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).
Peer Reviewed Journals
a form created by passion to unite us to ourselves': The Masks of Pizzorno and Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills (2011) a form created by passion to unite us to ourselves': The Masks of Pizzorno and Yeats. International Political Anthropology :191-200
Flesh and Bones: Anne Enright's The Gathering
Harper Margaret Mills (2010) Flesh and Bones: Anne Enright's The Gathering. South Carolina Review :74-87
'how else could the god have come to us'?: Yeatsian Masks, Modernity, and the Sacred
Harper Margaret Mills (2007) 'how else could the god have come to us'?: Yeatsian Masks, Modernity, and the Sacred. Nordic Irish Studies :57-72
An Interview with Michael Longley
Harper Margaret Mills and Michael Longley (2004) An Interview with Michael Longley. Five Points: A Journal of Literature and Art :57-71
Interview with Michael Longley
Harper Margaret Mills (2004) Interview with Michael Longley. Five Points: A Journal of Literature and Art :57-71
Nemo: George Yeats and Her Automatic Script
Harper Margaret Mills (2002) Nemo: George Yeats and Her Automatic Script. New Literary History :291-314
The Authoritative Image: Yeats's Singing School
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) The Authoritative Image: Yeats's Singing School. Studies in the Literary Imagination :105-118
An Interview with Eavan Boland
Harper Margaret Mills and Eavan Boland (1997) An Interview with Eavan Boland. Five Points: A Journal of Literature and Art :87-105
Books
A Vision (1937), Volume 14 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills and Catherine Paul (2015) A Vision (1937), Volume 14 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats. New York : Scribner
A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills and Catherine Paul (2008) A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats. New York : Scribner
Wisdom of Two: The Spiritual and Literary Collaboration of George and W. B. Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills (2006) Wisdom of Two: The Spiritual and Literary Collaboration of George and W. B. Yeats. Oxford : Oxford University Press
Yeats's 'Vision' Papers, Volume 4
Harper Margaret Mills, Harper George Mills (2001) Yeats's 'Vision' Papers, Volume 4. London : Palgrave Macmillan
The Aristocracy of Art: James Joyce and Thomas Wolfe
Harper Margaret Mills (1990) The Aristocracy of Art: James Joyce and Thomas Wolfe. Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press
Book Chapters
The clock has run down and must be wound up again': A Vision in Time
Harper Margaret Mills (2014) The clock has run down and must be wound up again': A Vision in Time. South Bend, Indiana : Notre Dame University Press Yeats and Afterwords
Reflected Voices, Double Visions
Harper Margaret Mills (2012) Reflected Voices, Double Visions. Clemson, South Carolina : Clemson University Digital Press Yeats's A Vision: Explications and Contexts
The Real Thing': Ní Chuilleanáin and Mattering Bodies
Harper Margaret Mills (2011) The Real Thing': Ní Chuilleanáin and Mattering Bodies. Bern : Peter Lang Irish Women Writers: New Critical Perspectives
George Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills (2010) George Yeats. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press W. B. Yeats in Context
Yeats and the Occult
Harper Margaret Mills (2005) Yeats and the Occult. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press The Cambridge Companion to W. B. Yeats :144-166
Our Lives with Yeats's Ghosts: The Writing and the Editing of the Automatic Script
Harper Margaret Mills, Barbara J. Frieling and Sandra L. Sprayberry (2003) Our Lives with Yeats's Ghosts: The Writing and the Editing of the Automatic Script. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :19-34
Celestial Bodies: Sexual Cosmologies and a Collaborative Vision
Harper Margaret Mills (2002) Celestial Bodies: Sexual Cosmologies and a Collaborative Vision. London : Palgrave Yeats Annual :102-119
Yeats's Religion
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) Yeats's Religion. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :48-71
Sisters, Outsiders, Histories: First Principles and Last Things in Boland and Lorde
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) Sisters, Outsiders, Histories: First Principles and Last Things in Boland and Lorde. Gainesville : University Press of Florida Representing Ireland :181-193
Fabric and Fame in the Odyssey and Penelope'
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) Fabric and Fame in the Odyssey and Penelope'. Gainesville : University Press of Florida Gender in Joyce :170-188
Bread and Wine, Coke and Peanuts: Teaching Sacramental Feasts
Harper Margaret Mills (1996) Bread and Wine, Coke and Peanuts: Teaching Sacramental Feasts. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press Pedagogy, Praxis, Ulysses :63-76
Taken in Drapery': Dressing the Narrative in the Odyssey and Penelope'
Harper Margaret Mills (1994) Taken in Drapery': Dressing the Narrative in the Odyssey and Penelope'. Madison : University of Wisconsin Press Molly Blooms: A Polylogue on 'Penelope' and Cultural Studies :237-263
Twilight to Vision: Yeats's Collaborative Modernity
Harper Margaret Mills (1994) Twilight to Vision: Yeats's Collaborative Modernity. Lewisburg, PA : Bucknell University Press Irishness and (Post)Modernism :61-83
The Message is the Medium: Identity in the Automatic Script
Harper Margaret Mills (1991) The Message is the Medium: Identity in the Automatic Script. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :35-54
The Medium as Creator: George Yeats's Role in the Automatic Script
Harper Margaret Mills (1988) The Medium as Creator: George Yeats's Role in the Automatic Script. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :49-71
Versions of History and Brother to Dragons
Harper Margaret Mills (1983) Versions of History and Brother to Dragons. Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press Robert Penn Warren's 'Brother to Dragons': A Discussion :226-243
Edited Books
A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats
Harper Margaret Mills and Catherine Paul (2008) A Vision (1925), Volume 13 of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats. New York : Scribner
Other Journals
Of Time and the River: The Problem of Authority
Harper Margaret Mills (1987) Of Time and the River: The Problem of Authority. The Thomas Wolfe Review :1-6
Conference Publications
Conference Contributions
Published Reports
Editorials
Book Reviews
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
Harper Margaret Mills (2011) 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. Irish Review :112-115
Joyce and Reality: The Empirical Strikes Back, by John Gordon
Harper Margaret Mills (2007) Joyce and Reality: The Empirical Strikes Back, by John Gordon. :143-147
Greek and Hellenic Culture in Joyce, by R. J. Schork
Harper Margaret Mills (2000) Greek and Hellenic Culture in Joyce, by R. J. Schork. :568-571
A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner
Harper Margaret Mills (1999) A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner.
Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce. James Joyce Literary Supplement :3-
The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :351-363
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
Harper Margaret Mills (1996) 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. Text: Transactions of the Society for Textual Scholarship :438-442
The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla. James Joyce Literary Supplement :15-15
Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian. James Joyce Literary Supplement :9-9
Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford. English Literature in Transition: 18801920 :211-216
Yeats and Artistic Power, by Phillip L. Marcus
Harper Margaret Mills (1994) Yeats and Artistic Power, by Phillip L. Marcus. English Literature in Transition: 18801920 :1-4
The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran. Studies in Short FIction :99-100
Yeats and Postmodernism, ed. Leonard Orr
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) Yeats and Postmodernism, ed. Leonard Orr. Christianity and Literature :364-365
Yeats and English Renaissance Literature, by Wayne K. Chapman
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) Yeats and English Renaissance Literature, by Wayne K. Chapman. South Carolina Review :185-187
All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola
Harper Margaret Mills (1992) All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola. Christianity and Literature :365-367
Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt
Harper Margaret Mills (1991) Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt. Christianity and Literature :320-322
Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker
Harper Margaret Mills (1991) Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker. Christianity and Literature :93-95
Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers
Harper Margaret Mills and Timothy J. McNiven (1988) Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers. Journal of Arts Education :25-28
Look Homeward: A Life of Thomas Wolfe, by David Herbert Donald
Harper Margaret Mills (1988) Look Homeward: A Life of Thomas Wolfe, by David Herbert Donald. Southern Literary Journa :88-94
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.
Harper Margaret Mills (1987) 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.. South Atlantic Review :149-152
Other Publications
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
Harper Margaret Mills (2011) 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. Irish Review :112-115
Joyce and Reality: The Empirical Strikes Back, by John Gordon
Harper Margaret Mills (2007) Joyce and Reality: The Empirical Strikes Back, by John Gordon. :143-147
Greek and Hellenic Culture in Joyce, by R. J. Schork
Harper Margaret Mills (2000) Greek and Hellenic Culture in Joyce, by R. J. Schork. :568-571
A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner
Harper Margaret Mills (1999) A Yeats Dictionary: Persons and Places in the Poetry of William Butler Yeats, by Lester I. Conner.
Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) Yeats's Worlds: Ireland, England and the Poetic Imagination, by David Pierce. James Joyce Literary Supplement :3-
The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard
Harper Margaret Mills (1997) The Collected Letters of W. B. Yeats, Vol. 3 (19011904), ed. John Kelly and Ronald Schuchard. Ann Arbor, MI : UMI Research Press Yeats: An Annual of Critical and Textual Studies :351-363
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
Harper Margaret Mills (1996) 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. Text: Transactions of the Society for Textual Scholarship :438-442
The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) The Girl Image as Subtext in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,' by Klára Weiss-Balla. James Joyce Literary Supplement :15-15
Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) Aesthetic Autobiography: From Life to Art in Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin, by Suzanne Nalbantian. James Joyce Literary Supplement :9-9
Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford
Harper Margaret Mills (1995) Gender and History in Yeats's Love Poetry, by Elizabeth Butler Cullingford. English Literature in Transition: 18801920 :211-216
Yeats and Artistic Power, by Phillip L. Marcus
Harper Margaret Mills (1994) Yeats and Artistic Power, by Phillip L. Marcus. English Literature in Transition: 18801920 :1-4
The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats, Volume XII: John Sherman and Dhoya, ed. Richard J. Finneran. Studies in Short FIction :99-100
Yeats and Postmodernism, ed. Leonard Orr
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) Yeats and Postmodernism, ed. Leonard Orr. Christianity and Literature :364-365
Yeats and English Renaissance Literature, by Wayne K. Chapman
Harper Margaret Mills (1993) Yeats and English Renaissance Literature, by Wayne K. Chapman. South Carolina Review :185-187
All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola
Harper Margaret Mills (1992) All Contraries Confounded: The Lyrical Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes and Marguerite Duras, by Karen Kaivola. Christianity and Literature :365-367
Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt
Harper Margaret Mills (1991) Abortion, Choice, and Contemporary Fiction: The Armageddon of the Maternal Instinct, by Judith Wilt. Christianity and Literature :320-322
Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker
Harper Margaret Mills (1991) Swan and Shadow: Yeats's Dialogue with History, by Thomas R. Whitaker. Christianity and Literature :93-95
Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers
Harper Margaret Mills and Timothy J. McNiven (1988) Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, and Nancy J. Vickers. Journal of Arts Education :25-28
Look Homeward: A Life of Thomas Wolfe, by David Herbert Donald
Harper Margaret Mills (1988) Look Homeward: A Life of Thomas Wolfe, by David Herbert Donald. Southern Literary Journa :88-94
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.
Harper Margaret Mills (1987) 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.. South Atlantic Review :149-152