Vonnegut/Twain Lecture Now Available

The fall 2021-2022 The Trouble Begins Lecture Series presented by the Center for Mark Twain Studies continues with “Complimentary Genius: The Sardonic Humor of Kurt Vonnegut and Mark Twain,” presented by Richard Coronado of South Texas College.

Coronado discusses the stylistic similarities between Vonnegut and Twain, who both used humor to tackle questions about human existence.  Coronado believes the similarities are not coincidental but that Vonnegut was purposefully making tribute to his predecessor.

Coronado teaches English classes at South Texas College. He has presented several papers on the work of Kurt Vonnegut, Katherine Mansfield and others. His literary interests include the philosophical novel, literature of the absurd and modern and postmodern poetry.

The next “Trouble Begins” lecture will take place on Wednesday, October 27 at 7 p.m. at Quarry Farm. Entitled, “[T]ie some buttons on their tails, and let on they’re rattlesnakes”: Twain’s Anti-sentimentality and Contemporary African American Satire” and presented by Sheri Marie-Harrison, University of Missouri. 

About The Trouble Begins Lecture Series – In 1984, the Elmira College Center for Mark Twain Studies initiated a lecture series, The Trouble Begins at Eight lecture series. The title came from the handbill advertising Mark Twain’s October 2, 1866 lecture presented at Maguire’s Academy of Music in San Francisco. The first lectures were presented in 1985. By invitation, Mark Twain scholars present lectures in the fall and spring of each year, in the Barn at Quarry Farm or at Peterson Chapel in Cowles Hall on Elmira College’s campus. All lectures are free and open to the public.