Département de langue et littérature anglaises

Additional Information / Informations supplémentaires

Office and Office Hour / Bureau et heure de réception

Research Interests / Recherches

Fiona Tolhurst is Maître assistante in Medieval and Early Modern English at the University of Geneva. She holds an MA and PhD in Medieval English Language and Literature from Princeton University, where she studied as a Mellon Fellow in the Humanities. Her research focuses on Arthurian literature and medieval women writers. Her articles and essays have appeared in journals such as Arthuriana and The Bibliographical Bulletin of the International Arthurian Society as well as in volumes such as Sacred and Profane in Chaucer and Late Medieval Literature, Eleanor of Aquitaine: Lord and Lady, and Re-viewing Le Morte Darthur: Texts and Contexts, Characters and Themes. She has an essay on Malory’s translation of the Grail quest forthcoming in Studies in Malory II: Malory and Christianity, and her book Geoffrey of Monmouth as Feminist Historian and Arthurian will be published in 2012 by Palgrave Macmillan Press. Her current book project concerns Margery Kempe and Julian of Norwich.

Publications

Authored / Comme auteur

In Press: “Trading Places: Orthodoxy in the Books of Margery Kempe and Julian of Norwich” (11,000 words). Sacred and Profane: Essays on Medieval Literature for John V. Fleming. Eds. Robert Epstein and William Robins (Toronto: Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, 2010).

In Press: “Slouching Towards Bethlehem: Secularized Salvation in Le Morte Darthur” (12,000 words). Studies in Malory II: Malory and Christianity. Eds. D. Thomas Hanks, Jr. and Janet Jesmok (Kalamazoo, MI: Western Michigan University Press, 2010).

“C. S. Lewis” entry. Arthurian Writers: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Eds. Laura Cooner Lambdin and Robert Thomas Lambdin (Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2008): 249-64.

“Why We Should Teach—and Our Students Perform—The Legend of Good Women.” Teaching Chaucer (Teaching The New English Series). Eds. Gail Ashton and Louise M. Sylvester (New York: Palgrave Macmillan Publishers, 2006), Chapter 3: 46-64.

“Guinevere” entry. Women and Gender in Medieval Europe: An Encyclopedia. Ed. Margaret Schaus (Oxford: Routledge, 2006): 338-39.

“Why Every Knight Needs His Lady: Re-Viewing Questions of Genre and ‘Cohesion’ in Malory’s Le Morte Darthur.” Re-viewing Le Morte Darthur: Texts and Contexts, Characters and Themes. Eds. K. S. Whetter and Raluca L. Radulescu (Woodbridge, England: Boydell and Brewer, 2005), Chapter 9: 133-47.

“The Outlandish Lioness: Eleanor of Aquitaine in Literature.” Medieval Feminist Forum Vol. XXXVII: 9-13 (Spring 2004) (online link).

“The Great Divide?: History and Literary History as Partners in Medieval Mythography.” Historical Reflections/Reflexions Historiques

“What Ever Happened to Eleanor?: Reflections of Eleanor of Aquitaine in Wace's Roman de Brut and Lawman's Brut.” Eleanor of Aquitaine: Lord and Lady. Eds. John Carmi Parsons and Bonnie Wheeler (New York: Palgrave Press, 2003), Chapter 15: 319-36.

“The Britons as Hebrews, Romans, and Normans: Geoffrey of Monmouth's British Epic and Reflections of Empress Matilda.” Arthuriana 8.4 (Winter 1998): 69-87.

“The Once and Future Queen: The Development of Guinevere from Geoffrey of Monmouth to Malory.” Bibliographical Bulletin of the International Arthurian Society 50 (1998): 272-308.

“Negotiating Feminist and Historicist Concerns: Guenevere in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae.” Quondam et Futurus: A Journal of Arthurian Interpretations 3 (1993): 26-44.

Edited / Comme éditrice

“The Evolution of Eve: A Comparison of French and English Religious Dramas from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Centuries.” Written by Maureen Fries and edited by Fiona Tolhurst. Studies in Philology (Winter 2002): 1-16.

On Arthurian Women: Essays in Memory of Maureen Fries (a collection of 32 articles). Eds. Bonnie Wheeler and Fiona Tolhurst (Dallas, TX: Scriptorium Press, 2001). Preface: “Maureen Fries, Arthurienne Extraordinaire,” pp. v-xiii.

Theoretical Approaches to Geoffrey of Monmouth. Editor of Special Issue of Arthuriana 8.4 (Winter 1998). 161 pages, 9 articles. Editor's Introduction: "Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia regum Britannie and the Critics," 8.4: 3-11.

Reviews / Comptes rendus

Gender and the Chivalric Community in Malory’s Morte d’Arthur by Dorsey Armstrong. Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies 80.4 (October 2005): 1229-31.

Historical Fabrication, Ethnic Fable and French Romance in Twelfth-Century England by David Rollo. Arthuriana 9.2 (Summer 1999): 65-67.

Current Projects / Projets en cours

Book manuscript: Geoffrey of Monmouth as Feminist Historian, Mythmaker, and Mythographer. Under contract with Palgrave Macmillan Press, Studies in Arthurian and Courtly Cultures Series.

Article: “C. S. Lewis as Closet Arthurian.” To be submitted to Arthuriana.

Article: “Why Our Undergraduates Should Perform Medieval English Drama—in Middle English.” To be submitted to Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching.