Prof. Irina Dumitrescu

2009        Ph.D. in English Language and Literature, Yale University

2006        M.Phil. in English and Medieval Studies, Yale University

2006        M.A. in English Language and Literature, Yale University

2003        B.A. (Honors) in English, with Distinction, University of Toronto (Trinity College)

Academic Employment:

2017-present:

• Professor and Head of English Medieval Studies, Institut für Anglistik, Amerikanistik  und Keltologie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
• Department Chair, IAAK (2020-1, 2023-), Deputy Department Chair, IAAK (2021)

2014-2017: Junior Professor of English Medieval Studies, Institut für Anglistik, Amerikanistik und Keltologie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

2012-2014: Alexander von Humboldt Post-Doctoral Fellow, Institut für Englische Philologie, Freie Universität Berlin

2009-2014: Assistant Professor, Department of English, Southern Methodist University

Other Positions Held:

2021-2022: Visiting Public Humanities Fellow, Jackman Humanities Institute, University of Toronto

2020: Visiting Professor, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto

2017-present: Associate Member of Junges Kolleg of the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts

2016-2017: Member of Junges Kolleg of the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts (until tenure)

2008-2009: Exchange Scholar, Department of English and Comparative Literature, Columbia University

2008-2009: Graduate Fellow, Whitney Humanities Center, Yale University

2002-2003: Corbet Fellow, Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies (CRRS), University of Toronto

Monograph

The Experience of Education in Anglo-Saxon Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Edited Journal Issues

Everyday Arts: Craft, Voice, Performance. Special issue of Medieval Feminist Forum, co-edited with Emma Bérat. 57.1 (2021).

In Brief. Special issue of New Literary History 50.3 (2019), co-edited with Bruce Holsinger.

Edited Books

Women in Early Medieval England: A Florilegium. Co-edited with Emily Butler. Under contract at Palgrave. 

Geschlecht macht Herrschaft – Interdisziplinäre Studien zu vormoderner Macht und Herrschaft. Co-edited with Andrea Stieldorf, Linda Dohmen, and Ludwig D. Morenz. Göttingen: Bonn University Press by V&R unipress, 2021.

Relations of Power: Women’s Networks in the Middle Ages. Co-edited with Emma Bérat and Rebecca Hardie. Göttingen: Bonn University Press by V&R unipress, 2021.

The Shapes of Early English Poetry: Style, Form, History. Co-edited with Eric Weiskott. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2019.

Rumba Under Fire: The Arts of Survival from West Point to Kinshasa. Brooklyn: Punctum Books, 2016.

Journal Articles    

“The Martyred Tongue: The Legendaries of Prudentius and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha.” postmedieval 3.8 (2017): 334-351.

“Beautiful Suffering and the Culpable Narrator in Chaucer’s Legend of Good Women.” The Chaucer Review 52.1 (2017): 106-123.

“The Borrower’s Sin in the Middle English ‘Judas’.” Anglia 131.4 (2013): 509–537.

“Bede’s Liberation Philology: Releasing the English Tongue.” PMLA 128.1 (2013): 40-56.

“Violence, Performance and Pedagogy in Ælfric Bata’s Colloquies.” Exemplaria 23.1 (2011): 67-91.

“The Grammar of Pain in Ælfric Bata’s Colloquies.” Forum for Modern Language Studies 45:3 (2009): 239-253. 

Essays in Collections

“Ambivalent Moves: Mary of Egypt, Mary Magdalene, Margery Kempe.” L’œuvre en mouvement de l’Antiquité au xviiie siècle. Eds. Morgan Dickson, Véronique Dominguez-Guillaume, Marie-Laurence Haack, Dominique Paris-Poulain and Philippe Sénéchal. Ausonius Éditions, 2022. 351-361.

“Charismatic Heroines in Chaucer's Legend of Good Women.” Heroinnen und Heldinnen in Geschichte, Kunst und Literatur. Eds. Uwe Baumann, Marc Laureys, and Konrad Vössing. Göttingen: Bonn University Press by V&R unipress, 2022. 357-374.

“Writing Instruction from Late Antiquity to the Twelfth Century.” With Carol Dana Lanham. A Short History of Writing Instruction: From Ancient Greece to Contemporary America. 4th ed. Eds. James J. Murphy and Chris Thaiss. New York: Routledge, 2020.

“Beowulf and Andreas: intimate relations.” Dating Beowulf: Studies in Intimacy. Eds. Erica Weaver and Daniel C. Remein. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2020. 257-278.

“Spoiled and Eaten: Figures of Absorption in Medieval English Poetry.” The Shapes of Early English Poetry: Style, Form, History. Eds. Irina Dumitrescu and Eric Weiskott. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2019. 215-236.

“Peter Abaelards neues Charisma und die Erinnerung an die Asketen der Antike.” Erinnerung. Studien zu Konstruktionen Persistenzen und gesellschaftlichem Wandel. Eds. Christoph Michels, Rozbeh Asmani, Clarissa Blume-Jung. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2018. 241-270.

“Englischsprachige fiktionale Texte muslimischer Autorinnen: Möglichkeiten der Repräsentation.” Migration. Gesellschaftliches Zusammenleben im Wandel. Eds. Anne Friedrichs, Susanne L. Gössl, Elisa Hoven, Andrea U. Steinbicker. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2018. 125-147.

“Literary Multilingualism in Everyday Life: The Case of Early Modern Vulgaria.” Das literarische Leben der Mehrsprachigkeit. Methodische Erkundungen. Eds. Till Dembeck and Anne Uhrmacher. Heidelberg: Winter Verlag, 2016. 95-111.

 “Introduction.” Rumba Under Fire: The Arts of Survival from West Point to Kinshasa. Ed. Irina Dumitrescu, Brooklyn: Punctum Books, 2016. xiii-xxiii.

“Poems in Prison: The Survival Strategies of Romanian Political Prisoners.” Rumba Under Fire: The Arts of Survival from West Point to Kinshasa. Ed. Irina Dumitrescu, Brooklyn: Punctum Books, 2016. 15-30.

“Pas de Philologie: On Playful Appropriation and the Anglo-Saxon Scholar.” Nains et Géants: Actes du Colloque du CESCM le 4 au 8 juillet 2011. Eds. Claude Andrault, Edina Bozoky, and Stephen Morrison. Culture et Société Médiévales, Brepols, 2015. 181-200.

“Verbal dueling.” Dragons in the Sky: English-Speaking Communities at the Close of the Millennia. Eds. Stuart Lee and Patrick W. Conner. Online book at http://users.ox.ac.uk/~stuart/dits/. 2002.

Shorter Pieces

“Slow Teaching with Gawain.” New Chaucer Studies: Pedagogy and Profession 3.1 (2022): 105-110.

“The Demon of Distraction.” With Caleb Smith. Special supplement on “Posts from the Pandemic,” edited by Hank Scotch. Critical Inquiry 47.S2 (2021): S77-S81.

“Mary of Egypt.” Written for Women in Early Medieval England: A Florilegium. Eds. Emily Butler and Irina Dumitrescu.

“Epigram.” New Literary History 50.3 (2019): 375-379.

“Afterword.” With Mary Kate Hurley. Remembering the Present: Generative Uses of England’s Pre-Conquest Past. Eds. Brian O’Camb and Jay Gates. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 289-94.

“Ælfric Bata.” Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain. Eds. Robert Rouse and Siân Echard. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2017. 13-14.

“Solomon and Saturn.” Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain. Eds. Robert Rouse and Siân Echard. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2017. 1738-40.

“About the Cover.” postmedieval 8.3 (2017): 267–269.

“The Practice of Dissent.” postmedieval FORUM. Ed. Holly Crocker. Online forum at http://postmedieval-forum.com/forums/forum-iii-dissent/. 2012.

Reviews

David K. Coley, Death and the Pearl Maiden: Plague, Poetry, England. Columbus, OH: The Ohio State University Press, 2019. The Medieval Review 20.08.09.

Jennifer A. Jordan, Edible Memory: The Lure of Heirloom Tomatoes and Other Forgotten Foods. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. Cultural History 8.2 (2019): 250-51.

Sarah Lynch, Medieval Pedagogical Writings: An Epitome. Leeds, UK: Kismet Press, 2018. The Medieval Review 19.03.10.

Aaron Hostetter, Political Appetites: Food in Medieval English Romance. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2017. Arthuriana 28.3 (2018): 115-6.

Allen J. Frantzen, Food, Eating and Identity in Early Medieval England. Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 2014. Cultural History 5.1 (2016): 105-107. 

Nicholas Orme, ed., English School Exercises, 1420-1530. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2013. Journal of Medieval Latin 25 (2015): 276-279.

László Sándor Chardonnens and Bryan Carella, eds. Secular Learning in Anglo-Saxon England: Exploring the Vernacular. Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi, 2012. Anglia 133.4 (2015): 759-762.

Cindy Ott, Pumpkin: The Curious History of an American Icon, Seattle and London: Univeristy of Washington Press, 2012. Cultural History 3.2 (2014): 200-201.

Memoir

“La un moment dat în rătăcirile noastre călcăm o limită care ne schimbă viața.” Scena9 5 (2022-2033): 76-80.

“Survival Mode.” The London Magazine, April-May 2023.

“I Spent My Life Avoiding Thrills. Then My Son Discovered Roller Coasters.” The Walrus, September 14, 2022.

• Featured on Memoir Monday

“Ziua în care a murit Regina.” (“The Day the Queen Died.”) Scena9, September 13, 2022.

“Modul de supraviețuire.” Scena9 4 (2021): 114-117.

“The Professor.” Longreads, November 17, 2021.

• Featured on Memoir Monday

“Tongue Stuck.” The Rumpus, October 12, 2021.

• Included in The Top 5 Longreads of the Week; featured on Memoir Monday and The Browser.

“Trash.” The Dalhousie Review 101.1 (2021).

“How to Learn Everything: The MasterClass Diaries.” Longreads, August 20, 2020.

• Included in The 25 Most Popular Longreads Exclusives of 2020.

“Someone is Wrong on the Internet: A Study in Pandemic Distraction.” Literary Hub, June 19, 2020.

• Included in The Top 5 Longreads of the Week

“Home truths: A dispatch from Germany.” The Times Literary Supplement, April 24, 2020.

“O limbă lipită de cerul gurii.” Scena9 2 (2019-20): 192-197. 

“Reading Lessons.” How We Read: Tales, Fury, Nothing, Sound. Eds. Kaitlin Heller and Suzanne Conklin Akbari. Brooklyn: Punctum Books, 2019. 1-11.

• Reprinted in adapted form at Longreads, July 22, 2019.
• Listed among the “Notable Essays and Literary Nonfiction of 2019” in The Best American Essays 2020, eds. André Aciman and Robert Atwan.
• The 25 Most Popular Longreads Exclusives of 2019; Vox’s weekly roundup of best writing on books; Arts & Letters Daily’s Articles of Note; BmoreArt’s The Internet is Exploding: 10 Must-Read Articles This Week; Cărturești’s weekly roundup. 

“The Kid Is All Right: In Defense of Picky Eating.” Serious Eats, February 13, 2018.

• Featured in Longreads: “You Don’t Have to Eat It,” by Catherine Cusick.

“An Unreliable Alchemy.” The Marginalia Review of Books, November 10, 2017.

“Swan, Late: The Unexpected Joys of Adult Beginner Ballet.” Longreads, February 7, 2017.

• Listed among the “Notables” of Best American Essays 2018, edited by Hilton Als and Robert Atwan.
• Included in “Essays of the Decade,” on Queen Mob’s Review of the Decade, Queen Mob’s Teahouse, December 28, 2019. 

“The Things We Take, the Things We Leave Behind.” Southwest Review 101.1 (2016): 13-29.

• Winner of a McGinnis-Ritchie Award for nonfiction from the Southwest Review.
• Nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
• Listed among the “Notables” of Best American Essays 2017, edited by Leslie Jamison and Robert Atwan.
• Published in Romanian as “Lucrurile pe care le luăm cu noi, lucrurile pe care le lăsăm în urmă,” translated by Iulia Gorzo, in Scena9, September 30, 2019.

“Dance, Mama.” The Manifest-Station, September 26, 2015.

“My Father and the Wine.” The Yale Review 103.2 (2015): 51-64.

• Reprinted in Wine Reads: A Literary Anthology of Wine Writing, edited by Jay McInerney (2018).
• Reprinted in Best American Essays 2016, edited by Jonathan Franzen and Robert Atwan.
• Nominated for the MFK Fisher Distinguished Writing Award, James Beard Foundation, March 2016.
• Audio version featured in Choice Magazine Listening’s Fall 2015 issue.

“Currywurst.” Petits Propos Culinaires 98 (2013): 71-77.

“Tasting Texas.” Southwest Review 97.1 (2012): 54-62.

• Listed among the “Notable Essays of 2012” in The Best American Essays 2013, edited by Cheryl Strayed and Robert Atwan.

Short Prose and Poetry
“Flesh Catalogue,” “Composition.” Cōnfingō Magazine, Autumn 2022: 57-58. (Poetry)

“Line.” Brevity Magazine 16 (May 2021). (Flash nonfiction)

• Featured on The Humble Essayist, June 2021.

“Improv.” Iberian Connections Glossary. 28 September 2020. (Aphorisms.)

“Shift.” The Enneadecameron. 1 June 2020. (Fiction)

Criticism
“The Norman conquest of the European imagination.” Apollo Magazine, September 2023.

“Flavourless Bacon.” London Review of Books, August 10, 2023.

“Echoes of Eco in his library: A portrait of the writer through his books.” Times Literary Supplement, July 7, 2023.

“How Do Certain Foods Become National Dishes?” New York Times, June 15, 2023.

“More anchorite than athlete: A study of ballet focusing on ‘the women who didn’t make it’.” Times Literary Supplement, March 17, 2023. 

“Christ in Purple Silk.” London Review of Books, March 2, 2023.

“Permission to leave: Opening the books on communist Romania.” Times Literary Supplement, February 17, 2023.

“Excellent women: Female agency in the medieval world.” Times Literary Supplement, November 18, 2022.

“Positivity Is Overrated.” New York Times, October 4, 2022.

“The rest of the iceberg: Three guides to writing personal narrative.” Times Literary Supplement, May 20, 2022.

“Scratch the surface: What psoriasis tells us about social outcasts.” Times Literary Supplement, March 25, 2022.

“Bad Company: A New Novel Strips Away the Veneer of Progressive Rhetoric.” The Walrus, March/April 2022.

“Different words for blue.” Times Literary Supplement, January 7, 2022.

“A Family Shatters Along With Yugoslavia.” New York Times, January 2, 2022.

“Industrious Habits.” New York Review of Books, December 16, 2021.

“Speaking in Tongues.” Times Literary Supplement, October 29, 2021.

“Smell the burn: What is the point of physical exercise?” Times Literary Supplement, September 17, 2021.

“The Beauty of Imperfection.” Los Angeles Review of Books, August 26, 2021.

“A Heroine’s Journey: On Lana Bastaši’s “Catch the Rabbit”.” Los Angeles Review of Books, August 18, 2021.

“Don’t Get Too Comfortable.” New York Review of Books, May 27, 2021.

“When You Roast Your Friends in a Book, and One’s Your Landlord.” The New York Times, May 3, 2021.

“The Flower and the Bee.” London Review of Books, April 22, 2021.

“Let us now tell sad stories.” Times Literary Supplement, March 12, 2021.

“Dudes Without Heirs.” New York Review of Books, December 3, 2020.

“Time travelling in comfort.” Times Literary Supplement, November 27, 2020.

“How to Read Aloud.” London Review of Books, September 10, 2020.

• Recorded for audio by Audm.

“In Praise of Solitude.” Los Angeles Review of Books, June 28, 2020.

“Making My Moan.” London Review of Books, May 7, 2020. 

“Quiet magic: The best ways to cultivate good writing.” The Times Literary Supplement, March 6, 2020. (lead cover story)

“Theater of War.” The New York Times, February 12, 2020. (print)

“Cooking as a profound art.” The Times Literary Supplement, December 20 and 27, 2019.

“Heel turns.” The Times Literary Supplement, September 20, 2019. (lead cover story)

“Door Open for Beauty: On Deborah Tobola’s “Hummingbird in Underworld: Teaching in a Men’s Prison, a Memoir.” Los Angeles Review of Books, August 2, 2019.

• Included in LARB’s Best: Fiction

 “Renaissance Man.” The New York Times, June 2, 2019. (print)

• Published in Spanish as “Memorial de los libros naufragados,” in El Cultural, November 11, 2019.

“Physical, cultural, personal: The demands of dance.” The Times Literary Supplement, February 1, 2019. (lead cover story)

“Hunger Games: Three Memoirs Where Food Takes Center Stage.” The New York Times, January 6, 2019.

“Literature as Lifeline: The Exile in “Call Me Zebra”.” Los Angeles Review of Books, March 18, 2018.

Brief Reviews
“Medieval modernity: Ian Mortimer’s unorthodox argument for the importance of the Middle Ages.” Times Literary Supplement, April 28, 2023.

“Catalogue of flops: Hans Magnus Enzensberger’s CV of failed projects.” Times Literary Supplement, November 11, 2022.

“Melancholy catalogues: Kathryn Schulz's powerful memoir about loss.” Times Literary Supplement, August 5, 2022.

“Out of the bag: Understanding the strange power that animals exercise over people.” Times Literary Supplement, April 22, 2022.

“Look backwards, fly forwards: A woman searches for her father – and herself – in fictional West Africa.” Times Literary Supplement, December 3, 2021.

“Speaking in Tongues: Paul McQuade's startling and casually surreal stories about language.” Times Literary Supplement, October 29, 2021.

“Somewhat cheery: Hersh Dovid Nomberg’s tales of generational guilt and obstructed love.” The Times Literary Supplement, May 21, 2021.

“Rings of Sarajevo: The fears, losses – and successes – that thread through a life in exile.” Times Literary Supplement, March 26, 2021.

“Stifled by cookie-cutters: Lessons in the art – and vocation – of publishing a book.” Times Literary Supplement, February 5, 2021.

“Old love, new tricks: Revisiting a medieval bestseller.” Times Literary Supplement, December 4, 2020.

“Homely ceremonies: Seeking pleasure in harsh circumstances.” Times Literary Supplement, October 30, 2020.

“Dance Macabre.” Times Literary Supplement, May 1, 2020.

“Dance.” Times Literary Supplement, April 17, 2020.

“Electric conversations: Twenty-five writers reflect on the magazines and journals they have enjoyed over the years.” Times Literary Supplement, October 25, 2019.

“Old English.” Times Literary Supplement, January 11, 2019. 

Column
“The Devil’s shortcuts: ChatGPT and moralizing medieval tales.” Times Literary Supplement, October 6, 2023.

“Fame is the spur: When stars lose their reputations.” Times Literary Supplement, September 15, 2023.

“Travelling hopefully: Broadening minds or bad for the soul?” Times Literary Supplement, August 11, 2023.

“Prison language: The difficulties and comforts of mastering a foreign tongue while incarcerated.” Times Literary Supplement, July 14, 2023.

“The cares of office: St Cuthbert’s management strategy.” Times Literary Supplement, June 16, 2023.

“Taking advice: The popular medieval guides to self-help.” Times Literary Supplement, May 19, 2023.

“The sleep of the just: Rest and relaxation in a world that will not wait.” Times Literary Supplement, April 21, 2023.

“Before Bowdler: The long history of strategic rewriting.” Times Literary Supplement, March 24, 2023.

“Shelf life: Judging books by their covers.” Times Literary Supplement, February 24, 2023.

““Fine romances: The problems and pleasures of a genre that’s ‘easy to read but hard to write’.” Times Literary Supplement, January 27, 2023.

“Give generously: What makes a good gift?”  Times Literary Supplement, December 23/30, 2022.

“The need for greed: The other side of gluttony.” Times Literary Supplement, December 2, 2022.

“Screen saver: The pleasure of limits in a limitless age.” Times Literary Supplement, October 28, 2022.

“Eating their words: Physical encounters with books.” Times Literary Supplement, September 30, 2022.

“In the family: Our suffocating desire to heal another person.” Times Literary Supplement, September 2, 2022.

“Signal virtue: The pleasures of a confusing Old English Saint’s Life.” Times Literary Supplement, July 29, 2022.

“A tale of two Alfreds: Burnt cakes and twice-foreign pasts.” Times Literary Supplement, July 1, 2022.

“Old mischief in new guise: Keeping your focus in the age of distraction.” Times Literary Supplement, June 3, 2022.

“The art of improv: Wobbling through life.” Times Literary Supplement, May 6, 2022.

“Plain speaking: How to write well.” Times Literary Supplement, April 8, 2022.

“Burnout culture: A disconnect between expectation and reality.” Times Literary Supplement, March 11, 2022.

“Beyond the girlboss: On the representation of women.” Times Literary Supplement, February 11, 2022.

“Our debt to pleasure: Nurturing delight in a dangerous world.” Times Literary Supplement, January 14, 2022.

Essays
“Why I’m No Longer a Proper Academic.” Creative Critical, 2023.

“Will ChatGPT Kill the Student Essay? Universities Aren’t Ready for the Answer.” The Walrus, March 24, 2023.

“Time for a Long Pause.” The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, July 11, 2022.

“The void that fills the void.” European Review of Books 1, June 2022.

“The Frenzied Folly of Professorial Groupthink.” The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, February 16, 2022.

“Addressing toxic behaviour is in universities’ interest.” Times Higher Education, November 11, 2021.

“Rereading the Revolt.” Public Books, November 5, 2021.

“Queen Kris.” Avidly, October 13, 2021.

“Are you a toxic enabler?” Times Higher Education, September 16, 2021.

“How to Cope With a Fear of Public Writing.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, April 19, 2021.

“Get medieval on your haters: lessons from Beowulf and Chaucer.” Psyche, November 17, 2020.

“Heroism should not be part of the academic job description.” Times Higher Education, October 29, 2020.

“We’re all Jessica Rabbit Now. Self-fashioning for the YouTube generation.” Times Literary Supplement, October 21, 2020.

“Time to Get Over Your Discomfort With Book Marketing.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, October 16, 2020.

“Struggling to exercise upward toxicity? Try toxic hypocrisy.” Times Higher Education, September 16, 2020.

“What Academics Misunderstand About ‘Public Writing’.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, July 2, 2020.

“Ten rules for succeeding in academia through upward toxicity.” Times Higher Education, November 21, 2019. Times Higher Education’s most-read article of 2019.

“‘Bio-Nazis’ Go Green in Germany.” Politico, July 12, 2018.

“Teachers and Students.” Aeon, February 7, 2018.

“Appetite (and iron-clad stomach) for success. The art of stuffing yourself while chancellor.” Politico Europe, June 17, 2017.

“The Curious Appeal of ‘Bad’ Food.” The Atlantic, August 5, 2016.

“‘Frivolous’ Humanities Helped Prisoners Survive in Communist Romania.” Zócalo Public Square, May 25, 2016. 

In: Rumba Under Fire: The Arts of Survival from West Point to Kinshasa, ed. Irina Dumitrescu, Brooklyn: Punctum Books, 2016.

• “War and the Food of Dreams: An Interview with Cara De Silva.” 53-77.
• “Terpsichore.” 197-199.

“Why ‘that’ photo mattered this time: Our children could be on that beach, too.” On Parenting for the Washington Post, September 8, 2015.

“On the Future of Old English.” Guest post at In the Middle, January 2014.

“The School’s Embrace.” This Book is a Class Room, eds. Lucie Kolb and Romy Rüegger. Berlin: Passenger Books and HIT, 2012. 43-44.

“Hidden Treasures at the Met Museum.” Guest post at In the Middle, July 2009.

Short Pieces & Forum Contributions
“How to be happy in academia.” Times Higher Education, September 28, 2023.

“Longing + debt.”  European Review of Books 2, December 2022.

“What is the happiest academic career stage?” Times Higher Education, July 21, 2022.

“A tropical atoll lies in prospect: Twenty TLS writers share their summer reading.” Times Literary Supplement, June 24, 2022.

“My worst teaching moment – and what it taught me.” Times Higher Education, March 3, 2022.

“Are you ready for the return to in-person teaching?” Times Higher Education, September 16, 2021.

“Moving mountains: the reforms that would push academia to new heights.” Times Higher Education, February 18, 2021.

“Life in the Zoomiverse: What we miss about the physical campus.” Times Higher Education, April 30, 2020.

“Should you be working 100 hours a week?” Times Higher Education, February 20, 2020.

• Longreads Best of 2018: Food Writing, December 2018.
• Zócalo Public Square’s Summer Book List, May 30, 2017.

“A Place of Absence, Loss, and Transcendence.” Zócalo Public Square, September 29, 2016.

Undergraduate Courses

• Introduction to Medieval English Literature
• Violence in Medieval English Literature
• The Medieval Love Poem
• Old English
• Medieval English Drama
• Old English Riddles
• Food and Eating in Medieval Literature
• How to Eat in the Middle Ages
• Short Readings in Old English
• Trying to be Perfect in the Middle Ages
• Middle English Lyrics
• Old English Poetry in Contemporary Translation
• Beauty, Love and Wonder in Middle English Romance (
• Kolloquium: Writing Workshop
• Old English Poetry (Then and Now)
• Beowulf and Its Afterlives

Graduate Courses

• Plenum Mittelalterstudien: Liebe und Erotik im Mittelalter
• Blockseminar Mittelalterstudien: Food & Culture
• Sex and Gender in Medieval England
• Heroines and Heroes in Medieval English Literature
• Middle English Dream Visions
  Medieval Romance: Adventure and Sanctity 
• Bede: Poet, Historian, Teacher
• English Hagiography
• Troilus and Criseyde and their Afterlives
• Fame and Celebrity in the Middle Ages
• The Culture of Food in Middle English Writing
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
• Chaucer’s Dream Visions
• Women’s Writing in Medieval England

Keynotes and Named Lectures

“Medieval Divas: The Medieval Prehistory of Celebrity.” Keynote, Texas Medieval Association 33rd Annual Conference, Dallas, TX. 23 September 2023.

“Beowulf, She Wrote.” Stephan Grundy Lecture, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX. 21 September 2023.

“The Perfect Wound.” CBC JHI Annual Lecture, Jackman Humanities Centre, University of Toronto. 4 May 2022.

Public Lectures

Public Medievalism: A Conversation with David Perry and Irina Dumitrescu, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto, 5 April 2022.

Part of “Cooking by the Book: A Conversation with Chefs and Writers.” Opening panel of Food and the Book: 1300-1800 conference, Newberry Library and Folger Institute, 2 October 2020.

“Relations of Power in Medieval Female Networks.” With Rebecca Hardie. Dies Academicus, University of Bonn, 4 December 2019.

“Englischsprachige fiktionale Texte muslimischer Autorinnen. Möglichkeiten der Repräsentation.” Plurale Gesellschaft? — Wirkungen von Flucht und Migration. Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfälische Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Künste, 13 April 2018.

Literary Readings

“Margery Kempe – Who is She and What is She to You.” With Daniel Tiffany. Hopscotch Reading Room, Berlin, 16 July 2019.

“Food Matters.” Kelly Writers House, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 27 February 2018.

“The Dark Side of Food Writing.” Ohio University, 6 October 2016.

Craft Talks and Workshops (last 5 years)

“Introduction to Public Writing.” Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX. 22 September 2023.

“Cultivating a Relationship with Yourself as a Writer.” Iberian Nights, Yale University, 20 September 2023.

“Writing for a General Audience.” Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, December 15, 2022.

“Introduction to Public Writing.” Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, November 17, 2022.

“Writing Historical Women.” Panel with Ruby Lal, Irina Dumitrescu, and Alison Keith, Jackman Humanities Centre, University of Toronto. 10 February 2022.

“Craft Matters.” Conversation with Ruby Lal, Jackman Humanities Centre, University of Toronto. 8 February 2022.

Participant in “Writing Outside the Academy” roundtable, 7 January 2021, online.

Conversation with the “Renaissance Bootcamp” class at Yale NUS (online), University Town, Singapore, 13 July 2020.

“Public Writing for Beginners.” Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, 25 February 2020; Cornell University, 5 March 2020.

Invited Lectures and Presentations (last 5 years)

“Reading Beowulf and Gawain as a Writer: Reflections on Creative Practice as Research Method.” International Society for the Study of Early Medieval England Virtual Seminar, 9 June 2023.

“Binders Full of Women: Chaucer and the Failures of the Archive.” Translation and the Archive: Performance, Practice, Negotiation International Symposium, Heinrich Heine Universität Düsseldorf, 31 May – 2 June, 2023.

“Olympic Exertions: Early Medieval Riddles as Training for Scriptural Interpretation.” L’Attention et la distraction dans la culture médiévale, University of Poitiers, 2 December 2022.

“The Wife of Bath.” Workshop talk with the enclosures working group (on zoom), 6 July 2021.

“Hard Feelings in Medieval Pedagogy.” Cambridge University (on zoom), 25 November 2020.

“Classroom Performance.” Workshop at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, 10 March 2020.

“The Prehistory of Celebrity.” Cornell University, 5 March 2020.

“Charisma and the Saints.” Workshop at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, 11 February 2020.

“Charisma in Motion: Mary of Egypt, Mary Magdalene, Margery Kempe.” The “Exceptional Selves” Lab, Tel Aviv University, 31 December 2018.

“Charismatic Performances in Medieval Literature.” Contextualizing the Self Workshop, Tel Aviv University, 25 December 2018.

“Imperfect Women: Reflections on Charisma and Power.” Connecticut College, New London, CT, 6 March 2018.

“Charismatic Strategies in Medieval Literature.” Yale University, New Haven, CT, 5 March 2018.

“The Riddle of the Old English Andreas.” University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 27 February 2018.

Conference Presentations (last 5 years)

“Medieval Divas: Between Passion and Power.” 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI, 11-13 May, 2023.

Participant in Roundtable on “Marie de France in Popular Culture II: Marie and Lauren Groff’s Matrix,” 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI, 11-13 May, 2023.

Participant in Roundtable, “The Canterbury Fails, Live and in Person.” 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI, 11-13 May, 2023.

“Feeling Out Loud: Voice and Emotion in Premodern Schoolbooks.” Crossing Cultures, Crossing Periods: A Performance Studies Laboratory, University of Bonn, 17-19 January 2019.

“Mixed Moves and Sinful Women.” L’Œuvre en mouvement de l’Antiquité au XVIIIe siècle, Université de Picardie Jules Verne, Amiens, France, 7-8 June 2018.

“The Performance of Emotions in Donatus’ Commentary on Terence.” Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, 1-3 March, 2018.

Selected

2019

• Seed grant, “Kooperationen mit Wissenschaftler*innen in den Schwerpunktländern für die internationale Zusammenarbeit”, University of Bonn

2017                              

• Judge for the nonfiction category for Sonora Review's 2017 writing contest.
• One-year stipend from the University of Bonn’s Maria von Linden-Förderprogramm.

2016-2020                        

• “Weibliches Charisma. Figurationen von Macht und Herrschaft in England und Frankreich (700 - 1500),” sub-project in SFB 1167 “Macht und Herrschaft – Vormoderne Ordnungen in transkultureller Perspektive.”

2015                              

• Member of Junges Kolleg of the North Rhine-Westphalian Academy of Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts

2012                              

• Humboldt Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation

2009                              

• James A. Veech Prize for best dissertation, Yale English Department

2008                              

• Whiting Fellowship in the Humanities

Primary content producer

“Close Readings Plus: Medieval Beginnings” 12 podcast series, developed and presented with Mary Wellesley for the London Review of Books, in 2023:

• Middle English Lyrics
• Troilus and Criseyde
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
• Havelok the Dane
• Le Roman de Silence
• The Lais of Marie de France
• The Ancrene Wisse
• Bede’s Life of Cuthbert
• Letters and Laments
• Beowulf

“Chaucer’s Ovid” with Thomas Jones, London Review of Books, 2023.

“Perfectionism: A Medieval and Modern Malady.” CBC Ideas, May 13, 2022.

“Encounters with Medieval Women” 4 podcast series, developed and presented with Mary Wellesley for the London Review of Books:

• “Firebrand” on Margery Kempe
• “Storyteller” on the Wife of Bath
• “Anchoress” on Julian of Norwich
• “Repentant Sinner” on Saint Mary of Egypt (re-aired on CBC Ideas)

Media Appearances

“Don’t Sweat It.” Times Literary Supplement podcast, 15 September 2021.

“Abbess, Editor, CEO.” London Review of Books podcast, 20 April 2021.

“Alles neu macht der Corona-Mai.” Interview with Lightmedium, 22 May 2020.

“Eskapismus als Überlebensstrategie.” Interview with Deutschlandfunk’s Aus Kultur- und Sozialwissenschaften, 14 May 2020.

“Godzilla, the plague, etc.” Times Literary Supplement podcast, 23 April 2020.

“Reading During Crisis.” The Spouter-Inn podcast, 3 April 2020.

“Absolutely worth the hype.” Times Literary Supplement podcast, 4 March 2020.

“Irina Dumitrescu on Food Writing.” The Spouter-Inn podcast, 18 November 2019.

“The recipe for superstardom.” Times Literary Supplement podcast, 19 September 2019.

“Netzwerke von Frauen in der Geschichte.” Interview with Deutschlandfunk’s Aus Kultur- und Sozialwissenschaften, 31 May 2018.

Bonn’s cherry blossom boom on The Globalist, 26 April 2018.

Bonner Mittelalterzentrum

Macht und Herrschaft. Bonner Zentrum für vormoderne Ordnungen und ihre Kommunikationsformen

TRA Present Pasts

Associated member of the Junges Kolleg of the Nordrhein-Westfälische Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Künste

New Chaucer Society

Deutscher Hochschulverband

Deutscher Anglistenverband

International Society for the Study of Early Medieval England