LibGuides: Bennington College History: Literature: 1940s Literature Readings and Lectures

1940s Literature Readings and Lectures

1940

Jacques Barzun. "Taking Sides vs. Taking Thought" (1940-03-21) General Meetings 1939-1945
Robert Speaight. Reading of T.S. Eliot (1940-04-18) General Meetings 1939-1945
Theodore Spencer. "The Teaching of Literature in Relation to the History of Ideas" (1940-05-14) General Meetings 1939-1945
I. A. Richards "Reading and Understanding" (1940-05-27) General Meetings 1939-1945
Richard Goetz. Goetz was invited to the College as a guest lecturer as part of a plan to support "displaced foreign scholars" as a result of World War II. He was a guest lecturer during the fall term in literature and drama. Steps Taken and Plans Being Made to Support Displaced Foreign Scholars, Students and Children | Letter to Richard Goetz from President Leigh | Letter from Richard Goetz to President Leigh | Francis Fergusson to President Leigh Regarding Goetz |
Letters of Recommendation for Richard Goetz from Francis Fergusson and Martha Hill.
- Richard Goetz. "Storm and Stress, the German Chance and Tragedy" lecture. (1940-09-23) General Meetings 1939-1945
- Richard Goetz. "The Historic Hero and the Dramatic Author" lecture. (1940-10-07) General Meetings 1939-1945
- Richard Goetz. "The Medieval Conception of Hell" lecture. (1940-10-14) General Meetings 1939-1945
- Richard Goetz. "Expressionism in Drama: Its Way and Consequences" lecture. (1940-10-21) General Meetings 1939-1945
- Richard Goetz. "The Russian Theatre" lecture. (1940-11-11) General Meetings 1939-1945
- Richard Goetz. "Drama and Theatre" lecture. (1940-11-18) General Meetings 1939-1945

1941

Marguerite Yourcenar. "Three Romantic Visionaries, de Nerval, de Quincey and Novalis" (1941-03-26) General Meetings 1939-1945 | College Week
James Joyce Memorial Meeting. (1941-04-07) College Week
William Troy. "Humanism and the 19th Century" (1941-04-17) General Meetings 1939-1945 | Humanism-Lecture Series List of Speakers and Topics
Eda Lou Walton. Readings from Modern American Women Poets (1941-05-08) College Week | General Meetings 1939-1945
Genevieve Tabouis. "How France Collapsed" "Genevieve Tabouis, "...French journalist and refugee from arrest in German-occupied France, is now American correspondent of the London Daily Dispatch and of the Critica of Buenos Aires" (1941-05-20) College Week
Sinclair Lewis. "How Not to Write Popular Novels" (1941-05-30) Press Release | College Week
Dorothy Thompson, political commentator and columnist of the New York Herald Tribune Syndicate. (1941-10-15) College Week | General Meetings 1939-1945
Richard A. E. Brooks. "Why Study the Novel?" (1941-10-20) General Meetings 1939-1945
C. Harold Gray "Shakespeare on War and Lechery" (1941-10-23) College Week | General Meetings 1939-1945
Panel Discussion on Satire (1941-11-24) College Week | General Meetings 1939-1945

1942

Panel Discussion on Tragedy. (1942-04-14) General Meetings 1939-1945
Ralph Marcus. "The Literature of the Old Testament" (1942-04-28) General Meetings 1939-1945
Genevieve Taggard. Poetry reading (1942-05-22) General Meetings 1939-1945
Lawrence Leighton. "The Van Wyck Brooks-Archibald MacLeish Controversy" (June 1942-06-01) General Meetings 1939-1945
Américo Castro. "The Hispanic Tradition" (1942-11-13) General Meetings 1939-1945
Pierre de Lanux. "The Fighting French and Their Organization" (1942-12-02) General Meetings 1939-1945

1943

Francis Fergusson. "On Reading Dante in 1943" (1943-05-06) General Meetings 1939-1945
Alain Locke. "Race in the Present World Crisis" (1943-10-28) General Meetings 1939-1945
Theodore Roethke. Poetry Reading. (1943-11-18) General Meetings 1939-1945

1944

Kenneth Burke "The Language of Unification" (1944-05-23) General Meetings 1939-1945
R. P. Blackmur "The Virgin and the Dynamo" (1943-06-09) General Meetings 1939-1945
Bernardo Clariana "Lecture on Modern Spanish Poetry" (in Spanish) (1943-06-12) General Meetings 1939-1945
William Carlos Williams. Poetry reading. (1943-06-30) General Meetings 1939-1945
Paul d 'Estournelles. Poetry reading. (1943-11-30) General Meetings 1939-1945

1945

Stanley Kunitz. Poetry reading. (1945-05-10) General Meetings 1939-1945
Louise Bogan. Poetry reading. (1945-06-28) General Meetings 1939-1945
Leo Spitzer. The International and Historical Significance of the Don Quixote Novel. (1945-07-05) General Meetings 1939-1945
Maria Bizzoni. Dante Reading. (1945-09-13) General Meetings 1939-1945
Fred B. Millett. The Rebirth of Liberal Education. (1945-10-26) General Meetings 1939-1945
Ralph Ellison. "American Negro Writing: A Problem of Identity" (1945-11-01) Correspondence about arrangements for his visit and lecture. | Evaluation of the General Meetings Program 1945-46 | General Meetings 1939-1945

1946

Stanley Hyman. "Henry Thoreau in Our Time" (1946-04-12) American Thought Lecture Series. Lecture
Joseph Campbell - "Mythology" Evaluation of the General Meetings Program 1945-46
Kenneth Burke - "Words, War and Peace" Evaluation of the General Meetings Program 1945-46
W. H. Auden - "Poetry Reading" Evaluation of the General Meetings Program 1945-46
The New Yorker Forum Evaluation of the General Meetings Program 1945-46

1947

Myth Lecture Series.""Four Lectures on Myth Work at Community Meeting Comprise Series" The Beacon v1 n1 | Lecture Series - Spring 1947
- Joseph Campbell. "Myth and Ritual" (1947-03-27)
- Kenneth Burke. "Ideology and Myth" (1947-03-31)
- William Troy "The Myth of the Hero" (1947-04-07)
Literary Seminar Series. "Faculty Speakers Starred in New Literary Seminar Series" The Beacon v1 n1
- James Jackson. Reading his short story "The Burnt Lemon" and Stanley Kunitz giving his interpretation. ( 1947-04-14)
- Vivian Mercier. "James Joyce and his Dublin" (1947-04-21)
- Stories and poems from the Silo Board. (1947-04-28)
- Maria Bizzoni. "The French Symbolists" (1947-05-05)
- Francis Fergusson. Talk on his play "Penelope" (1947-05-12)
- Stories and poems from the Literature Workshop class. (1947-05-26)
- Catharine Osgood Foster. "The Elizabethans" (1947-06-02) The Beacon v1 n6
- Student Writing. (1947-06-07)
- Stanley Kunitz. Talk on his own poetry. (1947-06-09) The Beacon v1 n6
- Kenneth Burke: An Analysis of a Poem. (1947-06-16)
- Pier Maria Pasinetti: A Talk on his short story "Family History" (1947-06-23) The Beacon v1 n7
- Peter Drucker: "Literary Expression" (1947-06-30) The Beacon v1 n6
Wallace Fowlie. "The French Literary Mind" (1947-09-15) The Beacon Volume 1 Number 10
Francis Fergusson. Talk on T. S. Eliot's "The Waste Land" (1947-10-08) The Beacon v1 n13
Louis Lyons. "Your Newspapers" (1947-10-30) The Beacon v1 n13
Anaïs Nin (1947-11-06) The Beacon v1 n13
Joint Art-Literature Seminar. "Primitivism" (1947-12-11) The Beacon v1 n16

1948

Stephen Spender. "Modern Poetry and Reality" (1948-03-01) The Beacon v2 n1

1949

Shirley Jackson. discussion of her work with Kenneth Burke's Literary Criticism class. Canfield Living Room. (1949-05-17) College Week
Ben Belitt, Francis Golffing, Stanley Kunitz, Howard Nemerov read a selection of "certain favorite poems." Poetry Seminar. (1949 spring) Bennington College Alumni Quarterly vol 1. no. 2 Spring 1949 pp 16-17
- Ben Belitt read: Four sonnets by G. M. Hopkins, Ode to a Nightingale and Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats
- Francis Golffing read: Sins Round and The Wreath by George Herbert, A Drizzly Easter Morning and During Wind and Rain by Thomas Hardy.
- Stanley Kunitz read: Ash Wednesday by T. S. Eliot and The Circus Animals' Desertion by W. B. Yeats.
- Howard Nemerov read: The Phoenix and the Turtle by Shakespeare and A Nocturnal upon Saint Lucie's Day
Ben Belitt, Francis Golffing, Stanley Kunitz, Howard Nemerov read from their own poems. Poetry Seminar. (1949 spring) Bennington College Alumni Quarterly vol 1. no. 2 Spring 1949 pp 16-17
- Ben Belitt read poems he has written since Five-Fold Mesh.
- Stanley Kunitz read poems from Passport to the War
- Francis Golffing read poems from a forthcoming book. [possibly Poems, 1943–1949]
- Howard Nemerov read poems from The Image and the Law and from recents editions of Furioso