Early Modern Research Group
We have particular expertise in literature from the Renaissance through to early Enlightenment (c.1550-1714), including key areas such as drama and performance; health and well-being; and politics and religion.
This research group involves the School’s early-modern researchers in a programme of papers, occasional conferences, and study groups.
The group provides a forum for staff and postgraduates, principally to share early-stage research. The most recent research programme was around early modern attitudes to the body and health.
It has a well-established interest in literary history of the early modern period, and has hosted international conferences with this focus.
The group meets on average four times a year, fairly informally, often to hear new research from staff and post-graduates, as well as external speakers, and we are always happy to welcome new members too.
Recent activities:
- Invited Talk: Sara Read delivered a paper for the Darwin College Lecture Series (Cambridge): ‘Transitional Bleeding in Early Modern England’
- Research Roundup: Ahead of the launch of the first tranche of Cambridge Edition of the Works of Aphra Behn, Elaine Hobby and Claire Bowditch present a summary of the challenges and joys of editing early modern writing.
- Symposium: 'Honest Labour: Exploring the Interface between Work and Nonconformity' (Loughborough and The International John Bunyan Society).
- Workshop: Exploring ideas relating to Gender and Work in a Postgraduate-led series of workshops
- Coming soon: ‘Early Modern Words’: three-day International Conference (Loughborough and E-Abida)
Recent publications:
- Armstrong, Catherine, American Slavery, American Imperialism US Perceptions of Global Servitude, 1870-1914 (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
- Bakewell, Lyndsey and Sara Read ‘“To Make Fools Laugh, and Women Blush, and Wise Men Ashamed”, in Humour in the Arts: New Perspectives, ed. by Vivienne Westbrook and Shun-liang Chao (Routledge, 2020), pp. 178-201.
- Bowditch, Claire and Elaine Hobby (eds), ‘Aphra Behn at her 350th Anniversary and Some Radical Reimaginings’, Women’s Writing, 27:3 (2020).
- Fitzpatrick, Joan (ed.), Three Sixteenth Century Dietaries: A Critical Edition, Revels Companion Library (Manchester University Press, 2017).
- Gill, Catie, New Critical Studies on Early Quaker Women, co-ed. With Michele Lise Tarter (Oxford University Press, 2018).
- Read, Sara, The Gossips’ Choice (Wild Pressed Books, 2020)
- Wood, Nigel, Shakespeare and Reception Theory (Bloomsbury, 2020)
