French Studies and the Literature Program Presents
Rival Riverains: Joyce and Proust in Paris
Tuesday, November 11, 2025
Reem-Kayden Center Laszlo Z. Bito '60 Auditorium
5:30 pm – 7:00 pm EST/GMT-5
5:30 pm – 7:00 pm EST/GMT-5
James Joyce and Marcel Proust met only once, at a late-night supper in the Hotel Majestic in Paris in May 1922. This lecture will revisit their brief and awkward encounter and explore what it reveals about the literary and social worlds of early twentieth-century Paris, how artistic value is created and sustained, and the contrasting experiences of exile and belonging that shaped each writer’s work.
Barry McCrea is the Donald R. Keough Family Professor of Irish Studies and Professor of English at Notre Dame University. He is the author of three books: Languages of the Night, winner of the American Comparative Literature Association’s René Wellek prize for the best book of 2016; In the Company of Strangers which was awarded the Heyman prize for scholarship in the humanities; and a novel, The First Verse, which won a number of awards including the Ferro-Grumley prize for fiction and a Barnes & Noble “Discover” award.
For more information, call 845-758-6822, or e-mail [email protected].
Time: 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm EST/GMT-5
Location: Reem-Kayden Center Laszlo Z. Bito '60 Auditorium
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