IN MEMORIAM
D. Lorne Macdonald
1955-2010

Dr. Lorne Macdonald, a member of the Department of English since 1991, died on 14 January 2010 following a brief illness. Lorne was a devoted teacher, a principled colleague, a meticulous scholar, and a valued friend. He will be missed by colleagues in the department, by scholars at many other universities in Canada and abroad, and by his students, past and present. 

Lorne was a voracious reader, a fine writer, and a kind person.  A respected scholar of British literature of the Romantic period, he was internationally recognized as a biographer and as a textual editor.  At the time of his death he was working on an ambitious monograph entitled “Geneva in 1816: A Group Biography,” a study of Lord Byron, Claire Clairmont, Matthew Gregory Lewis, John William Polidori, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (later Shelley) and Percy Shelley.  He published individual biographies of Polidori (Poor Polidori: A Critical Biography of the Author of “The Vampyre,” 1991) and of Matthew Gregory Lewis (Monk Lewis:  A Critical Biography, 2000).  His highly successful edition of Frankenstein (with Kathleen Scherf) provided Broadview Press with the template for the entire Broadview Editions series; editions of Wollstonecraft’s Vindications, Lewis’s The Monk, and Polidori’s “The Vampyre” and “Ernestus Berchtold” followed.  A fine edition of Charlotte Smith’s monumental last novel, Letters of a Solitary Wanderer, appeared from Pickering and Chatto in 2007.  For many years Lorne had also been working on a collaborative project, The Broadview Anthology of Literature of the Revolutionary Period, which finally went to the printers only a few days ago and which will appear next month.

Lorne’s sisters, Clare and Sylvia, and his brother, Jock, were able to be with him during the last ten days of his life, and for that we are grateful.  To them, to Lorne’s nieces and nephews, and to his mother Doreen in Ontario, we extend our deepest sympathy.  Here in the English Department, Lorne will be remembered with affection, appreciation, and respect. 

There will be a memorial event at a later date.  In the meantime, the family requests that contributions in Lorne's memory be made to the Haitian earthquake relief effort.

17th Century Play Comes to Life

After five years of research by scholars and students in English, history and drama, an anonymous 17th-century play is being staged at U of C—the first production in nearly 400 years.

The Department of Drama’s main stage production of The Humorous Magistrate builds on five years of research by Mary Polito, a professor in the Department of English, a team of faculty, librarians and graduate students from English, history and drama, and scholars from North America and the U.K. Learn more at UToday.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION FOR 1ST YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS

Incoming English majors are now required to take English 203 (Introduction to Literary Analysis) and English 205 (Shakespeare) in the first year. There will be eight different sections of English 203, offered in both fall and winter terms. You can take these courses in either term. Each section features its own topic and a small class size (around 20 students). Topics include “Banned Books: An Introduction to Literary Censorship,” “History, Memory, and Literary Representation” and “The American Slave Narrative: Visions and Revisions.” For a complete list of course descriptions, please visit the topics course descriptions at  http://english.ucalgary.ca/coursediscriptopics. Since the topics of these sections vary widely, we highly recommend you choose your English 203 course based on what topics interest you. Questions? Please contact engladv [at] ucalgary [dot] ca.

Poem of the Month Competition

The University of Calgary’s Poem-of-the-Season competition  is now receiving submissions for the Winter poem.The contest is open to all U of C students regardless of area of study. The winning entry will be published in poster format and displayed across campus.

Students can send one previously unpublished poem to maboyd [at] ucalgary [dot] ca with the subject line: Poem of the Season. The poem should be sent as an attachment in .RTF format, and must fit on a single page. Poems on any subject are welcome. Each submission should include the poet’s name, address, and phone number.

Deadline for receipt of submissions for the Winter poem is Friday, February 19.  

The Winter poem will be published in March during English Department Month.

H1N1 Pandemic Information

Fight the flu. What you need to do.