Even the strongest enthusiasms tend to fade. However, I remain as fascinated by English Literature as I was at 18, when I first came to university.

Certain literary conventions and reading practices can seem so natural to us that part of the challenge of studying literature is in trying to gain critical distance from them.

My English courses have trained me to think carefully and critically about what texts ‘do’, and what we as readers do with texts. I have had countless opportunities to develop these skills at university, including a Summer Research Scholarship, which allowed me to work closely with a lecturer on an overlooked aspect of New Zealand’s literary history.

Studying literature enlarges, rather than diminishes, the pleasures of reading—few subjects offer us so many occasions to be amused, moved and surprised by what we study.

I am an Associate Professor in English but also a graduate of the English programme at Victoria University of Wellington. I did a BA, an Honours year and a Masters in English here at the University. I’m one of a large (and constantly growing) group of Wellington English graduates who went on to do a PhD at a top international university (in my case, the University of Toronto).

The excellent training I received at the University not only prepared me for the challenge of a PhD overseas, it also enabled me to get rewarding work as a policy analyst when I returned to New Zealand, before I returned to academia as a lecturer.

I’ve seen the English programme from the perspective of a student as well as from that of a staff member, and it is a wonderful place to study and to work. It’s exciting to be part of a programme that includes people who have lived and studied all over the world.

The research interests of my colleagues cover a vast array of topics, from living writers to neglected authors from the past.

Our work has also cast new light on canonical authors—including Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, Pope, Coleridge, T. S. Eliot and Katherine Mansfield. We have research projects in train on the writing of Early Modern women, journalism, the historical novel, religious writing, science and literature, children’s literature, literary biography, and—importantly—the literature of this country. We also have two award-winning poets on our staff.

These interests shape our programme. They’re reflected in our stellar research record, but also in our teaching.

One thing I particularly like about being a lecturer at the University is that, unlike many distinguished English programmes internationally, the staff in Wellington’s English programme lecture and tutor at all levels, from first-year courses to Honours seminars, alongside our excellent postgraduate students.

Our students are thus taught by active researchers, many of whom are world-renowned in their fields. My research benefits from hearing students’ opinions about my own research topics, which focus on the relationship between journalism and literature, and indigenous peoples and British literature.