Great Writers Inspire

PLEASE NOTE: The 'Great Writers Inspire' project has its own website which features much more extensive, diverse and updated content. Please visit https://writersinspires.org

From Dickens to Shakespeare, from Chaucer to Kipling and from Austen to Blake, this significant collection contains inspirational short talks freely available to the public and the education community worldwide. This series is aimed primarily at first year undergraduates but will be of interest to school students preparing for university and anyone who would like to know more about the world's great writers. The talks were produced as part of the Great Writers Inspire Project which makes a significant body of material freely available on the subject of great works of literature and their authors. Visit https://writersinspire.org/ to see how great writers can inspire you.

Great Writers Inspire website Faculty of English Language and Literature

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 episodes

Episode	Description	People	Date
Oscar Wilde's Women	Sophie Duncan introduces Oscar Wilde by setting him in an accurate historical context.	Sophie Duncan	19 September, 2012
Great Writers Inspire Great Writing	Alex Pryce considers how writers are readers, influenced and inspired by the works of other writers.	Alex Pryce	19 September, 2012
Julian Thompson on Rudyard Kipling	Dr Julian Thompson considers a writer described by Kingsley Amis as 'our greatest writer of short stories'.	Julian Thompson	19 September, 2012
Julian Thompson on Sir Walter Scott	Dr Julian Thompson introduces 'the least read great writer in our literature'. He describes the popularly of Walter Scott in his own time and suggests some highlights of the 'living Scots' of his fiction.	Julian Thompson	1 August, 2012
Shakespeare and Voice	Linda Gates, Professor of Voice at Northwestern University (USA) discusses how Shakespeare's poetry and plays lend themselves to vocal performance by discussing how breath can be used to 'punctuate the thought'.	Linda Gates	1 August, 2012
What is a Classic? English Graduate Conference 2012 Panel Debate, Talk 3	Baroness Helena Kennedy QC, draws on her experience as a trustee of the Booker Prize and as a judge for many other literary prizes to offer a response to the question, 'What is a Classic?'.	Helena Kennedy	19 July, 2012
What is a Classic? English Graduate Conference 2012 Panel Debate, Talk 2	Judith Luna, the Senior Commissioning Editor at Oxford World's Classics, draws on her practical involvement in re-launching the Oxford World's Classics series in 2008 to give a publisher's take on the question, 'What is a Classic?'.	Judith Luna	19 July, 2012
What is a Classic? English Graduate Conference 2012 Panel Debate, Talk 1	Dr Ankhi Mukherjee, Wadham college, Oxford, speaks to the question 'What is a Classic?' by examining the residual influence of the Eurocentric literary canon in the age of world literature and emergent formations of canons and classics.	Ankhi Mukherjee	19 July, 2012
Dickens's Points of View	Professor Jon Mee, University of Warwick, discusses how Dickens's fiction can be considered 'cinematic' by drawing attention to the shifting points of view in Oliver Twist, Our Mutual Friend, and other novels.	Jon Mee	14 June, 2012
Jane Austen's Manuscripts Explored	Professor Kathyrn Sutherland from the University of Oxford talks around the manuscripts of Jane Austen, what we can learn from them about her family life but also her writing style and techniques.	Kathryn Sutherland	8 June, 2012
The Watsons: Jane Austen Practising	Professor Kathryn Sutherland from the University of Oxford talks about some of Jane Austen's manuscripts from the novel "The Watsons" and what we can learn about her from these.	Kathryn Sutherland	8 June, 2012
Great Writers Inspire- An Introduction to the Project	A short introductory video to the "Great Writers Inspire project.	Joshua Carr	23 May, 2012
What is a Great Writer? An academic panel discusses the question.	In this panel discussion from the Great Writers Inspire Engage Event workshop, Dr Seamus Perry, Dr Margaret Kean, Professor Peter McDonald and Dr Ankhi Mukherjee discuss what we mean when we talk about greatness in writing.	Seamus Perry, Margaret Kean, Peter McDonald, Ankhi Mukherjee, Rebecca Beasley	15 May, 2012
Julian Thompson on Wilkie Collins	Dr. Julian Thompson considers how Wilkie Collins's fiction was pioneering across a variety of genres, including detective fiction and gothic thrillers.	Julian Thompson	15 May, 2012
Chaucer	Professor Daniel Wakelin discusses the work of Chaucer and explains how he was one of the first to use everyday spoken English as a literary language in the 14th Century.	Daniel Wakelin	17 April, 2012
Ezra Pound	Dr Rebecca Beasley explains why we should read Pound, someone she considers as the central figure in early 20th Century poetry movements.	Rebecca Beasley	10 April, 2012
Mary Leapor	Dr Jennifer Batt talks about Mary Leapor, an 18th Century kitchen maid who wrote accomplished verses and won accolades from literary society.	Jennifer Batt	27 March, 2012
John Milton	Dr Anna Beer shares a few short extracts of Milton's poem Lycidas and discusses what they show about Milton's very special qualities as a writer.	Anna Beer	15 March, 2012
The Lure of the East: the Oriental and Philosophical Tale in Eighteenth-Century England	Professor Ros Ballaster discusses the objectives of oriental tales published in the second half of the 18th Century which use the sheer power of storytelling to conjure up alternative worlds.	Ros Ballaster	13 March, 2012
Only Collect: An Introduction to the World of the Poetic Miscellany	Dr Abigail Williams, Director of the Digital Miscellanies Index, explains how these popular collections of poetry designed to suit contemporary tastes were used in the 18th Century.	Abigail Williams	9 March, 2012
Why Dickens?	Dr Robert Douglas-Fairhurst talks of Dickens' life and influences and why these have made his works so popular.	Robert Douglas-Fairhurst	2 March, 2012
J.M. Coetzee	Professor Peter McDonald gives a talk on the work of South African Nobel Laureate, J.M. Coetzee.	Peter McDonald	7 February, 2012
Olive Schreiner	Professor Elleke Boehmer gives a talk on Olive Schreiner (1855-1920), the South African novelist, pioneering feminist, and anti-imperialist polemicist.	Elleke Boehmer	7 February, 2012
Katherine Mansfield and Rhythm Magazine	Dr Faith Binckes explains why modernist short story writer and critic Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) is a great writer, highlighting her involvement with the 1911-1913 periodical Rhythm, edited by her second husband John Middleton Murry.	Faith Binckes	7 February, 2012
George Eliot - A Very Large Brain	Dr Catherine Brown gives a talk on George Eliot and her influences.	Catherine Brown	7 February, 2012
William Blake	Dr David Fallon introduces the poetry, painting, and engraving of William Blake, focusing on the imaginative and visionary aspects of Blake's work and his desire to break the publics 'mind-forg'd manacles'.	David Fallon	7 February, 2012
18th Century Labouring Class Poetry	Dr Jennifer Batt gives a talk on Stephen Duck, one of the 18th Century labouring-class poets.	Jennifer Batt	7 February, 2012
Jonathan Swift and the Art of Undressing	Dr Abigail Williams gives a talk on Jonathan Swift and the Art of Undressing.	Abigail Williams	7 February, 2012
Beowulf	Dr Francis Leneghan gives a talk on Beowulf, one of the most important works in Anglo-Saxon literature.	Francis Leneghan	7 February, 2012
Shakespeare and the Stage	Professor Tiffany Stern gives a talk on William Shakespeare and how his plays were performed in Elizabethan England.	Tiffany Stern	7 February, 2012

Great Writers Inspire

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