Dr Jude Piesse
Humanities and Social Science
My new book, The Ghost in the Garden: In Search of Darwin's Lost Garden (London: Scribe, 2021) blends biography, memoir, and nature writing to tell the story of Darwin's lost childhood garden. My monograph British Settler Emigration in Print, 1832-1877 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016) is about the literary culture of nineteenth-century emigration from Britain.
Before joining the department in April 2017, I worked as a Lecturer in English for the University of Chester, based at University Centre Shrewsbury. I have also taught for the University of Exeter, Plymouth University, and as an Associate Lecturer for the Open University. My teaching has spanned a wide range of topics and periods, including nineteenth-century, twentieth-century, and American literature, introductory literature, interdisciplinary humanities, and critical theory courses, and creative writing.
I completed my PhD on the literature of nineteenth-century settler emigration at the University of Exeter. I also hold a BA in English from Leeds University, an MA in English Literature (1850-Present) from King’s College London, and an MA in Creative Writing (Prose) from the University of East Anglia.
Degrees
2013, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom, PhD in English
2009, King's College London, London, United Kingdom, MA in English Literature (1850-Present)
2004, University of East Anglia, United Kingdom, MA in Creative Writing (Prose)
2001, University of Leeds, United Kingdom, BA in English
Highlighted publications
Piesse J. 2021. The Ghost in the Garden: In Search of Darwin's Lost Garden Scribe. London 978-1913348052
Piesse J. 2016. British Settler Emigration in Print, 1832-1877 Oxford University Press 9780198752967 DOI Publisher Url
Other
Piesse J. 2023. 'Plotholders' (creative non-fiction essay, forthcoming Spring 2023) Anthophile,
Chapters
Piesse J. 2023. ‘Planting a Garden in Brontë Country: Gardens in the Brontës’ Lives, Art, and Legacy’ Wynne D, Regis A. The Edinburgh Companion to the Brontës and the Arts Edinburgh University Press. Edinburgh
Piesse JI. 2018. Exiles and Exes: Women's Emigration Poetry and Fiction in the Victorian Periodical Press International Migrations in the Victorian Era Brill. Leiden
Piesse J. 2017. The path out of Haworth: mobility, migration and the global in Charlotte Brontë’s Shirley and the writings of Mary Taylor Wynne D, Regis A. Charlotte Brontë: Legacies and Afterlives Manchester University Press 978-1-7849-9246-0 DOI Publisher Url
Piesse JI. 2014. "'Ever so Many Partings Welded Together'": Serial Settlement and Great Expectations . Wagner T. Domestic Fiction in Colonial Australia and New Zealand Pickering and Chatto
Internet publication
Piesse J. 2022. Q and A reflection Publisher Url
Piesse J. 2021. LJMU News Feature on The Ghost in the Garden Publisher Url
Piesse J. 2020. 'Finding the right venue – ‘Fern Crazy’ Publisher Url
Piesse J. 2019. Fern Crazy at Sefton Park Palm House Publisher Url
Books (authored)
Piesse J. 2021. The Ghost in the Garden: In Search of Darwin's Lost Garden Scribe. London 978-1913348052
Piesse J. 2016. British Settler Emigration in Print, 1832-1877 Oxford University Press 9780198752967 DOI Publisher Url
Journal article
Piesse J. 2020. Perspective: The History and Afterlife of Darwin's Childhood Garden Journal of Victorian Culture, 25 :264-278 DOI Publisher Url Public Url
Piesse J. 2013. 2012 VanArsdel Prize Essay Dreaming across Oceans: Emigration and Nation in the Mid-Victorian Christmas Issue Victorian Periodicals Review, 46 :37-60 DOI Publisher Url
Book review
Piesse JI. 2019. Imagined Homelands: British Poetry in the Colonies, by Jason R. Rudy Literature and History,
Piesse JI. 2017. Place and Progress in the Works of Elizabeth Gaskell Modern Language Review,
Piesse JI. 2016. Beautiful Trees, by Nick Perring Flash: The International Short-Short Story Magazine, Nine
Piesse JI. 2013. Dickens and Mass Culture, by Juliet John Victoriographies: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century Writing, 1790-1914, Three
Conference publication
Abberley W, Carver B, Lewis-Bill H, Welshman R, Piesse J. “Strange New Today: Victorians, Crisis and Response.” Piesse J. Strange New Today Publisher Url
Highlighted activities
Media Coverage:
Midlands Today television evening news feature on The Ghost in the Garden 2021. 2021
BBC Radio 4 Today Programme interview about new book, The Ghost in the Garden, with Sian Lloyd. 2021. 2021
BBC Radio Kent Mid-morning interview about new book, The Ghost in the Garden, with Julia George. 2021. 2021
Professional activities
Other Professional Activity:
Public lecture at Gladstone's Library, Hawarden: 'Writing Darwin's Garden at The Mount: Darwin, Gardens, and the Literary Imagination'. 2023
ReachOut educational charity workshops, LJMU. Contribution to two outreach workshops with Liverpool schoolchildren at LJMU (first event held March 14th).. 2023
The Ghost in the Garden book launch. Research Institute for Literature and Cultural History seminar series.. 2021
"Victorian Settler Emigration in Print". Presentation given at Research Fellows' Work-in-Progress Seminar Series, John W. Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington D.C..
May 2019: Public lecture at University Centre Shrewsbury, 'Narrating Darwin's Childhood Garden: The Mount Doves and Other Tales'..
Nov. 2017: I co-organized the bi-annual North-West Print Culture Research Network Workshop at Liverpool John Moores University, in collaboration with Edge Hill University. The event featured a range of presentations and papers from internal and external colleagues..
Peer-review: I have acted as a peer reviewer for manuscripts submitted to Studies in the Novel, Victorian Periodicals Review, Exclamat!on: An Interdisciplinary Journal, and The Historical Journal..
Public Lecture - 'Leaving Britain: Emigration and Literature in the Age of Empire', at Rowley's House, University Centre Shrewsbury. With graphic novelist Simon Grennan..
Conference presentation:
Darwin's Ecological Vision and the Garden at The Mount, Transitions 2023 (biennial annual conference for ASLE-UKI (the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment, UK/Ireland), University of Liverpool, Oral presentation. 2023
Darwin's Ecological Vision and the Garden at The Mount, Transitions 2023 (biennial conference of ASLE-UKI, the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment, UK/Ireland), University of Liverpool, Oral presentation. 2023
Glasshouses and Ferneries: Urban Gardens and Public Engagement at Sefton Park Palm House, In the City: Exploring Urban Landscapes (LJMU Research Institute for Literature and Cultural History symposium), Bluecoat, Liverpool, Oral presentation. 2022
'Writing Darwin's Garden at The Mount', 'Seeds of Literature' research seminar programme, Universite de Picardie Jules Verne, France (online delivery),, Oral presentation. 2021
The Ghost in the Garden, Launch of the Research Institute for Literature and Cultural History, Tate Liverpool, Oral presentation. 2019
“The Life and Times of Darwin’s Childhood Garden: Patterns, Pathways, Forms”, 'Victorian Patterns', British Association of Victorian Studies Annual Conference, University of Exeter, Oral presentation. 2018
The Life and Times of Darwin’s Childhood Garden: Patterns, Pathways, Forms, British Association of Victorian Studies Annual Conference 2018 - 'Victorian Patterns', University of Exeter, Oral presentation. 2018
“Prison Voices in the Classroom: Crime, Punishment, and Pedagogy in the Digital Age”, Crime Fiction(s): Victorian and Neo-Victorian Narratives of Crime and Punishment, Edinburgh Napier University, Oral presentation. 2018
Victorian Settler Emigration and the Radical Press, Fifth meeting of the North West Print Culture Research Network, Edge Hill University, Oral presentation. 2017
"Darwin the Writer: The Imaginative and Literary Life of Charles Darwin", Darwin's Childhood Garden Study Day, University Centre Shrewsbury, Lecture and creative workshop. 2017
"Five Million Journeys: Mass Emigration in the Victorian Peroidical Press", The Local and the Global (BAVS/NAVSA/AVSA annual conference), Venice, Oral presentation. 2013
"Widening Wests: Nineteenth-Century American Westerns and the Literature of Anglo Settler Migration", British Association for American Studies Annual Conference, University of Exeter, Oral presentation. 2013
'Victorian Settler Emigration in Print', Research Fellows’ Work-in-Progress Seminar Series., John W. Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington, DC., Oral presentation. 2012
"Decomposing Great Expectations: Reading Migration in Serial Form", Composition and Decomposition (BAVS annual conference), University of Birmingham, Oral presentation. 2011
"Dreaming Across Oceans: Emigration and the Nation at Christmas", Travel in the Nineteenth Century: Narratives, Histories, and Collections, University of Lincoln, Oral presentation. 2011
"Openings Without Limit: Female Emigration and the Case of Miss Rye", Work and Leisure (annual conference of the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals), Canterbury Christ Church University, Oral presentation. 2011
"Consumption, Diffusion, and Influences; or, the Consequences of Three Metaphors", Popular Fictions: Selling Culture? (Annual Conference of the Association for Research in Popular Fictions), Liverpool John Moores University, Oral presentation. 2010
Research Grants Awarded:
Liverpool John Moores Communities and Impact QR grant route 2023/24, Susannah Darwin at The Mount: Hidden Maternal Histories, In collaboration with Shropshire Museums Service, Grant value (£): £6417.42, Duration of research project: 9. 2023
Being Human Festival, funded by AHRC and British Academy, The Nonsense Tree, Kate Walchester, LJMU, Grant value (£): £2715, Duration of research project: 6. 2023
British Association for Victorian Studies, 'Fern Crazy', Being Human Festival 2019 (supplementing award from Being Human)., Grant value (£): £240. 2019
Being Human Festival - funded by AHRC and British Academy, Fern Crazy, Grant value (£): £1497.70, Duration of research project: 6. 2019
AHRC, British Research Council Fellowship at Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington, Grant value (£): 3,500, Duration of research project: 4 months. 2012
British Association for Victorian Studies, British Association for Victorian Studies postgraduate funding for co-organized conference “‘Strange New Today’: Victorians, Crisis and Response”, Rebecca Welshman, Ben Carver, Hannah Lewis-Bill, Grant value (£): 400. 2011
AHRC, AHRC Research Support Training Grant, towards attending the 2012 Dickens Universe at the University of California, Santa Cruz., Grant value (£): £849.11, Duration of research project: 1 week.
AHRC, Full AHRC Doctoral Research Grant for PhD at Exeter University, Grant value (£): 50,000, Duration of research project: 3 years.
Other invited event:
Darwin Day lecture: The Ghost in the Garden, Norwich Research Park, Quadrum Institute of Bioscience, University of East Anglia, Keynote at Darwin Day symposium. 2023
The Ghost in the Garden: Darwin at The Mount, Theatre Severn Shrewsbury, Concluding keynote at the Darwin Festival, Theatre Severn.. 2023
Darwin in Conversation book talk, Cambridge University Library, Talk to the Friends of Cambridge University Library and members of the public about The Ghost in the Garden and doing creative research in CUL special collections. Linked to the Darwin in Conversation exhibition. https://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/whats/friends-ghost-garden. 2022
Women's Institute book talk, Glyndyfrdwy, Wales, Talk to members of Glyndyfrdwy Women's Institute and other Glyndyfrdwy residents about The Ghost in the Garden. 2022
Shrewsbury Festival of Literature, Shrewsbury, Public talk about The Ghost in the Garden at Shrewsbury Festival of Literature.. 2021
'Writing Darwin's Garden at The Mount', Universite de Picardie Jules Verne, France (online delivery), Talk for the university's 'Seeds of Literature' research seminar programme.. 2021
Thinking about Vagrancy in the Victorian Age, Birkbeck Centre for Nineteenth-Century Studies, Roundtable discussion with Alistair Robinson, Matthew Beaumont and Charlotte Mathieson.. 2021
Award:
2023 Writer in Residence Award, Gladstone's Library, Hawarden. Two-week funded writer's residency to be undertaken in September 2023., https://www.gladstoneslibrary.org/news/volume/meet-our-writers-in-residence-for-2023. 2022
Quality Research funding award for project 'The Ghost in the Garden: The Life and Times of Darwin's Childhood Garden' (£394)., Liverpool John Moores University. 2019
The Vera Stanton Scholarship, Gladstone's Library. 2019
Quality Research fund award for research project ‘The Ghost in the Garden: The Life and Times of Darwin’s Childhood Garden’ (£2,000)., Liverpool John Moores University. 2018
Robert and Vineta Colby Book Prize shortlist for book British Settler Emigration in Print, 1832-1877, Research Society for Victorian Periodicals. 2017
VanArsdel Prize, Research Society for Victorian Periodicals. 2012
AHRC Research Support Training Grant, AHRC. 2012
BAVS conference funding (for "Strange New Today: Victorians, Crisis and Response"), British Association for Victorian Studies. 2011
BAVS conference presenter's bursary, British Association for Victorian Studies. 2011
AHRC Block Grant Partnership Studentship (PhD funding), AHRC. 2009
Media Coverage:
Podcast about book The Ghost in the Garden for the gardening podcast 'Roots and All'. 2021
Midlands Today television evening news feature on The Ghost in the Garden 2021
BBC Radio 4 Today Programme interview about new book, The Ghost in the Garden, with Sian Lloyd. 2021
BBC Radio Kent Mid-morning interview about new book, The Ghost in the Garden, with Julia George. 2021
Interview with BBC Radio Shropshire about the Darwin's Childhood Study Day (co-organised with Shropshire Wildlife Trust in March 2016)
External collaboration:
Sefton Park Palm House, Roy Boardman and Kate Martinez at Sefton Park Palm House (Being Human Festival activity, 'Fern Crazy').. 2019
University Centre Shrewsbury, at University of Chester (co-organized event: Darwin's Childhood Garden Study Day), Shropshire Wildlife Trust (co-organized event: Darwin's Childhood Garden Study Day). 2016
Editorial boards:
Anthem Studies in British History, Anthem Press., Editorial board member. 2018
Membership of professional bodies:
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, Higher Education Academy. 2017
Fellowships:
British Research Council Fellowship., AHRC-funded fellowship at John W. Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington D.C.. 2012
Conference organisation:
"Strange New Today: Victorians, Crisis, and Response", Co-organiser. 2011