In the international realm, 1759 represented the turning point in the Seven Years' War and a watershed moment in Britain's drive for colonial dominance over France, with British military and naval victories making national heroes of men such as Pitt the Elder, General Wolfe and (to a lesser extent) Admiral Hawke. In literature, 1759 also saw the publication of 3 canonical novels of ideas: Voltaire's 'Candide', Samuel Johnson's 'The Prince of Abissinia' (later 'Rasselas'), and the first two volumes of Laurence Sterne's 'Tristram Shandy'. In the arenas of moral philosophy and aesthetic theory, Adam Smith outlined a rational model of sympathy in the first edition of 'The Theory of Moral Sentiments', while Edward Young published his 'Conjectures on Original Composition', Alexander Gerard an 'Essay on Taste', and Edmund Burke the second edition of 'A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful', with its important new introduction on 'taste'. Elsewhere in culture and commerce, 1759 also saw the opening to the public of the British Museum; John Harrison's completion of chronometer Number 4 (the eventual Board of Longitude prize-winner); the formal suppression of the 'Encyclopédie'; the deaths of Handel and William Collins; and the founding in Dublin of the St James' brewery, by Arthur Guinness.

The '1759' conference will enable discussion of all of these topics and anniversaries, and of the possible relationships between them. As we shall ask: if 1759 was a key year not just in political and military terms but also in literature, culture and thought, what are the links between these events and achievements, and how can we account - historically, culturally and theoretically - for their concurrence at this specific moment? More broadly, we shall hope to explore the 1750s as an understudied decade in the field of culture (as for instance in the history of the novel), and the national and political repercussions of the events of 1759, both within the Seven Years' War and beyond (for instance in Ireland and in relation to Jacobitism). In the spirit of the period itself, the conference will also encourage more general enquiry into the relationships between history, literature, philosophy and culture, along with self-reflexive debate about the academic 'anniversary' industry and the merits, and limitations, of focusing on a single year in history.

300-word proposals are invited, for 20-minute papers.

The deadline for submission is 31 July 2008. Proposals should be emailed to the conference organiser: Dr Shaun Regan, School of English, Queen's University, Belfast (s.regan@qub.ac.uk).

Further Information
For further information and a conference flyer, please see the Centre's website: http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/CentreforEighteenthCenturyStudies/