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Prof Tony Williams

Professor

Department: Humanities

Tony Williams is a poet and fiction writer. His practice research into the forms and techniques of medieval writing produced two novels, Nutcase (2017), an adaptation of the Icelandic saga of Grettir the Strong into a contemporary setting, and most recently Cole the Magnificent (2023), a picaresque which draws on a range of medieval forms and the ‘mixed modality’ of saga narrative in which the real and the fantastical coexist. His poetry collection Hawthorn City (2019) also engages with medieval material while continuing the interest in landscape and the contemporary pastoral developed in his earlier collections.

His poetry has been shortlisted for the Aldeburgh First Collection Prize, the Portico Prize for Literature and the Michael Murphy Memorial Prize. His flash fiction collection All the Bananas I’ve Never Eaten (2012) won Best Short Story Collection in the 2013 Saboteur Awards, and the visual sonnet sequence All the Rooms of Uncle’s Head (2011) was the Poetry Book Society’s Pamphlet Choice. He has also published critically on the reflective component of creative writing research and on the filmpoem.

He is currently a Co-I on the AHRC-funded project ‘Ephemera and writing about war, 1914 to the present’ for which he is writing a literary fantasy novel which continues his longstanding interest in Outsider Art and the visionary as well as themes of incarceration, trauma and containment. His current work in poetry explores via the discursive mode as a means of thinking about art and perception. He also works with Professor Billy Clark on the pragmatics of creative writing.

Tony has supervised a wide range of creative writing PhDs and is interested in hearing from candidates working in either poetry or prose.

Tony Williams

Campus Address

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  • Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
  • Caldebroc, by Antony Rowland, Arc Publications, 2023, 87 pp, £10.99, ISBN 978-1-911469-31-5, Williams, T. 23 Feb 2024, In: Bronte Studies
  • Cole The Magnificent, Williams, T. 15 Aug 2023
  • Grettir in Sheffield: Rewriting Icelandic saga as a contemporary novel, Williams, T. Oct 2019, In: TEXT
  • Hawthorn City, Williams, T. 15 Nov 2019
  • In Conversation: Capturing Reflection Between Poetry and Filmmaking Practice, Williams, T., Fentiman, A. Apr 2019, In: TEXT
  • On reflection: The role, mode and medium of the reflective component in practice as research, Green, M., Williams, T. 30 Apr 2018, In: TEXT
  • Nutcase, Williams, T. 15 Sep 2017
  • Love songs of carbon, Williams, T. Mar 2016, In: English
  • Flash fiction, Williams, T. 1 Apr 2014, The Handbook of Creative Writing (2nd edition), Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press
  • The Midlands, Williams, T. 2014

  • Susannah Ronnie Mapping a Mutiny: Engaging with documents relating to Henry Hudson’s final voyage to produce a poetry of fragmentation Start Date: 01/10/2017 End Date: 11/03/2022
  • Mark Holmes Performing Elvis: A Creative and Critical Exploration of American Post-War Popular Culture and Working-Class Masculinities in the North East of England Start Date: 23/02/2022
  • Sofie Schrey Wild Eyes: Writing a Rewilding Landscape Through an Ecocentric Hybrid Novel Start Date: 01/10/2021
  • Joseph Walton Moneykins: Using Speculative Fiction to Re-Imagine Money Start Date: 08/10/2013 End Date: 03/01/2017
  • Rowan Bowman On Barley Hill; Method-Writing and Spectral Landscapes in the Supernatural Gothic Horror Novel Start Date: 02/10/2012 End Date: 03/01/2017
  • Catherine Ayres ‘Small Finds: using poetry as an archaeological process to link the lived experience of modern women with that of women living in the forts on Hadrian’s Wall at the time of Roman occupation.’ Start Date: 01/10/2017 End Date: 10/05/2023
  • Ruth Stacey Feel Everything! Exploring the use of Symbolist poetics to write historical fiction through The Imagined Memoirs of Pamela Colman Smith Start Date: 01/10/2017
  • Nick Dodds Prose to Panel: Negotiating Authenticity and Visual Modality in the Comic-book Adaptation of a Literary Memoir Start Date: 01/10/2016
  • Daniel Hardisty Playing the Surreal: A Creative Writing Start Date: 20/01/2015

  • Education PGCert January 10 2011
  • English PhD September 01 2003
  • Fellow (FHEA) Higher Education Academy (HEA) 2011


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