibar, Macherey and the Labor of Reading听(1988).
He co-edited Sebastian de Covarrubias鈥檚 1613 Suplemento al 鈥楾esoro de la lengua鈥�. His 1992 translation into Spanish of Paul de Man鈥檚 Blindness and Insight won the PEN Critical Editions Award. Econom铆a pol铆tica del alma: El suceso cervantino, a collection of Jacques Lezra鈥檚 essays on Cervantes, will appear in Spanish in fall 2011.