This day-long symposium will bring scholars of Spanish Golden Age and English Renaissance literature into dialogue through focused investigation of a dominant publication form that their dramatic literatures share: the quarto. The English play quarto and the Spanish pliego suelto are composed in quarto gatherings: printed sheets folded twice to make four leaves. The Spanish author Lope de Vega even used this format in the composition process of his dramatic manuscripts. What can we learn from a comparison of quarto publications, across languages and cultural contexts? How did quarto publication shape genres other than drama? Symposium participants will engage directly with books and manuscripts from Kislak Center collections. We are also grateful to Sarah Horowitz and the Department of Special Collections, Haverford College Libraries for loaning materials for display on the day of the conference.
We honor the memory and scholarship of José M. Regueiro (1938-2017), Professor Emeritus of Romance Languages at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Spanish Drama of the Golden Age: A Catalogue of the Comedia Collection in the University of Pennsylvania Libraries.
Participants: Michael Agnew (Pine Tree Foundation/New York University), Laura Aydelotte (University of Pennsylvania), Claire Bourne (Pennsylvania State University), Roger Chartier (Collège de France/University of Pennsylvania), Steve Vásquez Dolph (University of Pennsylvania), Margaret Greer (Duke University), Seth Kimmel (Columbia University), Zachary Lesser (University of Pennsylvania), Marissa Nicosia (Pennsylvania State University), Victor Sierra Matute (University of Pennsylvania), Peter Stallybrass (University of Pennsylvania)
Friday, April 21, 2017
9:30-10:00am: Registration
10:00-11:00am: Overviews:
John Pollack (Kislak Center), Steve Dolph: Welcome and opening remarks
Margaret Greer, "The Spanish comedia, in quarto - manuscript and print"
Peter Stallybrass, "The Quarto as Play and as Pamphlet"
11:00-11:15am: Break
11:15-12:00am: Display/presentation: Penn quarto drama collections
12:00-1:00pm: Panel Discussion 1: Quarto drama across collections
Michael Agnew, "Lassoing Loose Sueltas: Towards An Electronic Union Catalogue of Comedias sueltas in US and Canadian Libraries"
Claire Bourne, "Accident & Experiment: Dramatic Typography on the Quarto Page"
Laura Aydelotte, "'A Sad One': A 17th Century Woman and Her Quartos"
1:00-2:00pm: Break
2:00-3:00pm: Panel Discussion 2: Case Studies
Marissa Nicosia, "The English Civil War in Quarto"
Seth Kimmel, "Hearing the Romancero: Print Culture and Medieval Iberia's Multiconfessional Sound"
3:00-4:00pm: Panel Discussion 3: Case Studies
Victor Sierra Matute, "Garcilaso in a Pocket: Appropriation and Book Format in Renaissance Spain"
Zachary Lesser, "Ghost Quartos (and Octavos)"
4:00-4:15pm: Break
4:15-4:45pm: Display/presentation: Quarto drama in broader contexts
4:45-5:30pm: Roger Chartier, "Looking for Quartos"