There have been many new beginnings in Scottish literature, and it has played a substantial role in many developments opening out into European and world literature: for example, in Romantic fiction and verse (Walter Scott, James Hogg),    in the fin-­‐de-­‐siècle (R.L.Stevenson), and in early twentieth-­‐century modernist   writing (Hugh MacDiarmid). Scottish novelists and poets – Muriel Spark, Edwin    Morgan, Alasdair Gray, Don Paterson, Ali Smith, John Burnside, Jackie Kay, Kathleen Jamie – have helped to shape British literature of the last thirty years.

Our conference will have two focuses: 
forms of beginning and opening: technique, device, narrative structure, language    that drive literature in new directions;

the literature of the last thirty years – especially prose and poetry.    
     

We invite proposals for papers that address the two focuses above – on the     literature of Scotland of the past thirty years, and on new poetic and narrative    forms, new ways of expression that are beginnings and openings.    
      
 The organization of the conference sessions will be innovative. Morning and    
 evening sessions will be given to traditional papers and plenary keynote    
 lectures. Afternoon sessions will consist of seminars in which invited speakers    
 and guests will focus on specific short texts relevant to the conference’s overall    
 theme.    
     

Alan Riach, Helen Lynch, Alan Spence, Elizabeth Burns, and Christoph Heyl have    already confirmed that they will attend as plenary speakers and guests of the    conference.    
  
Publications have come from previous conferences (see our website), and we    
plan to publish selected papers from the 2014 event.            
     

Please send 250-­‐word abstracts for papers by 1 March 2014 to between@ug.edu.pl