Meeting at 2pm, pub night at 6

Folks, we’ve almost made it. November – the saddest of all months, with its shrinking days and grey unsnowing skies – is almost over. We’ve waded through the weeds of seminar presentations, conference abstracts and dissertation deadlines to make it HERE: the final GEA meeting and pub night of 2018! Come out and celebrate your own achievements and those of your colleagues as we share pints of wisdom and also actual, literal pints.  Check out the details below – we hope to see you all there!

Sincerely,
Your 2018-19 GEA Exec

MEETING: 2pm, JHB 719       
Among other things, we’ll be sharing updates about comps from this fall’s Graduate English Council while checking in with each year’s representative to see how things are going. Please talk to your rep if you have any concerns you feel we can help address! 

PUB NIGHT: 6:30pm, Pauper’s Pub (539 Bloor St W)
Pretty self-explanatory. Even if you have no interest in pints of any kind, come out and help with that building-community stuff because grad school is hard and solidarity is IMPORTANT.  

It’s been weeks in the making, but the moment we’ve all been eagerly anticipating is almost here: the first GEA meeting of the 2018-19 academic year is nearly upon us! I don’t know about you, but I personally have been having trouble sleeping for the past few days out of sheer all-caps EXCITEMENT.

We hope to see you in Room 719 THIS FRIDAY, SEP. 21 from 5-6:30pm (following the GEA Fellowships Workshop in the same space) as we introduce ourselves (the new GEA exec), make plans for the year ahead and hold elections for several KEY positions (a full list of which can be found here). All of these positions are great ways to get involved with the GEA and meet fellow students both inside and outside the department without having to commit yourself to an onerous workload.

And if you thought things couldn’t get any better, you should probably take a deep breath before reading the next sentence: directly after the meeting, the GEA will be hosting a PUB NIGHT at East of Brunswick (just south of the intersection of Bloor and Spadina)! Bring your partners, friends and family members and come get to know your colleagues outside the classroom as we celebrate the beginning of another school year with an evening of WHOLESOME FUN. We hope to see you there!

Our annual Cook the Books event, an evening of delightful literary food and company, is approaching quickly! This year’s Cook the Books is scheduled for 5:00-8:00pm on Thursday Feb. 5, and we’re now looking for contributions of food and/or items for the silent auction (proceeds will go toward the GEA travel fund).

Auction items in the past have ranged from a tour of Robertson Davies’ collection of 19th century printing presses, a selection of attractive handmade jewelry, the composition and recording of a song on the topic of your choice, a variety of legendary jams and preserves, and even immortality (becoming a character in a novel).

We love to see edible literary allusions of all kinds, but for the sake of those with allergies we will be asking you to bring a list of ingredients along with your dish.

Please get in touch with Joel Faber (joel.faber[at]mail.utoronto.ca) or Chris Kelleher (christopher.kelleher[at]mail.utoronto.ca) to offer your contributions or with any questions you might have. We look forward to an entertaining and enjoyable evening together!

Since we’re beginning the new year with an event-full month, in an effort to make sure that no-one misses out, I’d like to draw your attention to the following upcoming events:

Academics Read Things They Wrote As Kids, 7:30 on Jan. 16 at the Tranzac Club — come share an evening of laughter over forgotten gems and support creative reading and writing among Toronto’s youth!

GEA Special Fields workshop, 3:00 on Jan 15. in JHB 719 — aimed at PhD students preparing for special fields, take this opportunity to hear experiences and share study strategies with those who have gone before.

Job talks

• 19-c. American: Jan. 12, 19, & 26 (coffee at 2:30 in JHB 719, talk at 4:30)
• Old English: Jan. 13, 20, & 27 (coffee at 2:45 in JHB 719, talk at 4:15)
• Contemporary British: Jan. 16, 23, & 30 (coffee at 2:45 in JHB 719, talk at 4:15 in JHB 616)

Brown Bag Lunch, 12:00 on Jan. 29 in JHB 719 — bring your lunch bag and hear from Prof. Danny Wright as he describes his current research.