Tennessee Williams Scholars Conference
Williams Research Center at the Historic New Orleans Collection
410 Chartres Street
About the TWSC
Founded in 1995, the Tennessee Williams Scholars Conference is a full day of sessions led by highly acclaimed Williams scholars from across the US and abroad. As part of the Tennessee Williams & New Orleans Literary Festival, the TWSC coincides with the publication of the Tennessee Williams Annual Review, founded in 1998. The journal’s managing editor, Margit Longbrake, a member of the TW Festival Board of Directors, serves as the TWSC codirector with Bess Rowen, Villanova University.
The day of scholarly presentations, discussions, and a staged reading is held at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum, research center, and publisher dedicated to the stewardship of the history and culture of New Orleans and the Gulf South, and a partner organization to the Tennessee Williams & New Orleans Literary Festival.
The TWSC is open to the public and is for anyone who wants to know more about the life and works of Tennessee Williams.
The Historic New Orleans Collection presents the 28th annual
TENNESSEE WILLIAMS SCHOLARS CONFERENCE
Williams Research Center, 410 Chartres Street, New Orleans
$10 per session or Scholars Conference Pass, LitPass, or VIP Pass
FRIDAY, MARCH 28, 2025
9 – 9:15 AM
Welcome and opening remarks from conference codirectors Margit Longbrake, The Historic New Orleans Collection, and Bess Rowen, Villanova University.
9:15 – 10:30 AM
Experimental Williams: Expect the Unexpected
Emerging scholars from the US and France bring fresh perspectives to Williams’s experimental works in discussions of “plastic” acting, the uncanny, and castration as a surprising step toward wholeness in the late plays.
Moderators: Bess Rowen, Villanova University; Matthew P. Smith, Tulane University. Panelists: Matthew Minor, City University of New York, Graduate Center; Jennifer Tsuei, City University of New York, Graduate Center; Anaïs Umano, Université de Lorraine.
10:45 AM – 12:15 PM
Queer Continuities
What does queerness in Williams’s texts have to do with 20th-century Tangier, the religion of early America, and a remarkable 21st-century Australian horror film? Join a panel of scholars from the US and Germany as they put a wide range of times, places, and forms in conversation.
Moderator: Annette J. Saddik, Graduate Center and City Tech, City University of New York. Panelists: Stephen Cedars, City University of New York; Benjamin Gillespie, City University of New York; Bess Rowen, Villanova University; Basil Wiesse, Catholic University Eichstätt-Ingolstadt.
12:15 – 2 PM
Lunch (on your own)
2 – 3:30 PM
Room to Work: Directors Take on Gaps in the Plays and Prose
Seasoned director-scholars describe fragmented source texts and perspectives missing from the plays and their productions—and reframe those gaps as directorial opportunities.
Moderator: Mark Charney, Texas Tech University. Panelists: Lurana Donnels O’Malley, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa; Tom Mitchell, University of Illinois, Urbana, emeritus; John “Ray” Proctor, Tulane University.
3:45 – 5:15 PM
Staged Reading: Williams Family Correspondence and “God in the Free Ward”
Theater director and educator Tom Mitchell and members of the University of Illinois theater company present a staged reading that interweaves HNOC’s newly acquired letters by Tennessee Williams’s beloved and tragic sister, Rose, with diary entries by his mother and excerpts from his letters and his previously unpublished short story “God in the Free Ward.”
The reading is introduced by HNOC curator and historian Mark Cave and HNOC editor and conference codirector Margit Longbrake, who discuss HNOC’s acquisition of Rose’s letters, and by director Mitchell, who offers insight into his process of combining the texts from various sources.
2025 Moderators and Panelists are pictured above, left to right from the top:
Stephen Cedars, City University of New York
Mark Charney, Texas Tech University
Benjamin Gillespie, City University of New York
Matthew Minor, City University of New York, Graduate Center
Tom Mitchell, University of Illinois, Urbana, emeritus
Lurana Donnels O’Malley, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
John “Ray” Proctor, Tulane University
Bess Rowen, Villanova University
Annette J. Saddik, Graduate Center and City Tech, City University of New York.
Matthew P. Smith, Tulane University
Jennifer Tsuei, City University of New York, Graduate Center
Anaïs Umano, Université de Lorraine
Basil Wiesse, Catholic University Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
(Not pictured) Margit Longbrake, The Historic New Orleans Collection
PRESENTED BY
