Heather Dubrow, Tighe-Evans Professor and John Bascom Professor
Department of English

My research and teaching have primarily focused on Shakespeare and on the lyric poetry of the early modern period, but I have also have a wide range of other interests, such as non-Shakespearean drama and twentieth-century poetry. Despite (and because of) this range, certain consistent commitments have structured my research. First, I have been engaged with genre throughout my career, although changes in our discipline over the years have inflected my approaches to that subject; genre was the topic of my first book and a major issue in the four subsequent ones. Second, I have attempted to connect genres and periods, as well as disciplines, in my own writing; while early modern (i.e., Renaissance) lyric poetry and Shakespeare are my primary interests, my writing encompasses analyses of lyrics from other periods and frequently comments on connections with such cognate fields as architecture and art.

Above all, throughout my career I have sought to build bridges between critical methods rather than participating in the dismissive response to alternative perspectives too often apparent in literary and cultural studies today. Thus in Shakespeare and Domestic Loss, my latest book, I dovetail genre studies and cultural history when I connect the preoccupation with intrusions in pastoral to distinctive domestic conditions in early modern England, such as changes in land laws. My recent article in Modern Language Quarterly, 61 (2000) defends the recuperation of the formal more explicitly, demonstrating in particular that Kant’s conception of the aesthetic has been misread. Similarly, I believe that close attention to the language of texts can be an avenue towards, rather than an antagonist of, a number of other critical methods, especially the historicized and feminist criticism I practice myself.

Certain administrative policies and problems have interested me throughout my career. I am particularly concerned with fostering the careers of younger colleagues and enabling older and retired professors who wish to remain active to do so, and I have published articles, delivered papers, and organized panels on those questions. My long-standing interest—and delight—in teaching is reflected both in the articles I have published on it and in my engagement with several projects. In my own department, for example, I proposed and set up a series of forums on teaching; as a member of the Executive Council of our principal professional organization, the Modern Language Association, I variously proposed and helped to organize a number of initiatives connected to teaching, such as a supplement to the MLA Newsletter focusing on innovations in undergraduate education.

The second hat I wear is, as it were, a beret: I have been writing poetry in recent years (in addition, a play of mine was also produced by a community theater some time ago). My publications in this area include two chapbooks and poems in numerous journals; a full-length book of poems is currently under consideration by publishers. Recently, one of my lyrics was set to music by a local composer and performed in a number of venues, including the Kennedy Center. I believe that writing lyrics helps me to read and teach them better, and I would encourage graduate students in literature who also write fiction and poetry to keep doing so despite all the other pressures on their time.

 

List of Major Publications:

Books and Chapbooks:

  • Genre. London: Methuen, 1982
  • Captive Victors: Shakespeare's Narrative Poems and Sonnets. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987
    Listed among the "Best Books and Articles of 1987" in The Year's Work in English Studies
  • A Happier Eden: The Politics of Marriage in the Stuart Epithalamium. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990
  • Echoes of Desire: English Petrarchism and its Counterdiscourses. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995
  • Transformation and Repetition (chapbook of poetry). Texas City, TX: Main-Travelled Roads/Sandhills Press, 1997. Second printing, 1998
  • Shakespeare and Domestic Loss. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999 (Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture series)
  • Border Crossings (chapbook of poetry). Madison, WI: Parallel Press/Silver Buckle Press, 2001

Edited Collections:

  • Co-editor [with Richard Strier] of The Historical Renaissance: New Essays on Tudor and Stuart Literature and Culture. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988
  • Coordinator of PMLA Special Topic on "The Status of Evidence," 111 (1996)


Reviews, etc.:

Review of Shakespeare Criticism: "Twentieth-Century Shakespeare Criticism," The Riverside Shakespeare. 2nd ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997. pp. 27-54 (this essay is approximately 99 pp. in ms., or 28,000 words)

Articles and Notes: 45 articles and notes on early modern literature (several of which have been reprinted, as have sections from my books), 7 on pedagogy, 6 on other educational issues. These essays have appeared in PMLA, Shakespeare Quarterly, JEGP, SEL, etc. Includes Studies in English Literature review-essay on all publications in non-dramatic Renaissance literature during 1999 ( a review of some 75 books).

Reviews: 22 reviews


Creative Writing:

2 chapbooks; 1 play produced by a community theater; 39 poems in print or accepted for publication (some have been reprinted). Beverly Taylor, a composer at the University of Wisconsin, set one of my poems to music; it was performed by a University of Wisconsin choral group on campus in November 2000 and performed in Norwalk, Ohio; Burnsville, North Carolina; Ardmore, Pennsylvania and in the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. in March 2001.

Honors and Awards:

  • Election to Phi Beta Kappa
  • Captain Jonathan Fay Award, given by Radcliffe College to the graduating senior "who in the judgment of the Deans has during her whole course, by her scholarship, conduct, and character given evidence of the greatest promise"
  • Doris Russell Scholarship, awarded by Girton College, University of Cambridge (1966-1967)
  • Fulbright Fellowship (1966-1967)
  • Honorary Woodrow Wilson Fellowship (1967-1968)
  • Harvard Graduate Prize Fellowship (1967-1972)
  • Leverhulme Visiting Fellowship (1973-1974)
  • Visiting Research Fellow, University of Sussex (summer term 1976)
  • General Research Board Fellowship, University of Maryland (1977, 1979)
  • Nominee for Student Award for Outstanding Teaching, University of Maryland (1979)
  • Harvard University Mellon Faculty Fellowship (1979-1980)
  • Honorary American Association of University Women Fellowship (1979-1980)
  • Bush Faculty Development Grant (fall 1983)
  • American Council of Learned Societies Travel Grant (1986)
  • National Endowment for the Humanities Senior Fellowship (1987-1988)
  • Bunting Institute Fellow (1987-1988)
  • Fellow, Institute for Research in the Humanities, University of Wisconsin (spring 1993)
  • Senior member, Institute for Research in the Humanities, University of Wisconsin (1994-1999)
  • John Bascom Professor (1995- )
  • Steenbock Summer Fellowship (won jointly with dissertator Susannah Brietz Monta; 1997)
  • Tighe-Evans Professor (July 1998- )
  • Selected as "Featured Poet" on Poetry Daily Web site, February 25, 1999
  • Graduate Teaching Award, given by University of Wisconsin English Department Graduate Student Association (1999)
  • Chancellor's Distinguished Teaching Award (university-wide award, 2001)

 

 

©2003 University of Wisconsin Board of Regents