Prof. Margaret Harper
Biography
A native of the US South, my degrees are from Florida State University (BA in Classics and English, summa cum laude, 1978) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (MA and PhD in English, 1981 and 1986).My first academic position was as Assistant Professor at the Ohio State University in Marion (1986-89), after which I moved to Atlanta, Georgia, where I served as Assistant, Associate, and then Full Professor in English and Women's Studies at Georgia State University (1989-2010).
In 2010, I moved to Ireland to take up the post of Glucksman Professor in Contemporary Writing in English at UL. From January to June 2015, I served as an Adjunct Visiting Professor at the Université de Lille 3, Lille, France.
I've served as the Director of the Yeats International Summer School and the President of the International Yeats Society.
In addition to my passion for literature and language, I have abiding interests in classical and traditional music.
Research Interests
My research focuses on modern and contemporary Irish, US, and world literature in English, especially poetry. I am a specialist on W. B. Yeats, especially his occult life and work.My book The Aristocracy of Art looks at the rhetoric of autobiographical fiction and its relationship to the issue of class in James Joyce and Thomas Wolfe. Wisdom of Two, my second book, analyses the spiritual and literary collaboration of W. B. and his wife George (Hyde Lees), especially their experiments with automatic writing. I have also been part of teams that have produced scholarly editions of the Yeatses' automatic writing and other occult experiments (Yeats's 'Vision' Papers) and the two versions of Yeats's book of esoteric philosophy, A Vision (1925 and 1937).
I'm interested in the relation between abstract form and felt experience, and I have an abiding interest in what escapes the patterns humans make in the world. My work gravitates towards issues of gender, race, class, and culture, particularly religious experiences and traditions.
I have served as Director of the Yeats International Summer School (2013-15) and as President of the International Yeats Society (2013-17).
Books
A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Prof. Margaret Harper
2008
New York
Scribner
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A Vision (1937), Volume 14 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Prof. Margaret Harper
2015
New York
Scribner
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The Aristocracy of Art: James Joyce and Thomas Wolfe
Prof. Margaret Harper
1990
Baton Rouge
Louisiana State University Press
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Wisdom of Two: The Spiritual and Literary Collaboration of George and W. B. Yeats
Prof. Margaret Harper
2006
Oxford
Oxford University Press
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Book Chapters
Sisters, Outsiders, Histories: First Principles and Last Things in Boland and Lorde
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
Gainesville
University Press of Florida
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The clock has run down and must be wound up again': A Vision in Time
Prof. Margaret Harper
2014
South Bend, Indiana
Notre Dame University Press
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Versions of History and Brother to Dragons
Prof. Margaret Harper
1983
Baton Rouge
Louisiana State University Press
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Fabric and Fame in the Odyssey and Penelope'
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
Gainesville
University Press of Florida
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The Medium as Creator: George Yeats's Role in the Automatic Script
Prof. Margaret Harper
1988
Ann Arbor, MI
UMI Research Press
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Celestial Bodies: Sexual Cosmologies and a Collaborative Vision
Prof. Margaret Harper
2002
London
Palgrave
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The Message is the Medium: Identity in the Automatic Script
Prof. Margaret Harper
1991
Ann Arbor, MI
UMI Research Press
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Our Lives with Yeats's Ghosts: The Writing and the Editing of the Automatic Script
Prof. Margaret Harper
2003
Ann Arbor, MI
UMI Research Press
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Taken in Drapery': Dressing the Narrative in the Odyssey and Penelope'
Prof. Margaret Harper
1994
Madison
University of Wisconsin Press
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Twilight to Vision: Yeats's Collaborative Modernity
Prof. Margaret Harper
1994
Lewisburg, PA
Bucknell University Press
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Bread and Wine, Coke and Peanuts: Teaching Sacramental Feasts
Prof. Margaret Harper
1996
Ann Arbor
University of Michigan Press
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The Real Thing': Ní Chuilleanáin and Mattering Bodies
Prof. Margaret Harper
2011
Bern
Peter Lang
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Reflected Voices, Double Visions
Prof. Margaret Harper
2012
Clemson, South Carolina
Clemson University Digital Press
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Edited Books
A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Prof. Margaret Harper
2008
New York
Scribner
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Peer Reviewed Journals
Other Journals
Conference Publications
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Conference Contributions
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Published Reports
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Editorials
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Book Reviews
The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran, and Volume VI: Prefaces and Introductions, ed. William H. O'Donnell
Prof. Margaret Harper
1996
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Thomas Wolfe Interviewed: 19291938, ed. Aldo P. Magi and Richard Walser, and Mannerhouse: A Play in a Prologue and Four Acts, by Thomas Wolfe, ed. Louis D. Rubin, Jr., and John L. Idol, Jr.
Prof. Margaret Harper
1987
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A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner
Prof. Margaret Harper
1999
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Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers
Prof. Margaret Harper
1988
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Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
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Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt
Prof. Margaret Harper
1991
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The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
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Irish Literature: Feminist Perspectives, ed. Patricia Coughlan and Tina O'Toole, and New Contexts: Re-Framing Nineteenth-Century Irish Women's Prose, ed. Heidi Hansson
Prof. Margaret Harper
2011
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Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker
Prof. Margaret Harper
1991
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Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
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All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola
Prof. Margaret Harper
1992
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Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
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The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran
Prof. Margaret Harper
1993
Read more
The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
Ann Arbor, MI
UMI Research Press
Read more
Other Publications
The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran, and Volume VI: Prefaces and Introductions, ed. William H. O'Donnell
Prof. Margaret Harper
1996
Read more
Thomas Wolfe Interviewed: 19291938, ed. Aldo P. Magi and Richard Walser, and Mannerhouse: A Play in a Prologue and Four Acts, by Thomas Wolfe, ed. Louis D. Rubin, Jr., and John L. Idol, Jr.
Prof. Margaret Harper
1987
Read more
A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner
Prof. Margaret Harper
1999
Read more
Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers
Prof. Margaret Harper
1988
Read more
Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
Read more
Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt
Prof. Margaret Harper
1991
Read more
The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
Read more
Irish Literature: Feminist Perspectives, ed. Patricia Coughlan and Tina O'Toole, and New Contexts: Re-Framing Nineteenth-Century Irish Women's Prose, ed. Heidi Hansson
Prof. Margaret Harper
2011
Read more
Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker
Prof. Margaret Harper
1991
Read more
Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian
Prof. Margaret Harper
1995
Read more
All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola
Prof. Margaret Harper
1992
Read more
Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
Read more
The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran
Prof. Margaret Harper
1993
Read more
The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard
Prof. Margaret Harper
1997
Ann Arbor, MI
UMI Research Press
Read more