Claire O'Callaghan

Claire O’Callaghan joined Loughborough in May 2018 as one of the University’s prestigious ‘Excellence 100’ appointments. Her research interests lie in Victorian and neo-Victorian studies, with a focus on gender, sexuality, identity, and the body. She is an expert on the lives and works Brontës and in the writing of Sarah Waters. She gained her PhD from the University of Leicester. She holds a PGCHE from the University of Nottingham, and she is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Claire co-leads (with Dr Sara Read) the Health Humanities Research Group.

Claire has published widely on the Brontës. She is the author of Emily Brontë Reappraised (2018), and she has published book chapters and articles on Jane Eyre, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Emily’s poetry, race in Wuthering Heights (and its afterlives), and the portrayal of Branwell Brontë in Sally Wainwright’s To Walk Invisible. She has also co-edited a special issue of Brontë Studies on the theme of coarseness.

Claire's current research gravitates around three other Brontë projects: the development of a monograph on queer theory and the Brontës (that builds on her article in Brontë Studies entitled ‘Reading Mr Rochester’s Coarseness Queerly’); a project on Charlotte Brontë’s historical novel, Shirley; and an article exploring the mythology of Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights and Haworth on the life and works of Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath. The latter also forms part of a book project looking at Emily Brontë's influence on literature and popular culture.

Claire O'Callaghan is Co-Editor-in-Chief of Brontë Studies with Dr Sarah Fanning.