Just got back from the 2011 International Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo. At the customary, and hilarious, Saturday night session of the “Pseudo Society,” I plunked myself down in one of the only available seats in the large auditorium (and this was nearly 30 minutes before the proceedings got underway!) and soon discovered I was sitting behind U of Minnesota grad student and MacLaurin Institute Staffer Abbey Von Gohren, who had been recommended to me by the redoubtable late-ancientist Oliver Nicholson as a potential member of a wishful-but-still-non-existent “Twin Cities Medieval Study Group.” Nice to meet you, Abbey! And I noted the U of M medievalists were out in force. Go Gophers!
Also directly in front of me at the Pseudo Society event was Curt Emanuel of Medieval History Geek, who blogged his Kalamazoo experience, as is his wont. It was great to meet Curt, as I’ve enjoyed his fanboy medieval blog for some time, and linked it on a couple of occasions. I understand he has a “bloggers get-together” on Friday mornings of the Kzoo conferences, and I’m definitely game for it next year.
I’ll soon (today?) be posting my own paper from the conference, “The Intuitive Medievalism of C S Lewis.” I agonized over it for the whole conference (yes, I hadn’t finished it yet when I arrived. Insert tsk-tsk about procrastination here) and it seemed to go well. Of course my friend the brilliant Edwin Woodruff Tait, who also presented in the brand-spanking-new C S Lewis track, as did his equally brilliant wife Jennifer Woodruff Tait, let me know at a dinner later that although he had enjoyed my paper, he had disagreed with a few things. Too bad he couldn’t remember what those things were: I always enjoy and benefit from Edwin’s critiques–which he’s never shy about giving. Gotta love that WWF European educational model.
More soon. . . .
Related articles
- Going Medieval on You? (carpetbaggersjournal.com)
Medieval Wisdom for Modern Christians
Grateful to the dead 
Pingback: Kalamazoo 2011 – Day 3 « Medieval History Geek
Sometimes I forget and put my Purdue e-mail in rather than Gmail. Instinct I guess. For the meetup, the closest to an organizer, as far as I can tell, is ADM from Blogenspiel. I’ll try to remember to keep you up on the conversation next year.
Aw, thanks for the shout-out, Chris! It was terrific to meet you. And in fact, yours was one of the papers that I wanted so badly to see and couldn’t (talk about agonizing). I would love to read it, if you don’t mind sharing.
Hope to keep in touch!
Cheers,
Abbey
Yes, let’s definitely keep in touch.
Here’s the paper: https://gratefultothedead.wordpress.com/2011/05/17/the-intuitive-medievalism-of-c-s-lewis-kalamazoo-2011-paper/.
Thanks for the kind words for the Gopher tribe, Chris. ‘Twas meat and drink to meet you in the flesh over breakfast on Sunday. Funny how far from St. Paul one sometimes has to travel in order to finally bump into a neighbor.
Jovially Yours,
Ben
It was fun meeting you, Ben. Good to know the U is “representing” so well at Kzoo.
It was great meeting you Chris – and quite a surprise. I kept trying to look at you out of the corner of my eye – trying not to stare but to figure out where I knew you from. Pretty sure I wouldn’t call that “my” blogger get-together since this is the 1st year I’ve made it but I’m sure you’d be welcome to come.
Curt, another connection: I notice your institutional email is at Purdue. I was at the conference to present at a C S Lewis track sponsored by the CS Lewis society at Purdue (Crystal Kirgiss was the organizer).
I’ll look for the blogger “do” next year. Is there a mailing list? Or does the Grand Master just send out positive vibes, and all the cognoscenti tune in and show up miraculously at the right time and place, like the Cylons aboard Galactica hearing the cosmic trigger melody? (OK sorry, geeking out there.)
Curt has it right: someone of the regulars says somewhere, “where’s the blogger meet-up this year?” and then someone else hosts a discussion where various alternatives are batted about, no-one expresses much of a preference and so it reliably winds up in the same place as before. And usually the two people are Notorious Ph.D. and Another Damned Medievalist. We bloggers appear to be creatures of tradition!
Thanks Jonathan!