The A. Owen Aldridge Prize
An Annual Paper Competition for Graduate Students 

The ACLA and the journal Comparative Literature Studies, published at Pennsylvania State University, cosponsor a competition for graduate student articles on any comparative literary topic. The winning article will be published in CLS and carries a monetary prize. In the past few years, the journal together with the ACLA have also provided financial support for winners to present their work and receive the prize in person at the annual convention (which in 2009 will take place at Harvard University).

The competition is named in honor of A. Owen Aldridge, founder of CLS, a quarterly dedicated to all topics of interest to the study of comparative literature. The purpose of this competition is to encourage and recognize excellence in scholarship among graduate students and to reward the highest achievement by publication.

Graduate students in a comparative literature department or program are encouraged to submit a polished paper in English, approximately 15 -20 pages long (double-spaced), preferably following Chicago endnote style (MLA-style papers will be accepted, but, must be converted for publication) and prepared for anonymous evaluation. Further information on the Aldridge prize may be found on the Comparative Literature Studies' Aldridge prize competition page.

Congratulations to the winner of the 2008 A. Owen Aldridge prize:

Ning Ma (Princeton University), for her essay, "When Robinson Crusoe Meets Ximen Qing: Material Egoism in the First Chinese and English Novels" (CITATION)

The winning essay is determined by a panel of judges that is selected annually by the ACLA. The prize committee for 2008-09 will be announced shortly.

Guidelines:
1. Any graduate student currently enrolled in an M.A. or Ph.D. program in comparative literature in the U.S. may submit one paper annually.
 
2. Papers may be on any comparative topic. They should be scholarly articles – on literary research, theory, criticism – not (for example) interviews, translations, or editions of texts.
 
3. Papers should be of normal length for journal submission. An approximate length from 6000 to 10000 words, typed and double-spaced, is suggested, although papers somewhat longer will also be considered. Submissions must be in final form: no preliminary versions, inquiries, or proposals are to be sent. Papers should be written in English, and if possible follow the CLS format for documentation (the "endnote" style of Chicago Manual of Style).
 
4. Papers should be prepared for anonymous evaluation. A separate cover sheet should give the paper's title, author's name, author's academic address, and the statement, "The student named above is presently enrolled in a program of study leading to a graduate degree in comparative literature," signed by the chair of the student's graduate department or program. The first page of the paper itself should include the title of the work, but not the author's name.
 
5. Papers must be submitted in four (4) copies.
 
6. All papers received by the deadline will be sent to the chair of the ACLA Aldridge Prize Committee. After consultation with subject-matter experts, that committee will recommend the winner; in case of an unclear decision, the committee will seek advice from other members of the ACLA Advisory Board.
 
7. The winning paper must conform to CLS standards and will be copyedited and subject to editorial recommendations as other CLS materials are. The intention of CLS is to publish the winning paper within twelve months. A note will indicate that the paper is the winner of the Aldridge competition and that it has been selected by the ACLA and CLS.

DEADLINE FOR RECEIPT OF SUBMISSIONS for the 2009 Aldridge Prize: November 15, 2008

Send submissions to:
Thomas Beebee, Editor-in-Chief
Comparative Literature Studies
311 N Burrowes Building
University Park, PA 16802

Previous Aldridge winners:

• Tobias Boes (Yale University), for "Apprenticeship of the Novel: The Bildungsroman and the Invention of History, ca. 1770-1820" (2007). (CITATION)
• Michael Allan (University of California - Berkeley), for "Reading With One Eye, Speaking With One Tongue – On the Problem of Address in World Literature" (2006). (CITATION)
• Katherine Mannheimer (Yale University), for "To the Letter: The Material Text as Space of Adjudication in Pope's First Satire of the Second Book of Horace" (2005). (CITATION)
• Mariano Siskind (New York University), for "Captain Cook and the Discovery of Antarctica’s Modern Specificity: Towards a Critique of Globalization" (2004). (CITATION)
• James Ramey (University of California - Berkeley), for "Parasitism and Pale Fire's Camouflage: The King-Bot, the Crown Jewels and the Man in the Brown Mackintosh" (2003).
• Andrea Bachner (Harvard University), for "Anagrams in Psychoanalysis: Retroping Concepts by Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, and Jean-Francois Lyotard" (2002).
• Kate Elkins (University of California - Berkeley), for "Stalled Flight: Baudelaire's Rewriting of Horace's Memorial Swan" (2001).
• Daniel Simon (University of Oklahoma), for "Translating Ruskin: Marcel Proust's Orient of Devotion" (2000).
• Robert Herbert Doran (Stanford University), for "Nietzsche: Utility, Aesthetics and History" (1999).
• Théresè Migraine-George (University of Colorado - Boulder), for "Specular Desires: Orpheus and Pygmalion as Aesthetic Paradigms in Petrarch's Rime sparse" (1998).
• Mary Frances Fahey (University of California - Davis), for "Allegorical Dismemberment and Rescue in Book III of The Faerie Queene" (1997).
• Nicholas Rennie (Yale University), for "Benjamin and Zola: Narrative, the Individual, and Crowds in an Age of Mass Production" (1996).  
• David Porter (Stanford University), for "Writing China: Legitimacy and Representation 1606-1773" (1995).
• Bradley Butterfield (University of Oregon), for "Enlightenment’s Other in Patrick Süskind’s Das Parfüm: Adorno and the Ineffable Utopia of Modern Art" (1994).
• Liang Shi (University of Massachusetts), for "The Leopardskin of Dao and the Icon of Truth: Natural Birth Versus Mimesis in Chinese and Western Literary Theories" (1993). 
• Hongchu Fu (UCLA), for "Deconstruction and Taoism: Comparisons Reconsidered" (1991) .
• Lynne S. Vieth, (University of Illinois - Chicago), for "Socrates as Untragic Hero: Satyric Pedagogy in Modern European Narrative" (1990).
• Aris Fioretos (Yale University), for "Nothing: Reading Paul Celan’s ‘Engführung’" (1989).
• Edward S. Brinkley (Cornell University), for "Proustian Time and Modern Drama: Beckett, Brecht, and Fugard" (1988).