Students in the class, titled 鈥淒ragons, Knights and Wardrobes: The Medieval Imagination in J.R.R. Tolkein and C.S. Lewis,鈥� tried their hand at Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA). The class is offered by the English Department of the 91福利社 College of Arts and Sciences and is taught by Dr. Katherine Wyma.听

The swords weren鈥檛 real, but the techniques were true to swordplay in the historical sense. Adjunct faculty member Amy Bright led in the activity, which contained elements of choreography in the form of defensive postures and some fancy footwork.听

Of course,听nobody was hurt.听

Students can explore this and other topics through an interdisciplinary minor in Medieval and Early Modern Studies offered by the 91福利社 College of Arts and Sciences.听

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The conference theme is 鈥淚maginative Reading: Walking into the Wardrobe.鈥�听

According to Dr. Katherine Wyma, conference director and associate professor of English in the 91福利社 College of Arts and Sciences, the conference theme is a nod to the 75th anniversary of the printing of the C.S. Lewis children鈥檚 classic The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.听

Featured conference speakers include New York Times, USA Today and Globe and Mail Bestselling author Patti Callahan Henry, presenting 鈥淭hrough the Wardrobe: The Alchemy of Grief, Imagination and Story. She has published historical fiction works that include Becoming Mrs. Lewis and Once Upon a Wardrobe. The public is invited to hear Henry, who will speak Friday, October 24 at 7 p.m. Details on this ticketed event can be found .听

Conference speakers also include Dr. Rachel Roberts, chair of the English Department at North Greenville University; and Rev. Austin Carty, pastor of Boulevard Baptist Church in Anderson.听

Dr. Roberts, whose academic specialty is early British literature, coauthored the book Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age. Rev. Carty is the author of High Points and Lows: Life, Faith and Figuring it All Out. He also wrote The Pastor鈥檚 Bookshelf: Why Reading Matters for Ministry, which received the 2023 Christianity Today Award of Merit and was named Book of the Year by Preaching Magazine.听听

Dr. Wyma commented that regional meetings take place every October at a different location in the Southeast鈥攗sually CCCU institutions.听

College professors and other scholars have submitted paper proposals to be included among the meeting鈥檚 scholarly presentations.听

Details, including a schedule are available online.听

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A creative writing class Updegraff took in high school sparked his interest initially. When he entered college, Updegraff set his sights on a writing career.听

This fall, Dr. Updegraff is entering his fifth year at Anderson, leading the creative writing program in the English Department of the College of Arts and Sciences.听听

鈥�I’ve been publishing poetry and short stories for many years now and it’s my sixth book, but my first novel,鈥� he said. 鈥淎s a fiction writer, I always kind of saw myself as a short story writer and didn’t really have any aspirations to write a novel. I just loved working in the short story form.鈥�听

The origin of his novel, titled Whole, started out as a short story he planned to include in his second short story collection. As he gave more thought to the story, he felt it needed more space to play out. But in what form? He thought about possibly expanding the story into a Novela at one point.听

Dr. Updegraff continued, 鈥淚 didn’t feel like it was quite done and so I pulled it out of that book and just kept it on the back burner. It’s the only short story I’ve ever worked on where I felt like I couldn’t get to an ending. I needed to spend more time with the characters, so I spent a few more years on it here and there… It just never went away.鈥�听

Described as a complex novel dealing with fable, romance, theology, life, death, love and heartbreak, Whole follows the life of Joe, a young man in his late 20s who lives in the Inland Empire of Southern California and works at a local 肠补蹿茅. Joe is an aimless, somewhat introspective poet who provides a first-person narrative in the story. He is dating Ashley, a writer and a poetry professor at a small Christian College. Distracted by a text from Ashley, Joe inadvertently runs his car into Ronnie, a homeless man on a bicycle. The bike is crushed and the aluminum cans he collected were scattered, but fortunately Ronnie鈥檚 injuries were minor. In the pages of the novel unfolds an unlikely relationship between Joe and Ronnie.听听

Throughout Whole, short vignettes pop up that are written in the third person鈥攎ini short stories within the story鈥攚hat Updegraff refers to as flash fiction pieces.听听

Updegraff explains, 鈥�As the reader keeps reading the book, they’ll figure out that those short pieces were actually written by the narrator, so they give insight into his upbringing, past his psychology. It was really experimental鈥攕hort, bizarre, almost fairytale like little mini stories that pop up throughout the book鈥攖hat was really fun to do.鈥�听

For the novel鈥檚 setting, Updegraff, a native Californian, chose the San Bernadino-Riverside areas.听听

As for Joe and Ashley, Updegraff said, 鈥淧arts of me came out in these characters in the very beginning, but then I want to make it very clear that I allowed them to develop their own identities, and they become people very different from myself.鈥�听

What happens next? Updegraff said there鈥檚 one clear resolution at the ending, but some things are left open at the end.听

鈥淚 think that’s what literary fiction wants to do鈥攊n a sense leave some stuff open for the reader to contribute meaning and predict things without closing every avenue off completely.鈥�听

Since the publication of Whole, Updegraff has started work on another novel. He also plans to publish his third collection of short stories.听

Whole, published in 2024 by , is available at and other major book outlets.听

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