Jim Petterson

The bulk of my scholarship in 19th-, 20th-, and 21st-century French poetry can be divided into several interdisciplinary areas: poetry and intellectual history; aesthetics and ideology; and poetry and law. These areas of interest are central to my first two books, Postwar Figures of L'Ephémère: Yves Bonnefoy, Louis-René des Forêts, Jacques Dupin, André du Bouchet, and Poetry Proscribed: Twentieth-Century (Re)Visions of the Trials of Poetry in France. A similar preoccupation with an interdisciplinary approach to French poetry runs through my latest book project, provisionally titled Poetry’s Incomplete Indifference: Poetry and Philosophy in France from 1970 to the Present, in which I examine the tensions among poetry, philosophy, and political commitment in late 20th- and 21st-century France.

I teach intermediate and upper-intermediate language and literature courses as well as advanced seminars in 20th- and 21st-century French studies, including a regular course on translation practice and theory and a recent seminar on multimedia poetry and "engagement" in contemporary France.

I have served as delegate assembly representative for the Division of Twentieth-Century French Literature and subsequently as regional representative for New England and Eastern Canada, both within the Modern Language Association. I am the past recipient of a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend and a Mellon-Mid-Career Fellowship, and I continue to translate works by contemporary French poets, philosophers, and historians.