Distinguished Lecture Series 2025-26: Workshop by Prof. Matthew Reynolds

Workshop: Constraints as a Route to Creativity with GenAI (and In General)

Speaker: Matthew Reynolds, Professor of English and Comparative Criticism, University of Oxford

March 20, 2026 (Fri), 4:00 PM – 5:30 PM

Seminar Room, Room 7.45, 7/F, Run Run Shaw Tower, Centennial Campus, HKU (Location Map)

Abstract:
Verse form, narrative voice, Oulipian lipograms – all are constraints which release creativity through the paradoxical act of confining it. What happens if we impose these or similar constraints on Large Language Models (LLMs)? - and how might this stimulate our own creativity, in translating/versioning and/or in single-author writing? Please bring a device with which to connect to an LLM, a text or idea you would like to work with, and a readiness to explore and share.

Biography:
Matthew Reynolds is Professor of English and Comparative Criticism at Oxford, where he founded and chairs the Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation Research Centre (OCCT) and the associated Masters in Comparative Literature and Critical Translation. Some of his books are: the open access Prismatic Jane Eyre: Close-Reading a World Novel Across Languages (2023) which includes interactive digital elements; Prismatic Translation (2019); Translation: A Very Short Introduction (2016); The Poetry of Translation: From Chaucer & Petrarch to Homer & Logue (2011); Likenesses (2013); The Realms of Verse (2001); and the novels Designs for a Happy Home (2009) and The World Was All Before Them (2013). He is currently leading a collaborative research investigation into 'AI, Decoloniality and Creative Poetry Translation' and developing an app to support creative, ethically reflective translation through language(s) in dialogue with AI tools.

Registration required. Register Now!

If registration quota via Enventbrite is full, please register through the link below.

https://english.hku.hk/event/573/Professor_Matthew_Reynolds_-_Workshop:_Constraints_as_a_Route_to_Creativity_with_GenAI_(and_In_General)

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

Get App

Host or Publisher HKU School of English