Jackson Renaissance — Celebrating Shirley Jackson's revival beyond Hill House
Trinity College Dublin will host a free online symposium exploring the revival of interest in the work of American author Shirley Jackson on Tuesday, December 14th.
While Jackson is still best known for classic supernatural horror novel The Haunting of Hill House (1959) and her infamous 1948 short story The Lottery, her work also encompassed psychological thrillers, domestic humour, children’s writing, and short fiction, as well as cultural commentaries and advice for budding writers.
Reading Shirley Jackson in the Twenty-First Century will hear how Jackson’s critical and cultural standing have in recent years been transformed by a surge of academic and popular interest, including a biopic starring Elizabeth Moss and a popular Netflix adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House. Penguin has now re-published her novels and stories in new editions as part of their 'Modern Classics' imprint.
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Hosted by Trinity's School of English and supported by the Trinity Long Room Hub Arts and Humanities Research Institute, the symposium combines live online panels on Tuesday, December 14th with pre-recorded panels, discussions, essays, and video and audio material, which is now available here.
This material includes such contributions as a presentation on Shirley Jackson's writings for younger readers; the challenges of adapting Shirley Jackson for film and television; and an exploration of haunted and contagious spaces in The Haunting of Hill House.
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"Jackson’s gender, her ability to evade conventional critical and generic categorisation, and her commercial success during her lifetime meant that she was often denied the respect – and the attention – afforded to many of her contemporaries. Now after decades of relative critical neglect, Jackson’s critical and cultural standing has been transformed by a surge of academic and popular interest," explains Dr Bernice M. Murphy from Trinity’s School of English, who was the academic consultant on the recently published book The Letters of Shirley Jackson, edited by Jackson’s eldest son, Laurence Jackson Hyman.
Reading Shirley Jackson in the Twenty-First Century takes place online on Tuesday, 14 December 2021, from 5 pm – 8 pm - register for the event here, and find out more here.
