Joseph Warren Beach Lectures in Literature

J W Beach For over 50 years, the Department of English’s Joseph Warren Beach Lectures in Literature have drawn many of the most respected names in literary criticism to the University of Minnesota. Indeed, the below list of speakers has itself become an inducement in contracting the next Joseph Warren Beach lecturer.

The man whose memory this lecture series commemorates, Professor Joseph Warren Beach, was a scholar of international reputation. His wide-ranging interests in modern literature produced such classic critical works as The Method of Henry James (1918), The Concept of Nature in Nineteenth-Century English Poetry (1936), American Fiction, 1920-1940 (1941), and The Making of the Auden Canon (1957).

Born in Gloversville, New York, he came to study at the University of Minnesota, where his uncle, Cyrus Northrop, was president. After graduating in 1900, he went to Harvard, where he earned his Ph.D. in 1907. He returned to Minnesota and served as an outstanding scholar, poet, and teacher until his retirement in 1948.

During his last eight years at the University of Minnesota, he chaired the Department of English and built it into one of the premier departments in the country. His high standards for himself drew the most distinguished writers, scholars, and teachers to Minnesota. This lecture series, arranged by family and friends in 1959, continues to bring the most eminent speakers to campus and serves to commemorate Joseph Warren Beach.

Joseph Warren Beach Lecturers

1959 - Lionel Trilling
1960 - Robert Penn Warren
1961 - R. P. Blackmur
1962 - Elizabeth Hardwick
1963 - Morton D. Zabel
1964 - Frank Kermode
1965 - Harry Levin
1966 - Howard Nemerov
1967 - Louis Simpson
1968 - Eric Bentley
1969 - William H. Gass
1970 - Allen Tate
1971 - R. W. B. Lewis
1972 - Richard Wilbur
1973 - Mary McCarthy
1974 - Mark Schorer
1975 - George Steiner
1976 - Kenneth Burke
1977 - Richard Ellmann
1978 - John Gardner
1979 - Alfred Kazin
1980 - Karl Shapiro
1981 - Leon Edel
1982 - Stanley Kauffmann
1983 - Paul Fussell
1984 - Sandra M. Gilbert
1985 - Robert Pinsky
1986 - Edward W. Said
1987 - Walter Benn Michaels
1988 - Annette Kolodny
1989 - Hayden White
1990 - Northrop Frye
1991 - N. Scott Momaday
1992 - Nikki Giovanni
1993 - Peter Matthiessen
1994 - Noam Chomsky
1996 - Louise Erdrich
1997 - August Wilson
1998 - Tony Kushner - introduction by Andrew Elfenbein
1999 - Robert Hass - introduction by Edward Griffin
2000 - Leslie Marmon Silko - introduction by Carol Miller
2001 - W. S. Merwin - introduction by Kent Bales
2002 - Eavan Boland - introduction by Michael Dennis Browne
2007 - Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak - introduction by John Mowitt
2008 - Nancy Armstrong - introduction by Lois Cucullu
2009 - Anne Carson - introduction by Paula Rabinowitz

2006 Esther Freier Endowed Speaker T.C. Boyle

"Thanks so much for another wonderful evening! Thanks too for maintaining your mailing list so well, so I get to hear and meet authors from everywhere!"

Lecture attendee

Address: 207 Lind Hall, 207 Church St SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455
Phone: 612-625-3363

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Last modified on May 14, 2012