Call for Papers
We would like to invite you to the second annual conference of the Northwestern University
Research Initiative for the Study of Russian Philosophy and Religious Thought (NU RPRT
Research Initiative), to be held at Northwestern University on April 19–20, 2024. The
conference, Celebrating Gary Saul Morson: Humanistic Traditions in Russian Thought and
Literature, will honor a preeminent scholar, searching public intellectual, and beloved
Northwestern University professor.
Gary Saul Morson is the Lawrence B. Dumas Professor of the Arts and Humanities at
Northwestern University, where he has taught since 1986. Founded in 2022, the NU RPRT
Research Initiative is dedicated to the type of fundamental humanistic inquiry that has made
Professor Morson a legendary teacher and a renowned scholar.
Presentations can address any aspect of Professor Morson’s rich oeuvre, which includes The
Boundaries of Genre: Dostoevsky’s “Diary of a Writer” and the Traditions of Literary Utopia;
Hidden in Plain View: Narrative and Creative Potentials in “War and Peace”; Mikhail Bakhtin:
Creation of a Prosaics (co-authored with Caryl Emerson); Narrative and Freedom: The Shadows
of Time; “Anna Karenina” in Our Time: Seeing More Wisely; Minds Wide Shut: How the New
Fundamentalisms Divide Us (co-authored with Morton Schapiro); and, most recently, Wonder
Confronts Certainty: Russian Writers on the Timeless Questions and Why Their Answers Matter.
We encourage participants to engage with Morson’s work, perhaps especially as it relates to the
Russian intellectual-cultural tradition of open humanism. Papers might explore how this tradition
has deepened our understanding of what it is to be human, what human nature reveals about the
nature of reality, and how Russian humanism can resist authoritarianism and promote human
dignity. It is our hope to publish selected papers from the conference in a Festschrift for
Professor Morson.
Please join us for a special weekend in celebration of Gary Saul Morson. We request that you
confirm attendance via email by November 30, 2023 and submit paper abstracts by January 1,
2024.
Sincerely,
Susan McReynolds Randall Poole Bradley Underwood
Co-Director Co-Director Associate Director