Biography
Before taking up the Lectureship at Keele in September 2016 I was Research Associate on the Dorothy Richardson Scholarly Editions Project, editing the collected letters and complete fiction of the modernist writer Dorothy Richardson for publication with OUP. I am co-founder of the May Sinclair Society and General Editor on the forthcoming Edinburgh Critical Editions of the Works of May Sinclair, which will publish Sinclair's complete prose writings. My monograph, Literary Impressionism: Vision and Memory in Dorothy Richardson, Ford Madox Ford, H.D. and May Sinclair was published by Bloomsbury in September 2016.This book charts the modernist crisis of vision, and the way the literary impressionists Richardson, Ford, H.D., and Sinclair used new concepts of memory in order to bridge the gap between perception and representation. I am interested in all aspects of modernism, modernist aesthetics and modernist interdisciplinary historicism, and would welcome PhD proposals in these areas.
Research and scholarship
I am co-founder of the May Sinclair Society, and I run the Society's website, which is a resource for modernist scholars and fans of Sinclair more generally - http://www.maysinclairsociety.com
I am a textual editor and am interested in the reception history of modernist texts, the material culture of books and their physicality, and the exigencies of editing modernist texts. I am an invited member of the New Modernist Editing network and General Editor on the forthcoming Edinburgh Critical Editions of the Works of May Sinclair, which will publish Sinclair’s fiction and her philosophy and non-fiction in themed ‘tranches’: philosophy and mysticism, psychology and genius, women, war and feminism, and social realism and social satire.
My interest in interdisciplinary modernism extends to the work of Ford Madox Ford, H.D., Bryher and Dorothy Richardson. I am interested in the networks between these writers and the ways they responded to their reading in contemporary issues: politics, philosophy and art. I am also conducting research into food and diet reform in modernist literature and the early-twentieth century fascination with physical culture and 'fit'/'fit for purpose' bodies.
Teaching
I teach on the modules Gothic Nightmares, Transatlantic Modernisms, Modernist Manifestos and Magazines, and Thresholds: Young Adult Fiction, as well as one-off lectures for Reading Literature, Texts and Contexts, Literature and Society.
I convene the two MA (and research training) modules Research Skills in the Humanities and Reflective Practice in the Humanities.
Selected Publications
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May Sinclair and the Brontë myth: rewilding and dissocializing Charlotte. Feminist Modernist Studies, 1-17. doi> link> full text>
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The ‘Fountain of Consciousness Novel’: Dorothy Richardson, Henri Bergson, Gustav Geley. In Literature and Modern Time. Palgrave Macmillan. doi>2020.
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One Hundred Years of the Stream of Consciousness: Editors’ Introduction. Literature Compass. doi> link> full text>
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Literary Impressionism Vision and Memory in Dorothy Richardson, Ford Madox Ford, H.D. and May Sinclair. Bloomsbury Publishing.2016.
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Comfort Food and Respectability Politics in Claude McKay’s Home to Harlem and Banjo: A Story Without a Plot. Modernism/Modernity. full text>
Full Publications Listshow
Books
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Bowler RM (Ed.). 2016. May Sinclair: Re-Thinking Bodies and Minds. Edinburgh University Press.
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Bowler RM (Ed.). 2016. May Sinclair: Re-Thinking Bodies and Minds. Edinburgh University Press.
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Literary Impressionism Vision and Memory in Dorothy Richardson, Ford Madox Ford, H.D. and May Sinclair. Bloomsbury Publishing.2016.
Journal Articles
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Comfort Food and Respectability Politics in Claude McKay’s Home to Harlem and Banjo: A Story Without a Plot. Modernism/Modernity. full text>
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May Sinclair and the Brontë myth: rewilding and dissocializing Charlotte. Feminist Modernist Studies, 1-17. doi> link> full text>
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One Hundred Years of the Stream of Consciousness: Editors’ Introduction. Literature Compass. doi> link> full text>
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Review: Feasts and Fasts: Towards a Modernist Food Studies. Modernism/modernity, 399-405, vol. 27(2). link> full text>2020.
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The Dental Record, Miscellany and the Mediator as Crank. Pilgrimages : A Journal of Dorothy Richardson Studies. link> full text>2020.
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‘The Cast of Backwater: A Biographical Note’. Pilgrimages: The Journal of Dorothy Richardson Studies.2015.
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‘“I wish I had a really stunning dress”: Fashion, Poverty, and Performance in Dorothy Richardson’s Pilgrimage’. Pilgrimages: The Journal of Dorothy Richardson Studies. full text>2015.
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‘“The beauty of your line – the life behind it”: Katherine Mansfield and the Double Impression’. Katherine Mansfield Studies, vol. 3(1). doi> full text>2011.
Chapters
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The ‘Fountain of Consciousness Novel’: Dorothy Richardson, Henri Bergson, Gustav Geley. In Literature and Modern Time. Palgrave Macmillan. doi>2020.
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‘May Sinclair and Physical Culture: Fit Greeks and Flabby Victorians’. In May Sinclair: Rethinking Bodies and Minds. Bowler R and Drewery C (Eds.). Edinburgh University Press.2016.
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‘May Sinclair and Physical Culture: Fit Greeks and Flabby Victorians’. In May Sinclair: Rethinking Bodies and Minds. Bowler R and Drewery C (Eds.). Edinburgh University Press.2016.
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Wet Aesthetics: Immersion versus the 'perfect imbecility' of the stream in Dorothy Richardson's Pilgrimage. In Reconnecting Aestheticism and Modernism Continuities, Revisions, Speculations. Routledge.2016.
- 2016.
- 2015.
Other
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‘“Stream of Consciousness”, Drama and Reality: What is really going on in May Sinclair’s review of Dorothy Richardson’s Pilgrimage?’.2012.
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‘Biography: May Sinclair, 1863-1946’.2012.
School of Humanities
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Head of School
Dr Nick Seager
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Email: n.p.seager@keele.ac.uk
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