I have just read my whole book. Which means I have a whole book. (still awful notes). Not QUITE ready to submit the MS by Easter as I had hoped (see above re: notes), but I'm pretty pleased!!!
*adds Bluey to acknowledgements*
Three working days til Easter hols. Only the intro to draft: just need to turn about 5000 words of notes into prose then the WHOLE THING will exist as a document. School drop off. Deal with Monday am emails. Settle down to write. 11am, phone rings. School. 4 y.o. has suspected ear infection. Noooo.
I have 76,000 words in 6 chapters which I have now reworked into something vaguely coherent following the reading of AMAZING colleagues, and though I still have to write a conclusion and introduction, and there are (MANY HORRENDOUS) notes to sort out, I finally feel as if this is actually A Book.
This project has been VERY slow due to the busy lives of the editing team, BUT we just put it all into one document so we're *so* nearly there and it's going to be FAB!!!!
Am really excited to be a part of this festival at @oxhumanities.bsky.social in June. www.schwarzmancentre.ox.ac.uk/theme/past-p...
That would be brilliant, thank you!
OMG I would have loved to hear this but I'll be ferrying children around. Are you/have you published on this?!
Out of office - for annual leave, then SABBATICAL - now on 🎉
7 y.o. reading out random phrases from ancient French phrase book for me. "j'ai une cartouche de cigarettes à déclarer. C'est pour mon usage personnel." "Pouvez-vous changer mes chèques de voyage en francs suisses....?"
Really wonderful event this evening @stcatz.bsky.social with Corinne Jaber & Atri Banerjee in conversation with Pablo Mukherjee about their project to bring Karthika Nair's Until the Lions: Echoes from the Mahabharata to the stage.
Nottingham too.... What a sad state of affairs. Thoughts with colleagues there.
📣 New WPH Editor Wanted
We're looking for a second postgraduate editor for our online journal 'MHRA Working Papers in the Humanities', launched in 2006 and aimed at early-career researchers and postgraduates.
Post from Dec 2025–Nov 2027
Deadline👉10 Nov 2025, 5pm
👉 www.mhra.org.uk/news/2025/10...
Coloured pen and glued paper on translated extract from Voltaire's Micromégas. By Eva, aged 4.
Would definitely cut the mustard in some art exhibitions. Title suggestions sought.
Today I finished a (very bad) first draft of the final chapter of The Book. There is a LONG way to go (intro, conclusion, much redrafting, sorting out the horrendous mess that is my footnotes), but this still feels like a milestone.
Cried when I dropped each of my children off for first day or nursery (2019, 2022). Cried today on dropping little one off for the last time, before school in Sept. Will doubtless cry then too. Luckily most of these occasions are in weather where sunglasses are (just about) acceptable!
Today was an INCREDIBLY early start for my first flight since pre-pandemic and first solo trip abroad since pre-children (2018!!!!). Off to Berlin to talk about the fragmented career trajectories of female artists and authors.
It's got worse, it now just says 'WHAT AM I TRYING TO SAY?!?!'
A shot of a computer screen reading: CONCLUSION WHAT??? NB COULD END WITH??
SOMEWHAT last minute writing of French Studies paper (I'm only joining you all at #SFS2025 on Weds), and as you'll see, this really is work in progress...
The hill I will die on is the hyphenation of eighteenth century (or any other century) when used as an adjective. Brought to you from mid-Finals marking frustration as I systematically circle this error even though the students are never going to see the scripts.
Oh hang on, and two PhD milestone vivas.
Teaching DONE for the academic year. Only an outreach session, committee meeting, end of year report meetings, finals scripts, and two last-minute conference papers (Bristol and Berlin) to deal with until I can get back to The Book.
SUPER excited to have been awarded a grant from the Humanities Cultural Fund to work with Pegasus youth theatre to devise a piece based on my research into Imagined Futures! 🎉
An image of a fox in a flower bed looking at the camera.
I think this cheeky intruder digging up our roses is telling me to stop rewriting reading lists and go to bed.
A newspaper front page from 22 Mat 1985, with the headline 'Closure threat faces some universities'
This day 40 years ago. Plus ça change...
I'm hoping they are not mutually exclusive....
I thought Christmas was peak unicorn. I was wrong.
Reaching crunch time for deliveries where a package arriving at any one moment could be a) cheese/alcohol for 40th party, b) unicorns (etc) for 4 y.o. bday, c) tiles/fittings for bathroom refurb. Apologies if we serve you unicorns or grout on Saturday....
Trying to be cool but really quite excited to be giving a workshop here today!