Richard O'Brien

• PhD in Shakespeare Studies. Thesis: ‘Shakespeare and the Development of Verse Drama’ - The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham (2014-2017)
• MA Shakespeare and Creativity - The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham (2013-14) 
• BA English and French - Brasenose College, University of Oxford (2008-2012)

I grew up in Lincolnshire and took my BA at Brasenose College, Oxford, in English and French. After graduating in 2012, I spent six months working as a radio host for a live daily English language show. I returned to academia the following year to take up a place in the first cohort for the Shakespeare Institute’s MA in Shakespeare and Creativity, where I went to complete my PhD: a wide-ranging study of the development of verse drama from Shakespeare to the present day, incorporating elements of creative practice.

My academic interests span from the 16th century to contemporary poetry, and I am always looking for ways to bridge the gap between them, as well as the more significant gap between critical and creative practice. I am a specialist in early modern theatre, and the particular focus of my current research is on contemporary fictional representations of the early modern period. My work in this field has been published in the Ben Jonson Journal, and presented at international conferences including the International Federation for Theatre Research (Stockholm, 2016) and the Shakespeare Association of America (2017, 2018). In March 2017, I was Global Premodern Studies Visiting Professor at the University of Minnesota.

Alongside my academic work, I also write creatively. My poetry has been published in three pamphlets with UK-based independent presses, and has featured in magazines including Poetry London, The White Review and The Literateur, as well as a number of anthologies: a full list of publications is available on my personal website. I have performed at the BBC Proms for a Radio 3 broadcast, translated work from French and Latvian, and edited anthologies for the Emma Press, where I am currently a commissioning editor. In 2017 I was one of six winners of the Society of Authors' Eric Gregory Award. I also write for children and do school visits for Pop Up Projects. My first play for children, an adaptation of Oscar Wilde's The Selfish Giant, premiered at the Arcola Theatre, London, in December 2016.

I teach on the Shakespeare Institute's unique MA course in Shakespeare and Creativity, leading the modules Shakespearience and Shakespeare and Society. My undergraduate teaching includes Shakespeare: Elizabethan and Jacobean, Songs and Sonnets, and the first-year modules in Poetry and Prose. Previously I taught in the Department of Creative Writing at UoB, and supervised creative dissertations largely in playwriting at undergraduate and Masters level.

The development of verse drama in Britain from the 16th century to the present day, particularly as understood in dialogue with Shakespeare; fictional depictions of Shakespeare and especially Shakespeare’s contemporaries, with a focus on Ben Jonson and Christopher Marlowe; incidental uses of Shakespeare in popular music and pop culture; the relationship between politics and poetic form; contemporary poetry; depictions of class in post-war British literature and music, including a project on the songwriter Jake Thackray: Gather a Bud or Two for Jake

I am a Commissioning Editor for the Emma Press, a regional press of growing national importance (featured in The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, BBC Radio 6 Music), developing poetry anthologies for adults and publications for children. I have also chaired three conferences — 'Poetry and TV', co-chaired with Dr Jenna Clake (University of Teesside) in July 2018, 'Out of Practice', an event showcasing practice led research, in collaboration with Tom White (June 2016), and the 2015 British Graduate Shakespeare Conference, the largest postgraduate event of its kind in early modern drama.

In 2016 I served as an academic consultant with Professor Ewan Fernie on ‘Our Shakespeare’ — the Library of Birmingham’s 2016 Shakespeare Exhibition, in collaboration with partners from the Library of Birmingham and the British Library. I have also produced schools resources for the Poetry Society, and participated in the Pop Up Festival arts programme in primary schools in Hackney and Telford to deliver writing workshops based around the CLiPPA-shortlisted children's poetry anthology Falling Out of the Sky (Emma Press, 2015) and my co-translation of the children's poetry collection The Noisy Classroom by Ieva Flamingo.