Degrees

Ph.D. Yale, 1977
B.A. Amherst, 1971

Books

Epic, Oxford, 2008
 

Tennyson and the Doom of Romanticism, Harvard University Press, 1988
 

Browning's Beginnings: The Art of Disclosure, Minnesota, 1981

Edited Works

Writ Large, special issue of NLH, 2018

Song, special issue of NLH, 2015

A New Companion to Victorian Literature and Culture , Wiley-Blackwell, 2014

Victorian Literature 1830-1900, Harcourt College Publishers, 2001

(Edited,with Dorothy Mermin)

Under Criticism: Essays in Honor of William H. Pritchard, Ohio University Press, 1998

Critical Essays on Alfred Lord Tennyson , G. K. Hall & Company , 1993

Digital Projects

For Better for Verse: An Interactive Prosody Tutorial

Articles

• “Gates of Horn in Ivory Towers: On Beauty’s Truth.”  In The Question of the Aesthetic, ed. George Levine, Oxford, 2022.
• “Kingsley’s Muscular Poetics.”  In Charles Kingsley: Faith, Flesh and Fantasy, ed. Jonathan Conlin and J. M. I. Klaver.  Routledge, 2021.
• “Victorian Quakerism: Evangelical Revival, Liberal Renaissance.”  Victorian Review 46 (2021).
• “Balladry in Motion.”  Wordsworth Circle  (2021)
• “Dramatic Monologue.”  In The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Victorian Women’s Writing, ed. Lesa Scholl.  Palgrave, 2019-.
• “Better Yet: Tennyson’s Poetic Revisionism in the Harvard Manuscripts.”  In Poetry in the Making: Creativity and Composition in Victorian Poetic Drafts, ed. Daniel Tyler.  Oxford, 2020.  52-77.
• “Epic.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature. Oxford University Press, 2015–.
• “Afterword: The Well Spoken Hand.”  In Victorian Hands: The Manual Turn in Nineteenth-Century Body Studies, ed. Peter J. Capuano and Sue Zemka. Ohio State University Press, 2020.
• "Formalism." Victorian Literature and Culture  (2018).
• “Verse Visa:  Dickens Adapts Poetry in The Old Curiosity Shop.”  Nineteenth-Century Literature (2018).
• “Changes of Address: Epic Invocation in Anglophone Romanticism.”  In The Call of Classical Literature in the Romantic Age, ed. K. P. Van Anglen and James Engell.  Edinburgh, 2017.
• “Terminal Swinburne.”  Journal of Pre-Raphaelite Studies (2017).
• “After Magic: Modern Charm in History, Theory, and Practice.”  New Literary History (2017).
• “Influence: Tennyson to Wilde.”  In John Keats in Context, ed. Michael O’Neill. Cambridge, 2017.
• “Fretted Lines: Di-versification in Augusta Webster’s Dramatic Monologues.”  Victorian Poetry (2017).
• “Shock Troupers: Browning, Bidart, and the Drama of Prosody.”  Wordsworth Circle (2016).
• “Christina Rossetti’s ‘Echo.’”  In Annette Federico, Engagements with Close Reading.  Routledge, 2016.
• “Victorian(ist) Epistemographies.”  Victorian Studies (2014).
• “Unsettled Scores: Meter and Play in Two Music Poems by Browning.”  Critical Inquiry (2014).
• “The Victorian Problem with Joy.”  Nineteenth-Century Contexts (2013).
• “A Field of Magpies: Disciplinary Emergence as Modus Vivendi in English Studies.”  Modern Language Quarterly (2014).
• “Story.”  In The Oxford Handbook of Victorian Poetry, ed. Matthew Bevis.  Oxford, 2013.
• “The Unappreciated Eliot: Poetry.”  In A Companion to George Eliot, ed. Harry E. Shaw and Amanda Anderson.  Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
• “Shakespearean Being: The Victorian Bard.”  In Oxford Handbook to Shakespeare’s Poetry, ed. Jonathan F. S. Post.  Oxford, 2013.
• “What Goes Around: Swinburne’s Century of Roundels.”  In Algernon Charles Swinburne: Unofficial Laureate, ed. Catherine Maxwell and Stefano Evangelista.  Manchester, 2013.

Reviews

• Tom Mole, What the Victorians Made of Romanticism: Material Artifacts, Cultural Practices, and Reception History.  In Modern Philology (2018).
• Kevin McLaughlin, Poetic Force: Poetry after Kant.  In Victorian Studies (2016).
• Annmarie Drury, Translation as Transformation in Victorian Poetry.  In Translation and Literature (2016).
• Daniel Karlin, The Figure of the Singer.  In Victorian Studies (2016).
• Linda K. Hughes, Victorian Poetry; Valentine Cunningham, Victorian Poetry Now.  In Victorian Studies (2013).
• Gregory Tate, The Poet’s Mind: The Psychology of Victorian Poetry 1830-1870.  In Journal of Victorian Culture (2013).
• Jason D. Hall, ed.,  Meter Matters: Verse Cultures of the Long Nineteenth Century.  In Victorians Institute Journal (2012).
• Christopher M. Keirstead, Victorian Poetry, Europe, and the Challenge of Cosmopolitanism.  In Modern Language Quarterly (2012).
• Peter France and Kenneth Haynes, eds., The Oxford History of Literary Translation in English, vol 4. In Modern Philology (2010).

Lectures

• “Finding Eva Hoffman in Lost in Translation.”  International Association of University Professors of English, Poznan, Poland (July 2019)
• “Good Enough to Eat: Orality and Consumption in Victorian Poetry.” Victorians Institute, Asheville  (November 2018).
• “Unfinishing School:  Victorian Poetics of Imperfection.”  Northeast Victorian Studies Association, Philadelphia (April 2018)
• “Browning Takes Italy In.”  North American Victorian Studies Association, Florence (May 2017).
• “Charms and the Nerd: Dark Arts, High Tech.” School of Literatures, University of Edinburgh (February 2017).
• “Terminal Swinburne.” University of Cambridge. (July 2016).
• “Verse Visa: Dickens Adapts Poetry in The Old Curiosity Shop.”  Dickens Society, Reykjavik  (July 2016).
• “Augusta Webster’s Fretted Lines.” Yale University (May 2016).
• “World of Our World: Microcosm and Form.”  North American Victorian Studies Association, Honolulu (July 2015).
• “Outclassed: Henry Mayhew’s Quixotic Taxonomies.”  North American Victorian Studies Association, London, Ontario (November 2014).
• “At the Doors of Perception: Liminality in Victorian Poetry.” Victorians Institute.  Charlotte (October 2014).
• “Incantatory Yeats: The Charms of Prosody.”  Yeats International Summer School, Sligo, Ireland (July 2014).
• “Evidently:  How Victorian Poems Meant Things.”  North American Victorian Studies Association, Pasadena (October 2013).
• “Balladry in Motion.”  North American Society for the Study of  Romanticism, Boston University.  (August 2013).
• “Panic and Mirth: 1874, Coincidentally.”  Northeast Victorian Studies Association, Boston University (April 2013).
• “Browning, in Charm’s Way.”  Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University (November 2012).
• “Word Magic: Victorian Charm in Theory and Practice.”  Australasian Victorian Studies Association, Brisbane (April 2012).
• “Of Shakespearean Being: The Victorian Bard.”  Department of English, Massey University, New Zealand (April 2012)
• "Marginalia: The Littoral Figure in Victorian Poetry.”  Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand (March 2012).
• “Unsettled Scores: Structure and Play in Browning’s Music Poems.”  University of Liverpool (November 2011).
• “The Ekphrastic Witness in Michael Field’s Sight and Song.”  University of Oxford (October 2011).
• “Compost Happens: A Synthetic Analysis.”  British Association for Victorian Studies, University of Birmingham (September 2011).
• “Perspective, Scale, and Everything: Victorian All in All.” North American Victorian Studies Association, Montréal (November 2010).

Editorial

• Associate Editor, New Literary History, Virginia, 1996-
• Series Editor, Victorian Literature and Culture, Virginia, 1989-

Honors

• College Fellow (Virginia) 2018-2020
• International Senior Research Fellow (Durham University), 2017
• Distinguished Visiting Fellow (Queen Mary University of London), 2017
• American Academy of Arts & Sciences,   2011-
• Fulbright Scholar, 2011-2012
• Fellow, Teaching and Technology Initiative (Virginia), 2008-2009
• Margaret Bundy Scott Visiting Professor (Williams College), 2006
• Donald J. Gray Prize (North American Victorian Studies Association), 2004
• National Humanities Center Fellow, 2000-2001
• Shannon Center for Advanced Studies (University of Virginia) 1986-1988, 1997
• MLA-ACLS Fellow, 1982-1983
• Whiting Fellow, 1976-1977
• Danforth Fellow, 1973-1977