A celebration of the 30th birthday of a prestigious literary journal is taking place at the University of Sussex this week.
‘30@30: The Future of Literary Thinking’ will feature live readings of a selection of 30 short essays written especially for the 30th anniversary issue of Textual Practice.
Readings will include new work written especially for the occasion from such writers as J.M. Coetzee, Ali Smith and Gabriel Josipovici; poets David Marriott and Keston Sutherland; and influential literary theorists Marjorie Perloff, Steven Connor and Simon Jarvis.
The event is free to attend and will take place on Wednesday (30 November) at 5pm at the Meeting House on the University of Sussex campus.
In addition to the event, the journal’s publisher Taylor & Francis has taken an unprecedented step in the journal’s history and made all the essays free to view online.
Professor Peter Boxall, Professor of English at the University of Sussex and editor of Textual Practice, said: “Textual Practice has been shaping critical thinking for 30 years. This celebration looks forward, to imagine how the journal might help to determine the role of literary thinking in the future.”
Founded in 1987, Textual Practice is Britain’s primary journal covering radical literary theory, working to understand relationships between politics, history and media through the literary medium.
It has a particular focus on the relationship between marginal ethnicities and sexualities and the mainstream, and has developed some of the most influential theories with which to understand the role of literary thinking in responding to and transforming our cultural environments.