Dr Andy Wimbush

Institute of Continuing Education (ICE)

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Biography

Dr Andy Wimbush holds a BA and a PhD in English from the University of Cambridge. He specialises in the study of twentieth-century and contemporary literature, particularly experimental fiction, the relationship between literature, religion, and philosophy, and also the work of Samuel Beckett. He is the author of Still: Samuel Beckett’s Quietism (Ibidem, 2020) and has published in The Journal of Beckett Studies, Literature and Theology, and various academic books. Andy has taught at the University of Cambridge since 2013 and is an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Qualifications:

PhD, University of Cambridge

MA (Environmental Politics), King’s College London

BA, University of Cambridge

Associate Fellowship (Teaching), Higher Education Academy

Research

Andy's research focuses on modernist and experimental fiction, particularly Samuel Beckett. He has also worked on autobiography, ecocriticism, literary influence, and literature's relationship with philosophy of mind, ethics, and religious mysticism.

His teaching work has covered British, Irish and American literature since 1850, Shakespeare, the metaphysical poets, film studies, theatre and performance, moral philosophy, psychoanalysis, close reading, and academic study skills.

Selected Publications

JOURNAL ARTICLES

‘Hey prestos and Humilities: Two of Beckett’s Christs’. The Journal of Beckett Studies, 25:1 , 2016
"Humility, Self-Awareness, and Religious Ambivalence: Another look at Beckett's 'Humanistic Quietism'", The Journal of Beckett Studies, 23:2, September , 2014
‘Humility, Self-Awareness, and Religious Ambivalence: Another look at Beckett’s “Humanistic Quietism”’, The Journal of Beckett Studies, 23:2, September , 2014
‘Omnipotence and Omniscience: Beckett’s Joyce vs Beckett’s Gide’ in Beckett and Modernism, eds. Olga Beloborodova, Pim Verhulst and Dirk Van Hulle (London: Palgrave Macmillan) , 2018
‘“Christ this is getting tedious!”: Beckettian tone versus narrated memory in B.S. Johnson’s Trawl’, in Experiments in Life Writing, eds. Julia Lajta-Novak and Lucia Boldrini (London: Palgrave Macmillan) , 2017

BOOK CHAPTERS

‘Omnipotence and Omniscience: Beckett’s Joyce vs Beckett’s Gide’ in Beckett and Modernism, eds. Olga Beloborodova, Pim Verhulst and Dirk Van Hulle (London: Palgrave Macmillan) , 2017 (IN PRESS)
‘“Christ this is getting tedious!”: Beckettian tone versus narrated memory in B.S. Johnson’s Trawl’, in Experiments in Life Writing, eds. Julia Lajta-Novak and Lucia Boldrini (London: Palgrave Macmillan) , 2016 (IN PRESS)
"Palaeozoic Profounds: Samuel Beckett and Ecological Time" in Time and Temporality, ed. Robin Vogelzang. (Leuven: Peeters Publishing) , 2015
"Biology, the Buddha and the Beasts: The influence of Ernst Haeckel and Arthur Schopenhauer on Samuel Beckett's How It Is" in Encountering Buddhism in Twentieth Century British and American Literature, eds. Lawrence Normand and Alison Winch (London: Bloomsbury) , 2013

CONFERENCE PAPERS

‘Transgressive Compassion: Samuel Beckett’s How It Is and the Natural Order’. Presented at ‘Beckett and Politics’, University of Reading, 3-4 November , 2016
‘Omnipotence and Omniscience: Beckett’s Joyce vs Beckett’s Gide from Dream of Fair to Middling Women to Molloy’. Presented at ‘Beckett and Modernism’, the Second Annual Conference of the Samuel Beckett Society, University of Antwerp, 27-30 April , 2016
‘Against the Latin Mind: Beckett’s Quietist Aesthetic’. Presented at ‘Beckett and Europe’, University of Reading, 28-29 October , 2015
"The Tranquillity of Decomposition: Beckett's Molloy, Gide's Dostoïevsky, and the Quietist Novel". Presented at The Oxford Beckett Seminar. Invited speaker. June , 2014
"Adapting the Uncanny: Stanley Kubrick's The Shining". Presented at The Centre for Psychoanalysis Postgraduate Conference, June , 2014
"Afterlife all life long: Rebirth in Samuel Beckett's novel series, via Proust and Schopenhauer". Presented at The Long Modernist Novel: A Comparative Conference, Birkbeck College, University of London, April , 2014
‘The Sage Under the Bo: Interspecies ethics and epic narratives in Samuel Beckett’s How It Is.’ Presented at the Darwin College Humanities Seminar, 21 October. Invited speaker , 2014
‘Palaeozoic Profounds: Samuel Beckett’s Geology of Conscience’. Presented at the Time and Temporality Conference, University of Leuven, 16-19 September. Invited speaker , 2013
‘Salvage and Salvation: Samuel Beckett’s modes of reading, 1929-1938’. Presented at the Writers and their Libraries Conference, Senate House, University of London, 15-16 March , 2013

ELECTRONIC ARTICLES

‘The Pretty Quietist Pater: Samuel Beckett’s Molloy and the Aesthetics of Quietism’, Literature and Theology. Published online, June 16 2015, doi: 10.1093/litthe/frv025 , 2015

BOOKS

Still: Samuel Beckett’s Quietism (Stuttgart: Ibidem Press) , 2020

Memberships

British Association of Modernist Studies

Past courses taught

The shape of ideas: thinking with Beckett, Melville, and Shakespeare | Summer Programme course

Moby Dick an introduction to a great American novel | Weekend Courses

The plays of Samuel Beckett | Weekend Courses

Contemporary fiction and the return of Modernism | Summer Programme course

Tears and laughter: Samuel Beckett and Irish comic fiction | Summer Programme course

The plays of Samuel Beckett | Virtual Festival of Learning

Moby-Dick: an introduction to a great American novel | Virtual Festival of Learning

Tears and laughter: Samuel Beckett and Irish comic fiction | Summer Programme course

Moby-Dick: an introduction to a Great American Novel | Summer Programme course

Undergraduate Certificate in English Literature: Texts and Contexts | Undergraduate Certificate/Diploma

Tears and laughter: the Irish comic novel | Summer Programme course

21st-century fiction and the ghosts of Modernism | Summer Programme course

21st century fiction: writing now | Short Course (2-7 days)

Undergraduate Certificate in English Literature: Approaches to Literary Study | Undergraduate Certificate/Diploma

21st-century fiction and the return of Modernism | Summer Programme course

Contemporary American literature and the spiritual quest | Summer Programme course

One day, one novel: Murphy by Samuel Beckett | Short Course (1 day)

Matters of life and death: 21st-century fiction | Summer Programme course

One day, one novel: On The Road | Short Course (1 day)

One day, one novel: Moby Dick | Short Course (1 day)

Contemporary fictions: experiments in storytelling | Short Course (5 wks part-time)

Religion and contemporary literature | Summer Programme course

Undergraduate Certificate in English Literature II | Undergraduate Certificate/Diploma

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