Arts & Sciences

Following the Sept. 6 death of James E. McLeod, vice chancellor for students and dean of the College of Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton has announced a transitional leadership plan for the College of Arts & Sciences. Sharon Stahl, PhD, associate vice chancellor for students and dean of the First Year Center, and Wayne Fields, PhD, the Lynne Cooper Harvey Distinguished Professor of English in Arts & Sciences, have agreed to take on the additional responsibilities of leading the College of Arts & Sciences on an interim basis.

Washington University Libraries present a book talk by Michael Sherberg, PhD, associate professor of Italian in Arts & Sciences, at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 5, in Olin Library, Ginkgo Reading Room, Level 1. Sherberg’s lecture — titled “Boethius in the Renaissance: What Recent Acquisitions Teach Us” — will discuss three 16th-century translations of Boethius’s influential 6th-century work, Consolation of Philosophy, and what the translations tell modern scholars about the politics and poetics of translation in the Renaissance.

With its poodle skirts, bouffant hairdos and withering irony, John Waters’ Hairspray (1988) feels almost timeless. It could be set at any point after which the 1950s had ceased to be cool. It is actually set in 1962, the year James Meredith became the first African-American admitted to the University of Mississippi. That historical grounding is at the center of a new staging of Hairspray: The Musical, the 2002 Broadway extravaganza based on Waters’ film, by the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences.

Arts & Sciences starts the fall semester with a new program director and four new departmental chairs, two of whom are heading newly created and reorganized departments.The Department of Asian and Near Eastern Languages and Literatures (ANELL) and the programs in East Asian Studies (EAS) and Jewish and Islamic Studies (JINES) have been reorganized into two full-fledged departments.

A chance encounter with James McLeod by Jazz at Holmes series organizers beneath the Brookings Hall archway in 1998 would lead to the continuation of the popular series, which has become a local instituion in its 13th season. On Oct. 6, Jazz at Holmes will honor McLeod, who died Sept. 6, with a concert by legendary St. Louis saxophonist Freddie Washington.

It is the stuff of campus legend. In 1937, Tennessee Williams took fourth in a playwriting competition at Washington University in St. Louis. So upset was the young writer that he soon left town and later, in The Glass Menagerie, exacted sly artistic revenge upon his alma mater. But on Oct. 7 and 8, Williams will return to Washington University, in the form of two one-man shows by veteran actor and playwright Jeremy Lawrence.

Sidney Outlaw, a rising young American baritone lauded as a “terrific singer” by The New York Times, will join pianist Carol Wong for an intimate Liederabend at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 9, at Washington University in St. Louis. Literally translated as “evening of song,” Liederabend is a German term referring to a recital given by a singer and pianist, particularly of works by 19th-century Austrian or German composers. The performance is presented in conjunction with the American Arts Experience—St. Louis.

James E. McLeod, vice chancellor for students and dean of the College of Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, will be remembered by the university community in a memorial service set for 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 9. McLeod died Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2011, at Barnes-Jewish Hospital of kidney failure after a two-year battle with cancer. He was 67.

Nearly 50 first-year students at Washington University in St. Louis created their own chapter to the novel The Cellist of Sarajevo, as part of the First-Year Reading Program Contest. Five contest winners were treated to lunch with author Steven Galloway, including Juliet Kinder, who won the grand prize and a $250 gift certificate to the Washington University Campus Store.

Three aspiring playwrights will present staged readings of their works Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 as part of the 2011 A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Festival. Nicknamed “The Hotch,” the festival is sponsored by the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences and is named in honor of celebrated alumnus A.E. Hotchner. It consists of an intensive two-week workshop, led this year by nationally known dramaturg Megan Monaghan Revis, which culminates in the staged readings.