I enjoyed this unusually literary bit of marketing from my university with @mckeever.bsky.social

Edinburgh good reads: a modern Scottish literature bookshelf - Edinburgh Impact

Discover Dr Gerard McKeever’s favourite Scottish classics, inspiring quotations, and what he’s reading now for pure enjoyment.

impact.ed.ac.uk

Call for Papers: 'Politics, Place and Print Culture: The 14th International Walter Scott Conference', @edinburgh-uni.bsky.social, 28-30 June 2027, organised by @mckeever.bsky.social & team. Deadline for proposals: 1 October 2026. Details of financial support for PGRs to follow. tinyurl.com/yt2vj4x7

The special issue of Eighteenth Century Studies on coasts is now out! If you click on the link and scroll down a bit, the very eclectic table of contents is visible. Pleased to be a part of this. #CoastalHistory #CoastalStudies 🗃️ muse.jhu.edu/issue/55889

British.

Recorded on 4 Sept 2025 – Dr Gerard McKeever, lecturer in modern Scottish literature at @edinburgh-uni.bsky.social, speaks about Walter Scott’s relationship with Scotland, particularly through the lens of his so-called “Scotch Novels” #C19th #romanticism www.youtube.com/watch?v=twvr...

Dr Gerard McKeever - Scotch Novels

YouTube video by The Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott Club

youtube.com

Huge congrats to the wonderful @cleoocy.bsky.social who passed her viva today with no corrections!

Just watched There Will Be Blood for the first time in about ten years. Holy mackerel, what an unbelievable film. Had forgotten quite how unhinged Day-Lewis’s character is.

Went on a holiday and it was totally awesome

IDF soldiers have now themselves admitted they have been ordered to murder aid-seekers in Gaza. Truly an atrocity built on atrocity. www.haaretz.com/israel-news/...

I like the Pope, the Pope says nope

ian bremmer@ianbremmer.com · last yr.

pope leo speaks on the risks children face from using ai, saying he’s concerned about “the possible consequences of the use of ai on their intellectual and neurological development.” “access to data, however extensive, must not be confused with intelligence” he said.

The secrets are out! Great to see this years-long labour of love out in the world. The official publication date is June 28; available for pre-order on the OUP website now! global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Call for Applications: Stephen Copley Research Award Deadline 1st June 2025 The BARS Executive Committee has established the bursaries in order to help fund research expenses up to a maximum of £500. More information and how to apply: www.bars.ac.uk/main/index.p...

Normalise writing a nice quick note to scholars literally every time you read and like their work. Our world is small and getting smaller. We need encouragement.

3/3 Only at the very end of this rehearsal of the lore do we get to the real basis of the problems here:

Key lime time

Email I received from a senior colleague at Berkeley this week opened ‘Greetings from the anarcho-neofascist hellscape!’ … thoughts are with everyone in the US 🙏

A new Five Questions interview up on the BARS Blog (@bars.bsky.social) - @mckeever.bsky.social on his new monograph, Regional Romanticism: Literature and Southwest Scotland, c.1770–1830: www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=5944.

🔥🔥🔥 Some much needed good news at last!: www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/316427...

Shadow Ticket by Thomas Pynchon: 9781594206108 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books

The new novel from Thomas Pynchon Milwaukee 1932, the Great Depression going full blast, repeal of Prohibition just around the corner, Al Capone in the federal pen, the private investigation busines...

penguinrandomhouse.com

It could be an April Fool but, apparently, it’s publication day for this wee book. Thanks to all at @boydellandbrewer.bsky.social for bringing it into the world!

Fellowship opportunity here at Edinburgh for unaffiliated ECRs in C19 studies. Very happy to chat to anyone who’s interested in applying.

British Association for Romantic Studies ECRs & Postgraduates@bars-ecrs-pgrs.bsky.social · last yr.

We're delighted to announce that applications for the 2025-26 BARS/BAVS Nineteenth-Century Matters Fellowship are now open! Deadline for applications: Monday 12 May 2025. We look forward to hearing from you!

Big news! The digital edition of Alice Thornton's four Books is now complete and online. There are 1,019 pages (c. 270,000 words) of Thornton’s life-writings in both modernised and semi-diplomatic versions and they are fully searchable. #EarlyModern 🗃️ 📚 📜 thornton.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/posts/news/2...

“I have no doubt most of you feel that the on-going genocide is wrong, I likewise have no doubt each of you feel you did the best that you could (at the MLA, or elsewhere).” Please read @palumboliu.bsky.social’s open letter relinquishing his lifetime MLA membership. academeblog.org/2025/02/05/r...

Resignation Letter from the Modern Language Association (David Palumbo-Liu)

POSTED BY JENNIFER RUTH As readers are no doubt aware, the problem of undemocratic professional associations is coming more and more to the fore as members attempt to hold their scholarly and profe…

academeblog.org

I’m collecting literary maps relating to Scotland for a thing. A few examples here. If anyone has suggestions for others, I’d love to hear them 🙏

Spare a thought for the Burns scholar on Burns night, wincing in the corner with his precious little facts.

Truly among the worst things about living in the British countryside is the regular encounters with aggressive dogs, off the lead, frequently with the owner nowhere in sight. When (if) owner appears, they invariably expect you to adopt a fondly understanding attitude to their terrifying pet.

Does anyone know of book history/bibliographical work that imagines books as actors in the terms of actor-network theory?

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled is convincing literary scholars that a 35-year-ish Romantic Period is somehow equivalent to the whole of other centuries, and like 1,000 years of medieval history.

Applications are now open for 2025-26 Fellowships at IASH, with 60 places available! Apply here: www.iash.ed.ac.uk/application-... Senior/mid-career programmes close 28 Feb. Postdoctoral/early-career programmes close 25 April. See our Fellowship pages for details: www.iash.ed.ac.uk/fellowship-p...

This v interesting 1787 edition of Robert Burns’s poems has been brutally washed in solvent, probably by a lateC19 collector. This results in super clean pages but also a kind of cancelled, ghost marginalia that has been almost washed away. It’s like the book has repressed memories of a former life