About Dr Rebecca Newby
Dr Rebecca Newby is Assistant Professor (Teaching & Scholarship) in English (Academic Writing) at Northeastern University London. She holds BA and MA degrees from Cardiff University in English Literature and completed her AHRC-funded PhD in English and French medieval studies in 2020. Her teaching specialisms include the Arthurian legend, Chaucer, and medieval romance poetry, as well as close reading and academic writing. She has worked as an Assistant Editor on several academic journals, including Romantic Textualities: Literature and Print Culture, 1780-1840.
Qualifications
PhD in English Literature, Cardiff University (2020)
MA in English Literature, Cardiff University (2014)
BA in English Literature, Cardiff University (2013)
Dr Rebecca Newby's Research
Dr Rebecca Newby is a medievalist specialising in the narrative structures of English and French romance poetry. Her most recent project considered the different ways medieval poems end, with a focus on unfinished works, and sought to challenge the assumption that aborted narratives could result only from the death of the poet or material damage. She is particularly interested in narrative closure in the work of Chrétien de Troyes and Geoffrey Chaucer, but she has also conducted research into Victorian medievalism and experimental postmodern poetry.
Rebecca is an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a member of The International Arthurian Society. She is currently revising her doctoral thesis on ‘The Ends of Romance in Chrétien and Chaucer’ for book publication and preparing a paper on Chrétien’s Le Chevalier de charrette for the XVIIth Triennial Congress of the International Courtly Society at the University of British Columbia in 2023.
Publications
‘Romance with a Difference: The Squire and Sir Thopas’, The Chaucer Review (January 2023)
‘The Three Barriers to Narrative Closure in Hue de Rotelande’s Ipomedon and the Ends of the Middle English Translations’, in Cultural Translations in Medieval Romance, ed. by Megan Leitch and Victoria Flood, Boydell & Brewer (2022), 135-152.
‘Illusory Ends in Chrétien de Troyes’ Erec et Enide’, Arthurian Literature XXXV (2018), 1-21.
Dr Rebecca Newby's Teaching
At Northeastern London, Dr Newby teaches the First-Year Writing Studio and Cultures of London courses. Previously, she taught classes in medieval and early modern literature, the Victorian novel, and twentieth-century British poetry at Cardiff University. She is passionate about humanities education and teaching writing.