My Articles
Academic Publications
Articles for a general audience
- “From ‘Namby Pamby’ to ‘Sinister:’ The Kitty Riddle in Emma,” Persuasions Online, JASNA, Dec 2022. Argues that the riddle “Kitty, a Fair and Frozen Maid” is not about venereal disease and prostitution but is a typical Georgian riddle which draws on classical love poetry.
- “Admiral Croft and the Rich Uncle,” Persuasions Online, JASNA, Dec. 2021. Albert, or, the Wilds of Strathnavern, a 1799 novel by Elizabeth Helme, may have supplied the prototype for one of Austen's most beloved characters, and its depiction of amateur theatricals might have inspired Austen's use of Lovers' Vows in Mansfield Park.
Articles for a general audience
- "Commemorating Mary", Quillette magazine online, 18 Nov 2020, discusses the kerfuffle that arose over the Mary Wollstonecraft statue erected in Newington Green.
- “Interrogating Jane,” Quillette magazine online, April 2021. Discusses the kerfuffle that arose when the Jane Austen House Museum planned an “historical interrogation” of the Austen family’s ties to the slave trade and empire. Slavery as a topic in Austen’s novels compared to some other female novelists of the period.
- "The Stanford Rape Hoax," Quillette magazine online, 3 Apr 2023. Stanford has the lowest acceptance rate of any university in North America, that is, over 90 percent of the people who apply there are not accepted. Yet, campus activists suggest that female students are in greater risk of being raped at Stanford than they would be in some war-torn country.
- “Travelling Bridesmaids in England,” Travelling bridesmaids in history and literature from Georgian to Victorian times, with special reference to Mansfield Park. Jane Austen's Regency World, Nov. 2020.
- “A Source for Sanditon?” The Farmer of Inglewood Forest (1796) by Elizabeth Helme contains two plot devices which are remarkably similar to Jane Austen's unfinished 1817 novel Sanditon. Jane Austen's Regency World, Sep 2021.
- “Finding Employment in Mansfield Park,” The possible occupations taken up by the Price cousins and how much it would have cost Sir Thomas Bertram to set them out in the world. Jane Austen's Regency World, May 2021
- “Debates About the Slave Trade in Novels of the Long 18th Century: Beyond the “Dead Silence,” The Historians Magazine, Oct. 2022. Discusses and gives excerpts of two now-obscure 18th century novels in which the characters debate the slave trade.
- "Delightful authors": an early mention of Jane Austen in an 1820 novel. Jane Austen's Regency World, Nov/Dec 2022.
- "Novel First Impressions": examines how Margaret Holford's 1801 forgotten novel may have inspired some plot points in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Jane Austen's Regency World, Jan/Feb 2024.