English Undergraduate Association's Writers Dead & Gone Series Celebrates Second Year
October 10, 2013
Where can you eat all the pizza you desire and hear dramatic readings from writers that are dead and gone? In the undergraduate lounge at the The English Undergraduate Association's Writers Dead & Gone series!
The Writers Dead & Gone series began in October 2012. It developed from the English Undergraduate Association's (EUA) desire to host a social event, as well as inspiration from the Department's successful Writers Here & Now series.
EUA's Writers Dead & Gone series takes place on the last Tuesday of the month in the undergraduate lounge. Pizza is plentiful at each of the events, which are themed according to the featured writer of the month. The writer's books are distributed around the room for anyone to pick up and deliver an impromptu reading. At the recent Dr. Seuss reading, a Chesire Cat hung on the wall, and a dramatic horror-inspired interpretation of The Lorax was performed in front of 56 attendees.
At EUA meetings, members propose their favorite deceased writers for upcoming events, then record and add the names to a running list. When choosing the next writer, members aim for diversity in time period and genre. Past featured writers have included, J.R.R. Tolkien, Jane Austen, and Lewis Carroll.
The series came out of EUA's wishes to reconnect with authors on a non-scholarly level and to remember why they loved these writers, in an environment where they are not required to engage with them for a grade. Despite the similarity in their names, Writers Dead & Gone was modeled to juxtapose the Writers Here & Now series. At Writers Here & Now, living writers read and comment on their own work. At Writers Dead & Gone, students read the writer's work and have freedom to speak to it without the writer's interpretation.
EUA will host the second annual Writers Dead & Gone featuring Edgar Allen Poe on October 29, at 5 pm. At the event, Poe and other Halloween-related works (think Frankenstein and Dracula) will be read. Costumes are encouraged and plans for pumpkin carving are in the works. In December, at their last event for the semester, Writers Dead & Gone will explore Plath, to keep consistent with the mood of finals week.