The Glenn Hughes Lectures

In his senior essay, Dick Russell offers an imaginative reconstruction of lectures about how to write a screenplay given by UW Drama professor and poet Glenn Hughes, after whom the Penthouse Theater is named.  In the 1920s he spent time in Europe with poets Richard Aldington, Ezra Pound and H.D. and in his lectures he discusses their importance in his life and their relationships.  As an appendix, Dick offers an example of a screenplay based on these characters and the remarkable similarity in their lives, particularly Aldington and H.D., to Orpheus and Eurydice, Theseus and Ariadne, Jason and Medea and Catullus and Lesbia. What is especially satisfying in this paper is the fact that Dick integrates what he has learned in the Classical Studies program with his own interest in modern poetry.