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A Conversation with Edgar Garcia & Benjamin A. Saltzman
Past event
Featured Book
Turning Away: The Poetics of an Ancient Gesture
A sweeping account of how we are at our most human when we turn away from the pains of the world.
Why do we look away from the suffering of others? Why do we cover our faces in shame? Why do we lower our heads in grief? Few gestures are as universal as the averted gaze. Fewer still are as ambivalent and inscrutable. In this incisive study, Benjamin A. Saltzman reveals how the kaleidoscopic appearance of these gestures in art, poetry, and philosophy has turned them into an essential language for our uncomfortable engagements with the world, challenging us to reflect on the ways we fundamentally relate to others.
Into the horizon of contemporary discourse, Turning Away sets out from five influential scenes in which figures avert their gaze: Timanthes's Sacrifice of Iphigenia, Plato's Republic, Augustine's Confessions, Christ's Crucifixion, and the Fall and Expulsion of Adam and Eve. The gestures of aversion in these scenes refract across visual media, through philosophy and politics, into modernity and the present day, having been reimagined along the way by thinkers like Hannah Arendt, artists like Marc Chagall and Salvador Dalí, poets like Langston Hughes, and many others. Saltzman offers a timely critique of the privilege of turning away and of the too-easy condemnation of our tendencies to do so.
This book will be available for purchase at the event.
About This Event
Edgar Garcia and Benjamin A. Saltzman will discuss their new books Cantares and Turning Away, respectively. A Q&A and signing will follow the discussion.
At the Co-op
BENJAMIN A. SALTZMAN is associate professor of English at the University of Chicago, where he coedits the journal Modern Philology. Saltzman is the author of Bonds of Secrecy: Law, Spirituality, and the Literature of Concealment in Early Medieval England and the coeditor of Thinking of the Medieval: Midcentury Intellectuals and the Middle Ages.
EDGAR GARCIA is associate professor of English at the University of Chicago, where he is affiliated with the Program in Creative Writing. He is the author of Emergency: Reading the Popol Vuh in a Time of Crisis, Skins of Columbus: A Dream Ethnography, and Signs of the Americas: A Poetics of Pictography, Hieroglyphs, and Khipu.
Featured Author
Benjamin Saltzman
BENJAMIN A. SALTZMAN is associate professor of English at the University of Chicago, where he coedits the journal Modern Philology. Saltzman is the author of Bonds of Secrecy: Law, Spirituality, and the Literature of Concealment in Early Medieval England and the coeditor of Thinking of the Medieval: Midcentury Intellectuals and the Middle Ages.
In Conversation With
Edgar Garcia
EDGAR GARCIA is associate professor of English at the University of Chicago, where he is affiliated with the Program in Creative Writing. He is the author of Emergency: Reading the Popol Vuh in a Time of Crisis, Skins of Columbus: A Dream Ethnography, and Signs of the Americas: A Poetics of Pictography, Hieroglyphs, and Khipu.
About the Venue
Seminary Co-Op Bookstore
For over 60 years, the Seminary Co-op Bookstores has served as a cultural anchor in and beyond Chicago; as the first not-for-profit bookstore whose mission is bookselling, their stores, which include 57th Street Books, celebrate the power of the browsing experience to inspire curiosity, discovery, and delight.
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NaNo 2.0
Ready to Write Your Novel? Say hello to NaNo 2.0—a community-led endeavor that’s keeping the spirit of National Novel Writing Month alive. The goal? Write 50,000 words over the course of November or you can pick any writing project for the month that feels exciting to you! At the Seminary Co-Op Bookstores, we want to support our writerly community by hosting NaNo Drop-ins on November 2, 9, 16, and 30 from 5:30pm to 7:30pm at the Seminary Co-Op (5751 S Woodlawn Ave). Seminary Co-op Board Member Holly Smith (MA Writing) will be at each drop-in and available to be a sounding board for anything that has you stuck. If you want to buy books at a NaNo Drop-in, you will just have to do so before 6pm. Please send any questions about the event to events@semcoop.com. We hope to see you there!
Frances Ferguson - "Records of Reward: Essays on Literature and Value" - Heather Keenleyside
Frances Ferguson will discuss Records of Reward: Essays on Literature and Value. She will be joined in conversation by Heather Keenleyside. A Q&A and signing will follow the discussion.
A Conversation with John Scalzi!
Join us for a conversation and book signing with New York Times Bestselling Science Fiction author John Scalzi! We are so excited to welcome beloved Science Fiction author John Scalzi to the Co-op! John will discuss his newest novel MONSTERS OF OHIO. A Q&A and book signing will follow the conversation. About the Book: Welcome to Richland, Ohio. Things aren't great. The town’s biggest employer is closing shop, and Richland's on the brink. It's where Mike Boyd, with his own set of problems, finds himself returning to after decades away. He's not planning to stay. But Richland has other plans for Mike, his old friend Dave, and a newcomer Andi. They're caught in a swirl of local troubles, private equity, executive theft… and something extremely weird involving Jeremy Keller’s prize cow. Welcome to Richland. Leave your expectations behind. Bring a tarp. About John Scalzi: JOHN SCALZI is one of the most popular science fiction authors of his generation. His debut, Old Man's War, won him the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. His New York Times bestsellers include The Last Colony, Fuzzy Nation, Redshirts (which won the Hugo Award for Best Novel), The Last Emperox, The Kaiju Preservation Society, Starter Villain, When the Moon Hits Your Eye, and The Shattering Peace. Material from his blog, Whatever, has earned him two other Hugo Awards. He lives in Ohio with his wife and daughter. Helpful information: *There is street parking only. There is a parking lot next door to our store but it is NOT ours and we cannot guarantee that you will not be towed. *You may start lining up at 6pm. Doors will open at 6:30pm. *Refund requests will not be accepted after 3pm, 11/04! *If you have a free general admission ticket, you MUST purchase the book at the event to enter the signing line. *Limited seating is available on a first come first serve basis. There will be standing room only once seating is full. If you do require seating, please email mgmt@semcoop.com to reserve a seat. *Additional copies of the book and backlist will be available for purchase at the store during the event.