Prof Susan Sellers

Emeritus Professor

Researcher profile

Email

scs2@st-andrews.ac.uk

 

Biography

Susan Sellers studied in London and Paris, receiving a DEA from the Sorbonne and a PhD from the University of London. While in Paris she worked closely with leading French feminist writers, particularly Hélène Cixous. She has written several books including Myth and Fairy Tale in Contemporary Women's Writing and Hélène Cixous: Authorship, Autobiography and Love. Her first novel Vanessa and Virginia, a fictional account of the sibling rivalry between Virginia Woolf and the painter Vanessa Bell, was translated into numerous languages and adapted for the stage; her most recent novel, Firebird, explores the controversial marriage between the economist John Maynard Keynes and the Russian dancer Lydia Lopokova. She is co-editor of the Cambridge University Press edition of Woolf's writing and volume editor of Woolf's novel The Waves.

Research areas

My work falls into three main areas: creative writing, modernist and contemporary women's fiction and literary and feminist theory. I run the Cambridge University Press scholarly edition of the writings of Virginia Woolf, and am volume editor of Woolf’s novel The Waves. My novel exploring the sibling relationship between Woolf and the painter Vanessa Bell, Vanessa and Virginia, has been translated into multiple languages and adapted for the stage; my most recent novel Firebird about the controversial marraige between the economist John Maynard Keynes and the Russian dancer Lydia Lopokova has also been translated. I have  published widely in the general area of feminist literary theory, including Language and Sexual Difference, Myth and Fairy Tale in Contemporary Women’s Fiction, and several studies of the pioneering French feminist philosopher and writer Hélène Cixous.

Selected publications

• Postmodernism and the biographical novel

  Sellers, S. C., 18 Oct 2018, Conversations with Biographical Novelists: Truthful Fictions Across the Globe. Lackey, M. (ed.). New York: Bloomsbury Academic, p. 207-222 16 p.

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• ونسا و ویرجینیا

  Sellers, S. C., 2019, Tehran: Roshangaran, Iran.

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• Virginia Woolf: writing and the ordinary mind

  Sellers, S., 11 Jan 2018, Thinking Through Style: Non-Fiction Prose of the Long Nineteenth Century. Hurley, M. D. & Waithe, M. (eds.). Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 315-331 17 p.

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• Introduction

  Sellers, S. C. & Woolf, V., 19 Oct 2017, Orlando. Pan Macmillan

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• About 'Vanessa and Virginia'

  Sellers, S. C., 2017, (Submitted) Biographical Fiction: A Reader. Lackey, M. (ed.). Bloomsbury Academic

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• Woolf and the essay

  Sellers, S. C., 2017, Southport: Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain. 20 p. (Annual Virginia Woolf birthday lecture; vol. 18)

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• ヴァネッサとヴァージニア

  Sellers, S. C. & Kubota, N. (Translator), 2017, Sairyusha.

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• Virginia Woolf

  Sellers, S. C., 14 Jul 2016, Fifty One Key Feminist Thinkers: The Key Concepts. Marso, L. J. (ed.). Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, 50

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

 

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