“Comedy, Play, Theory”, Helsinki, June 1– 2, 2026

This year’s workshop of the Research Committee on Literary Theory of the International Comparative Literature Association will take place in Helsinki on 1-2 June 2026. Co-organised by Natalya Bekhta (Tampere University) and Karin Kukkonen (University of Oslo), the workshop is hosted by the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies.

Programme

Monday, 1 June

10.00               Welcome from Hanne Appelqvist (HCAS), Natalya Bekhta & Karin Kukkonen

10.15-11.45   Panel I

Chair: Karin Kukkonen

Anne Duprat (Amiens) Aristotle’s Lost Marble, or: Did Literary Theory Really Miss the Joke?

Davide Giuriato (Zurich) Laughing at/as theory. On the praise of the fly

Ábel Tamás (Budapest) Laughing Signs: Theorising Acrostics and Telestichs

12.00-14.00   Lunch

14.00-15.30   Panel II

Chair: Natalya Bekhta

Karin Kukkonen (Oslo) Choose your game: The Theoretical Potential of Gameplay in the Salons

Enrica Zanin (Strasbourg) Theory at play: What happens to dramatic theory when, instead of commenting on a play to students, we play it with them?

Susanne Strätling (Berlin) Knight’s Move: Formalism at Play with Literary Theory

15.30-15.45   Coffee

15.45-17.15   Panel III

Chair: Karin Kukkonen

Ivana Perica (Berlin) Can the political novel produce a cheerful fart?

Marco Caracciolo (Ghent) Humor and Bad Environmentalism in Nonhuman Narration

Mengchen Lang (Shanghai) Contemporary Hybrid (Non)Fiction: A Playful Exercise of Fictionality Literacy

17.30-18.30   Business meeting

20.15               Dinner

Tuesday, 2 June

Chair: Natalya Bekhta

10.30-12.00   Keynote: Academy Professor Sari Kivistö (Tampere) Gently Biting Sheep: The Ethics of Humour in Early Modern Satirical Poetics

12.00-13.00   Lunch

13.00-14.00   Panel IV

Chair: Karin Kukkonen

Luciana Villas Boas (Rio de Janeiro) Greek Nonsense for Debate. Contemporary Reflections on Thomas More’s Utopia

Natalya Bekhta (Tampere) Utopia for Dark Times