Campus
- Downtown Toronto (St. George)
Fields of Study
- Poetry and Poetics
- Romantic and Victorian Literature
- The Novel
Areas of Interest
- Realism and mimesis
- Philosophical aesthetics;
- The literary tradition
Biography
My research considers the relationship of two pivotal nineteenth-century movements, literary realism and modern philosophical aesthetics. Situating these movements within a broader “story of art” as it unfolds from classical mimesis to postmodern experimentalism, I read across languages and national literatures to engage ongoing conversations about literary realism, aesthetic history, and the philosophical representation of reality. My dissertation argues that, despite the tensions between their competing programmes, in the nineteenth century realism and aesthetics are dialectically linked, converging on representation as an end in itself. Taking a comparativist and interdisciplinary approach, my dissertation shows that realism and aesthetics jointly usher in sweeping changes in novelistic technique and manifest a fundamental reimagination of the purpose of art.
Additional Information
Freelance writer and translator of French to English and English to French