We are pleased to share news of the publication of The Routledge Companion to Elizabeth Gaskell, co-edited by Rebecca Styler (University of Lincoln) and Elizabeth Ludlow (Anglia Ruskin). The Companion will be available in early 2026 and can be pre-ordered now from Routledge.

The Routledge Companion to Elizabeth Gaskell brings together twenty-five chapters by emerging and established scholars that address Gaskell’s works, networks, contexts, and legacies. Contributors draw on a range of cutting-edge approaches including ecocriticism, queer theory, and studies in emotion. Particular attention is paid to the intersections between race, class, gender and religion in Gaskell’s fiction, as well as to the ongoing afterlife of her work in fiction, film, web-series, and fanfiction.   

The Companion is divided into three sections. ‘Texts’ showcases 11 innovative readings of individual works, including Gaskell’s well-known novels and biography of Charlotte Brontë, but also less familiar shorter tales, non-fiction pieces, and letters. ‘Themes’ contains 10 chapters that present original perspectives on various combinations of Gaskell’s works in relation to many cultural and literary concerns including the built environment, material and visual culture, abolition, and the rituals of mourning. ‘Legacies’ considers the reception of Gaskell’s writings from the late nineteenth century to the present day, addressing their adaptation into multiple forms and media.

The Routledge Companion builds on the 2007 Cambridge Companion to Elizabeth Gaskell (ed. Jill Matus), reflecting a further two decades of scholarly work and the expansion of Gaskell’s popular reputation. With its international and comprehensive scope, this volume attests that Gaskell continues to be a writer worthy of substantial critical attention, and signals new directions in Gaskell studies and Victorian studies more widely.

We are pleased to share a new publication co-edited by Owen Clayton (University of Lincoln) and Iain McIntyre (University of Melbourne): The Popular Wobbly: Selected Writings of T-Bone Slim (University of Minnesota Press, 2025)

This is the first critical edition of the writings of the prolific radical workers’ newspaper columnist and musician who rode the rails during the Great Depression.

The Popular Wobbly brings together a wide selection of writings by T-Bone Slim, the most popular and talented writer belonging to the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). Slim wrote humorous, polemical pieces, engaging with topics like labor and class injustice, which were mostly published in IWW publications from 1920 until his death in 1942. Although relatively little is known about Slim, editors Owen Clayton and Iain McIntyre coalesce the latest research on this enigmatic character to create a vivid portrait that adds valuable context for the array of writings assembled here.

Known as “the laureate of the logging camps,” Slim also composed numerous songs that have been performed and recorded by Pete Seeger, Utah Phillips, and Candie Carawan, who in 1960 updated Slim’s song “The Popular Wobbly” with Civil Rights–era lyrics. Slim’s witticisms, sayings, and exhortations (“Wherever you find injustice, the proper form of politeness is attack”; “Only the poor break laws—the rich evade them”) were widely discussed among fellow hobos across the “jungle” campfires that dotted the railways, and some even transcribed his commentary on boxcars that travelled the country. Yet despite Slim’s importance and fame during his lifetime, his work disappeared from public view almost immediately after his death.

The Popular Wobbly is the first critical edition of Slim’s work and also a significant contribution to literature about working-class writers, the radical labour movement, and the history and culture of nomadism and precarity. With this publication, Slim’s rediscovered writings can once again inspire artists and activists to march and agitate for a more just and equitable world.

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“With switchblade wit, the great IWW provocateur T-Bone Slim skewered injustice and uplifted the working class.”—Tom Morello

“This is lost wisdom.”—Billy Bragg

“[These writings have] the force of Hemingway plus the sting of Swift.”—Lee Taylor

“It remains impossible to reproduce T-Bone Slim’s matchless wordplay and invention of language. . . . We believe his madcap humor and sober truths because his brilliance hews so closely to our everyday experiences.”—David Roediger

“T-Bone Slim wrote the way an arsonist sets fires.”—Franklin Rosemont

“T-Bone Slim lived his life in North America, but he created a world of his own. This world was rooted in the harsh realities of migrant workers’ lives, but at the same time it was a world of fantasy, black humor, and language play, free from time and place. This world is just as alive and recognizable today as it was in his time.”—Kirsti Salmi-Niklander

“[T-Bone Slim] was the laureate of the logging camps.”—Harvey O’Connor

See the book on the University of Minnesota Press website!

Third-year English undergraduate students taking ENL3095 ‘Literature and the Visual 1770-1900’ visited the print studio on campus last month to experiment with making cyanotype prints. This hands-on session introduced them to the process of cyanotype printing but also explored the legacy of the pioneering Victorian photographer, Anna Atkins. Born in 1799, Atkins was a botanist and artist who used the cyanotype process to document plant specimens. In 1843, she published Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions, the first book to be illustrated with photographs. Her work not only contributed to the fields of botany and photography but also paved the way for future generations of female photographers.

Cyanotype printing is a photographic process that produces blue prints using UV light. This technique involves coating a surface, typically paper or fabric, with a light-sensitive solution of ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. When exposed to UV light, the coated surface develops a rich cyan-blue colour. In the Victorian period, Atkins would have used sunlight; on a cloudy day in spring, we could use the UV unit in the print studio.

During the workshop, students learned to coat their chosen materials, and expose their prints using the UV unit. They experimented with various objects like leaves, flowers, and seed pods, and created their own negatives based on drawings of botanical forms.

Cyanotype printing is considered relatively eco-friendly compared to many other photographic processes. It uses non-toxic chemicals like ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide, which are generally safe to handle with basic precautions. Unlike traditional photographic methods, cyanotype does not require harsh developers, fixers, or solvents, reducing its environmental footprint. (The rinse water from cyanotype prints is typically safe to wash down domestic drains in small amounts.)

Thanks to the students for coming along and experimenting, and to Sian Kirman-Wright, our Photography and Printmaking Technician for her help!

– Laura Gill

Dr Sarah Longair (Associate Professor in the History of Empire) has been named one of the 2024 winners of the prestigious National Teaching Fellowship and Collaborative Award for Teaching Excellence (CATE)!

You can read more about Sarah’s research-led, interdisciplinary teaching here.

We are very pleased to share the news that Owen Clayton’s book Vagabonds, Tramps, and Hobos: The Literature and Culture of U.S. Transiency 1890–1940 (Cambridge University Press, 2023) has won the esteemed BAAS (British Association for American Studies) book prize this year.

The most enduring version of the hobo that has come down from the so-called ‘Golden Age of Tramping’ (1890s to 1940s) is an American cultural icon, signifying freedom from restraint and rebellion to the established order while reinforcing conservative messages about American exceptionalism, individualism, race, and gender. Vagabonds, Tramps, and Hobos shows that this ‘pioneer hobo’ image is a misrepresentation by looking at works created by transient artists and thinkers, including travel literature, fiction, memoir, early feminist writing, poetry, sociology, political journalism, satire, and music. This book explores the diversity of meanings that accrue around ‘the hobo’ and ‘the tramp’. It is the first analysis to frame transiency within a nineteenth-century literary tradition of the vagabond, a figure who attempts to travel without money. This book provide new ways for scholars to think about the activity and representation of US transiency.

To quote the BAAS book prize committee: 

This excellent book explores the roots of the idea of “the Hobo” in American society and literature and offers a compelling argument for the uniquely “Americanness” of the idea. By focusing on the period before some of the better-known figures/works (Kerouac, Thelma and Louise, etc) it puts them in a larger conversation around questions of labour, migration (or movement more generally), and identity. 

Tracing the evolution of the idea and highlighting distinctions between “vagrants,” “tramps,” and “hobos,” the book offers a nuanced framework for exploring the continued evolution of these ideas in later works. The range of sources and perspectives (memoirs, cartoons, newspapers, music, literature, academia) add richness and depth, showcasing the strengths of American Studies as a discipline.

You can order the book on the Cambridge University Press website here (LINK).