Emma Mary Kirby

(she/her)

Overview

I started my Full-time PhD in Critical and Creative Writing in January 2023. Prior to this, I received a First-Class Honours Degree from Oxford Brookes University, an MA in Creative Writing from Portsmouth University and an MA in Nineteenth Century Literature from King's College London (Distinction). 

I am currently writing a neo-Victorian ghost story, under the supervision of Professor Ann Heilmann and Dr Meredith Miller. My aim is to employ a Gothic framework to draw upon neo-Victorian fiction's engagement with contemporary concerns, specifically in relation to Britain's colonial past.

I delivered a paper to the ENCAPsulate Conference in 2023 on 'Colonial Hauntings in Sarah Waters' The Little Stranger and in 2024, my ENCAPsulate paper explored the position of the neo-historical writer: 'Reviving and Revising the Past'. I contributed to the 2024 Victorian Popular Fiction Study Day - 'Silenced Voices and Erased Agencies in Victorian Life and Fiction'  - by delivering a paper on 'Colonial Unspeakability'. In September 2024 I delivered a paper to the BAVS in-person conference where I spoke about my current project: 'Writing neo-Victorian Fiction: Spectres in the Shadows'. I am currently writing a book chapter for Bloomsbury's forthcoming Haunted Writing collection and have had an article proposal for a new journal (Advances in Nineteenth Century Studies) accepted. This will be based on Frances Hodgkins-Burnett’s The Secret Garden: ‘Decoloniznig the Garden: (Play)ing the Victorians’.

Prior to starting my PhD, I published numerous educational resources and articles for A Level and GCSE Literature.