5 July 2024
Fritz Senn and the International James Joyce Foundation

On 28 June 2024, The Irish Times published two articles about ‘inappropriate behaviour’ and ‘accusations of misogyny and harassment’ in the community of James Joyce scholars. These articles paint a thoroughly distorted picture of the crisis currently gripping Joyce studies. The articles in question quoted a small number of academics, including those known as the originators of a ‘safety’ campaign broadly inspired by the #metoo movement. This campaign, though originally well-intentioned, has riven apart what had traditionally been an exceptionally welcoming, convivial, and nurturing international community. Since 2018, a section of the Joyce world has generated rumours that have resulted in the vilification of a number of fellow Joyceans for offences always nebulously whispered about but never openly declared.

The intimidating atmosphere fostered by this project of suspicion and insinuation has been both upsetting and demoralising. It culminated in the expulsion of Fritz Senn from the Glasgow conference on the grounds that he represented a threat to the safety of a student volunteer (he had offered her chocolate and unwanted compliments, taken her photograph in a crowded place, and asked for her email address). Senn, now 96, and the founder of the Zürich James Joyce Foundation, has been at the fulcrum of the Joyce world for decades, tirelessly shaping and enriching it with his tremendous knowledge of Joyce’s works, his generosity of time and energy, his wisdom, humour, and friendship. The joyous, inclusive, diverse community we knew and loved was largely of his making. He has, by a highly divisive turn of events, become the first victim of these excessive and immoderate accusations. His disciplinary hearing was improvised, expedited, and procedurally deeply flawed. The sanction applied was grossly disproportionate – an attempt to make an example of a central and much-loved figure of the Joyce world. Without wishing to downplay the concerns which led to this situation, the conduct of those acting in the name of ‘safety’ calls for urgent reconsideration. It is time for the community to come together again around its core purpose: the academic study and collegial celebration of one of the greatest, life-affirming authors of all time.

373
signatures
346 verified
  1. Erika Mihálycsa, Associate Professor, Babeș-Bolyai University, Cluj
  2. Serenella Zanotti, Associate Professor, Roma Tre University, Rome
  3. Laura Pelaschiar, Associate Professor, TRIESTE JOYCE SCHOOL, University of Trieste, TRIESTE
  4. Scarlett Baron, Associate Professor, University College London
  5. Paul Devine, Retired, Independent Scholar, Rotterdam
  6. Ilma Rakusa, Writer, translator, Zurich
  7. anonymous
  8. Enrico Terrinoni, Professor, translator, writer, Università per Stranieri di Perugia, Rome
  9. Daniel Ferrer, Director of research emeritus, ITEM-ENS-CNRS, Paris
  10. Ilaria Natali, Associate professor, University of Flore ce, Firenze
  11. Fabio Luppi, Researcher, UNIVERSITÀ ROMA TRE, Rome
  12. Chiara Valcelli, PhD student, UCC, Cork
  13. Ellen Carol Jones, Former Associate Professor, Saint Louis University, Dublin, Ohio
  14. Morris Beja, Professor Emeritus, The Ohio State University, Dublin, Ohio
  15. Caroline Elbay, Adjunct Professor, Champlain College Dublin, Dublin 9
  16. Armağan Ekici, Translator, Amsterdam
  17. Jolanta Wawrzycka, Professor, Radford University, Radford
  18. Massimiliano Bianchi, Founder / President & CEO, Ulysses Neuroscience Ltd, Dublin
  19. Annalisa Federici, Assistant Professor, Roma Tre University, Rome
  20. Ira Torresi, associate professor, University of Bologna, Forli
...
306 more
verified signatures
  1. José A. Alvarez-Amorós, Professor of English, University of Alicante, Alicante
  2. Bahare Aarabi, Lecturer, Tehran
  3. Ricardo Navarrete Franco, Associate Professor, University of Seville, Seville, Spain
  4. Teodora Tzankova, scholar, Sofia University, Sofia
  5. Maria Parrino, Independent scholar, university of venice
  6. Irene De Angelis, Associate Professor of English Literature, University of Turin, Turin
  7. Susan Bazargan, Emerita Professor, Eastern Illinois University, Chicago
  8. Kamilla Voronina, research fellow, University of Bologna, Forli
  9. Arturo Silva, Writer, Vienna
  10. Nicholas Birns, Educatorv, NYU, New York
  11. Guillermina Heredia Campos, Maestra Romera Enseñanza, Universidad de Sevilla, Sevilla
  12. Kari Hukkila, writer, Helsinki
  13. andrea white, Emerita Professor, California State Univ. Dominguez Hills, Encino
  14. Elisabetta TIGANI SAVA, Trieste Joyce SecretarySchool, University of Trieste, TRIESTE
  15. Dora Garcia, artists and teacher, Oslo
  16. Petra R. Lott, Professor, California State University Long Beach, Los Angeles
  17. Yvonne Studer-Wüthrich, Teacher of English, Kantonsschule Hohe Promenade, Zürich
  18. Stefano Rosignoli, Teaching Assistant, Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin, Dublin
  19. Marta Medrzak, Independent scholar, Warsaw
  20. Tanya Hogan, Writer/Journalist, Freelance, Zürich
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