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Our late colleague and former William Morris Society president Jack Walsdorf, whom we lost this past summer, wrote of a past Modern Language Association convention, “This will be a great time for Morris lovers from across the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. to bond in friendship.” Jack’s comment speaks to the WMS’s history of forging relationships and welcoming new members. In addition to coordinating activities with Morris societies worldwide, our annual meeting, which we hold in conjunction with the MLA Convention each year, offers our members many opportunities to meet up with fellow Morrisians.  This year’s convention in New York City promises to be a busy one for WMS members, with all our formal events taking place on Friday, January 5. Our sponsored session this year is on “Objectifying Morris” (3:30-4:45 pm) with the following participants and papers: Rachel Ernst (Boston College), "Materially Relational: William Morris and the Hybrid Literary Object" Florence S. Boos (U

A recent conference at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art in London, " Alma-Tadema: Antiquity at Home and On Screen ," coincided with the appearance of an exhibition of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema's work at Leighton House Museum entitled "Lawrence Alma-Tadema: At Home in Antiquity."  Organized by Peter Trippi, Elizabeth Prettejohn, and Ivo Blom, the exhibition appeared at the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden, The Netherlands (the artist's hometown), followed by the Belvedere in Vienna, and then finally Leighton House Museum.   William Morris (1834-1896) and Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912) were contemporaries, but very little seems to connect them in terms of artistic ideals and interests other than an overlapping circle of friends, including Edward Burne-Jones.   Alma-Tadema was also a founding member of Morris’s Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings, founded in 1877.   Morris wrote to his daughter Jenny on October 17, 1888 about the ela