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Biography

Before coming to Aberdeen, I studied at Oxford and Princeton and taught at Leeds. My research focusses on the Renaissance reception of classical literature, and particularly how C16th and C17th English poets used classical imitation and allusion to reflect on contemporary events and political issues.

I have published two monographs exploring these questions in relation to the Elizabethan poet Edmund Spenser, the first focussing on his relation to the irreverent love poet and political exile Ovid, and the second (which received the Isabel MacCaffrey Award) on his nuanced and revisionary engagement with the Augustan laureate Virgil—both revealing a radically independent sense of poetry's social role and relation to power. A third monograph explores the use of classical imitation for political ends by royalist poets in the period leading up to the English Civil War. I have also edited interdisciplinary volumes on classical intertextuality and on euhemerism, and published articles on a wide range of Renaissance poets, and several chapters in handbooks from Oxford, Cambridge and Blackwells.

At Aberdeen, I am Director of Research for the School of Language, Literature, Music, and Visual Culture, and co-director of the Herbert Grierson Research Centre. Beyond the University, I am Chair of the Classical Association of Scotland’s Aberdeen and North of Scotland Centre, contributing editor for the online journal Spenser Review, and a member of the editorial board of Spenser Studies. 

I welcome enquiries from students interested in postgraduate research on Renaissance poetry, especially anyone interested in focussing on poetry and politics, or classical imitation and intertextuality.

Research Overview