Assistant Professor, English
Ph.D. English, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Email: bburk1@uis.edu
Phone: (217) 206-6779

Teaching Interests: American Literature 1865-1915 with emphasis on the novel, postmodern fiction, Midwestern literature, and American women writers.

Courses: Graduate seminars in Postmodern Fiction, Writers of The New Yorker, and Mark Twain; American Novel 1865-1915; Contemporary American Novel; American Short Story; Midwestern Literature.

Papers:

Modern Language Association Convention:

• “Nabokov and The New Yorker: The Letters of Vladimir Nabokov and William Maxwell”
• “Langston Hughes’ Blues Lyrics and the Songs of Bessie Smith”

Midwest Modern Language Association:

• “‘The Natural History of Home’: William Maxwell’s Midwestern Town in Time Will Darken It”
• “Chicago, the Midwest and the World Beyond in William Maxwell’s The Folded Leaf”

College English Association:

• “‘The Saving Grace of Unimportance’: William Maxwell’s Early-Century Prairiescape.”

Conference of the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature:

• “The Blues Woman In Langston Hughes’ Not Without Laughter”
• “All the Days and Nights: The Short Fiction of William Maxwell”
• “The Midwesterner Abroad: William Maxwell’s The Chateau”
• “Memory and Metafiction in William Maxwell’s So Long, See You Tomorrow”

Publications:

• A Kind of Bliss: The Writing Life of William Maxwell. University of Illinois Press, 2004. critical acclaim
• “Eliza Farnham,” “Langston Hughes,” “William Maxwell,” “Carl Van Vechten.” The Dictionary of Midwestern Literature. Indiana University Press. 2001.
• “The Blues Woman in Langston Hughes’ Not Without Laughter.” MidAmerica. XXIII (1996). Midwestern Press. The Center for the Study of Midwestern Literature and Culture. East Lansing, Michigan.
• “Behind the Writer’s Window: Visiting with William Maxwell.” Tamaqua. 3.2 (Fall 1992); 71-87. Reviews in The San Francisco Chronicle, Illinois Issues, Illinois Times, The James Jones Newsletter.