Brian Gibbons
Lecturer in Literature & Cultural History
Research Interests
Magic and the occult; seventeenth-century radicalism; Renaissance theatre.
Current Projects
I am currently writing up research on the Faust legend. I have also begun research on various versions of the myth of Medea, which I propose to carry forward in two directions: a) an exploration of issues of gender and ethnicity in twentieth-century appropriations of the myth; b) a more general study of the figure of the sorceress in Western culture.
Publications (Selected)
Books
Spirituality and the Occult: from the Renaissance to the Modern Age (Routledge, 2001)
Journal Articles
‘Mysticism and Mechanism: The Religious Context of George Cheyne’s Representation of the Body and its Ills’, British Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies 21 (1998), 1-23
Book Chapters
Articles for The New Dictionary of National Biography on Richard Overton, Durant Hotham, Francis Lee and Richard Roach.
External Professional Activities
Postgraduate Teaching and Supervision
I am currently supervising a PhD thesis on William Blake and alchemical discourse.
Teaching: Undergraduate
I teach on various undergraduate modules, includimg “Witchcraft and Magic in Western Culture”.
