Dr Niall Sreenan
Lecturer in Comparative Literature
- Phone
- +44 (0)1334 46 4394
- ns259@st-andrews.ac.uk
- Office
- Room 308
- Location
- Buchanan
- Office hours
- Tuesday 12-2
Biography
I joined the University of St Andrews in August 2023 as Lecturer in Comparative Literature in the School of Modern Languages. I hold an MA (King’s College London) and a PhD (University College London) in Comparative Literature, and previously completed a joint honours degree in Music and English at University College Cork.
Before taking up this post, I was a Research Associate at the Policy Institute at King’s College London, contributing to applied, policy-led projects at the intersection of the humanities and social sciences, including managing large, impact-oriented grant-funded initiatives.
My teaching spans the Comparative Literature programme at both undergraduate and postgraduate level, from nineteenth-century European realism and twentieth-century political theatre to the history of utopian writing and thought and critical methods in Comparative Literature.
I am a member of the British Comparative Literature Association and the British Society for Literature and Science.
Selected publications
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Open access
The costs and benefits of research grant funding peer review
Pollitt, A., Taylor, C., Sreenan, N. & Grant, J., 24 Jun 2026, In: F1000Research. 15, 534.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Rethinking the human in the Darwinian novel: Zola, Hardy, and utopian fiction
Sreenan, N., 18 Dec 2025, Oxford: Legenda (Modern Humanities Research Association). 184 p. (Studies in comparative literature (Oxford, England); vol. 51)Research output: Book/Report › Book
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Open access
In the name of the father: Darwin, scientific authority and literary assimilation
Sreenan, N., 23 Apr 2024, From Shakespeare to autofiction: approaches to authorship after Barthes and Foucault. Procházka, M. (ed.). London: UCL Press, p. 91-108 18 p. (Comparative literature and culture).Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
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Utopian island realism in J. M. Synge’s travel narrative of The Aran Islands and Tomás O’Crohan’s autobiography The Islander
Sreenan, N., 21 Apr 2021, Landscapes of realism: rethinking literary realism in comparative perspectives - Volume I: Mapping realism. Göttsche , D., Mucignat, R. & Weninger, R. (eds.). Amsterdam: John Benjamins, p. 373–386 14 p. (Comparative history of literatures in European languages; vol. 32).Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
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Universal, acid: Houellebecq’s clones and the evolution of humanity
Sreenan, N., 2 Jan 2019, In: Modern and Contemporary France. 27, 1, p. 77-93 17 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Open access
Dreaming of islands: Individuality and utopian desire in post-darwinian literature
Sreenan, N., Nov 2017, In: Island Studies Journal. 12, 2, p. 267-280 14 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review