Professor Sharon Ruston
ProfessorResearch Overview
My main research interests are in the relations between the literature, science and medicine of the Romantic period, 1780-1820. My first book, Shelley and Vitality (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), explored the medical and scientific contexts which inform Shelley's concept of vitality in his major poetry. In 2010 I published Romanticism: An Introduction (Continuum). In 2013 I published Creating Romanticism: Case Studies in the Literature, Science, and Medicine of the 1790s (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). With Tim Fulford, I co-edited the Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy, published in four volumes by OUP in 2020. The Science of Life and Death in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was published in November 2021 by the Bodleian Library Press.
Career Details
2019-2023: Lancaster University: Head of English Literature and Creative Writing Department
2013-present: Lancaster University: Chair in Romanticism
2009–2013: University of Salford: Chair in Nineteenth-Century Literature and Culture
2006–2009: Keele University: Senior Lecturer in English
2000–2006: University of Wales, Bangor: Lecturer in English Literature
Research Grants
AHRC Research Grant: 'Humphry Davy's Notebooks: How Poetry Helped Create Scientific Knowledge' (2021-2024): £1,008,000.
AHRC Follow-on-Funding: Crowdsourced Transcriptions of Humphry Davy's Notebooks (2019): £78,758
AHRC Leadership Fellow: A Man of Science and a Poet: Humphrey Davy's Letters, Life and Legacy (2015-17): £238,812
British Academy Small Research Grant (2017): £9947
Chemical Heritage Foundation Fellowship (2017): $6000
British Society for Literature and Science (2017): £378
Society for the History of Chemistry and Alchemy (2017): £750
Scouloudi Institute for Historical Research funding bid (2016): £400
AHRC Being Human festival (2014): £4000 (Co-I)
MHRA Senior Research Associate for the Davy Letters Project (2014-15): £2300
AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Awards: Extended Programme with the Working-Class Movement Library (2010-15): £230,000 (Co-PI)
AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Training Programme (2009-11): ‘Theories and Methods: Literature, Science and Medicine’ (www.LitSciMed.org.uk): £48,131
AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award with the Royal Institution (2009-12): £50,040
British Academy Small Research Grant (February 2010): £7390. Project: The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy and his Circle
RISF Funding, University of Salford (January 2010): £3750. Project: The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy and his Circle
Society for the History of Chemistry and Alchemy (SHAC) (January 2010): £1000. Project: The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy and his Circle
Wellcome Trust Research Expenses Grant (January 2010): £4993.50. Project: The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy and his Circle (Co-PI)
British Society for the History of Science Grant (October 2009): £500. Project: The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy and his Circle
British Academy Small Research Grant (July 2008): £4575. Project: ‘Vital Romanticism: Literature, Science and Medicine in the Romantic Period’
British Academy Small Research Grant (July 2007): £2125. Project: ‘Mary Wollstonecraft and Natural History’
AHRB Research Leave to match institutional leave granted by University of Wales, Bangor (September British Academy Small Research Grant for research in the British Library and the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine (February 2004): £2871
British Academy Small Research Grant for research during the summer of 2003 in the British Library and the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine (January 2003): £2668
British Academy American Libraries Exchange Agreement grant for research at the Huntington Library in California (June 2002): $5000
Current Teaching
British Romanticism
External Roles
I am a Fellow of the English Association and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. I sit on a number of editorial boards.
Web Links
Interview for Shelley200 (October 2021): #Shelley200 Interview: Professor Sharon Ruston – The Shelley Conference
Davy Notebooks Project website: https://wp.lancs.ac.uk/davynotebooks/
Press:
Real science that 'inspired' the gruesome story of Frankenstein's monster revealed | The Sun
PressReader.com - Digital Newspaper & Magazine Subscriptions (The Sunday Telegraph)
Pilot Project transcriptions of 5 Humphry Davy Notebooks: http://humphrydavy.org.uk/notebooks/
The Collected Letters of Sir Humphry Davy (to be published in four volumes by OUP in 2020). The project website is here: http://www.davy-letters.org.uk/
LitSciMed: www.litscimed.org.uk
‘When respiring gas inspired poetry’, The Lancet, 381 (2 February 2013), 366–67: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2813%2960157-9/fulltext
Guardian Blog Post (November 2013): http://www.theguardian.com/science/the-h-word/2013/nov/12/mary-wollstonecraft-gbbo-feminism-nature-nurture
Royal Society Podcast (September 2012): http://royalsociety.org/events/2012/rights-of-woman/
Aeolian Harp Podcast: https://soundcloud.com/sounding-out-aeolus/sounding-out-aeolus-podcast-4
BBC New Generation Thinkers: Science and Poetry (2014): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04n2zcp
BBC Making History: Joseph Priestley and Warrington (2015): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b065vrl6
Medium Brow Podcast on Frankenstein (April 2016): http://poddirectory.com/episode/12348341/ep-93-medium-brow-starring-dr-michael-brooks
Little Atoms Podcast on Frankenstein (July 2017): http://littleatoms.com/science/little-atoms-launches-converging-cultures-podcast
Interview with Keats-Shelley Association of America on Shelleys and Chemistry (2017): https://k-saa.org/shelley-conference-sharon-ruston-on-chemistry-and-the-shelleys/
Radio 4 - Archive on 4, Frankenstein Lives! (Jan 2018): http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09lvy6l
Big Issue North on Frankenstei (Jan 2018): https://www.bigissuenorth.com/features/2018/01/creature-discomforts/
Optima Magazine on Frankenstein (March 2018): http://www.optimamagazine.co.uk/read/leisure/books/1802-frankensteins-legacy
Vox: The real experiments that inspired Frankenstein (May 2019): https://www.vox.com/videos/2019/5/10/18564319/real-experiments-inspired-frankenstein-history-club
LitSciPod podcast (January 2020), 'Science isn't separate': https://open.spotify.com/show/6t9VqpsReFJqG5Zcvr4Fbt
Qualifications
University of Liverpool
- 1995–99 Ph.D. thesis, ‘P. B. Shelley and the Science of Life’
- 1994–95 M.A. degree in English Renaissance and Romantic Literature
- 1991–94 B.A. (hons) degree in English Language and Literature (First Class)
University of Wales, Bangor
- 2003 Postgraduate Certificate of Teaching in Higher Education (Distinction)
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (from 2015)
PhD Supervisions Completed
- Alison Morgan, ‘P. B. Shelley’s Popular Songs’ (2009-12). Completed.
- Wahida Amin, ‘Science and Poetry: The Case of Humphry Davy’ (AHRC Funded; 2009-13). Completed.
- Jessica Roberts, ‘Vitalism in the Periodical Press’ (2010-14). Completed.
- Jennifer Morgan, ‘Transmission and Reception of P. B. Shelley in Working-Class Journals’ (AHRC Funded; 2010-14). Completed.
PhDs Examined
- January 2018: External Examiner to Ashleigh Blackwood, ‘Managing Maternity: Reproduction and the Literary Imagination in the Eighteenth Century’ (Northumbria University, PhD)
- November 2012: External Examiner to Leanne Stokoe, “Poetry […] concealed by facts and calculating processes”: political economy in the prose of Percy Bysshe Shelley (University of Newcastle, PhD)
- November 2012: Examiner for Prof. Dr. Ralf Haekel: ‘The Soul in British Romanticism’ (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Habiliitation, second PhD thesis)
- January 2009: External Examiner to Jane Darcy, ‘The interaction of medical and literary constructions of melancholy and madness in biographical writing, 1750–1900’ (King’s College, London, PhD)
PhD Supervision Interests
Romantic literature and science, medicine and technology; Romantic poetry; literature and science; literature and medicine; animals and literature; Romantic women's writing and science and/or medicine; literature and chemistry; literature and natural history.
The Future of Human Reproduction: new agendas and methods for the Humanities and Social Sciences
22/04/2022 → 22/07/2025
Research
IAA - AHRC Impact Acceleration Account
01/04/2022 → 31/03/2026
Research
Humphry Davy's Notebooks: How Poetry Helped Create Scientific Knowledge
18/01/2021 → 18/07/2024
Research
Crowdsourced Transcriptions of Humphry Davy's Notebooks
11/03/2019 → 10/12/2019
Research
Reproduction and Speculative Cultures
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
The Notebooks of Humphry Davy
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
The Davy Notebooks Project
Invited talk
Poetry, Chemistry, and Everything in Between: Humphry Davy's Notebooks
Invited talk
Royal Society (Publisher)
Editorial activity
What did Humphry Davy write in his Notebooks?
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
What did Humphry Davy write in his notebooks?
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Reading Davy's Notebooks
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Library Workshop: Davy Notebooks Project
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Library Workshop: Davy Notebooks Project
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Davy Notebooks Library Workshop
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
International Conference of Three Societies on Literature and Science
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Protean Poetics in Humphry Davy's Notebooks
Invited talk
The Davy Notebooks Project
Invited talk
The Science of Life and Death in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
BARS-Wordsworth Grasmere Digital Event: Romanticism and Science: The Case of Sir Humphry Davy
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Talk to the Friends of the Wordsworth Trust
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Poetry Reading Workshop
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Humphry Davy's Notebook
Invited talk
Davy Notebooks Project travelling exhibition (London, Morpeth, and Grasmere)
Types of Public engagement and outreach - Festival/Exhibition
Romantic Science
Invited talk
Davy Notebooks Project ‘Science and/or Poetry: Interdisciplinarity in Notebooks’ conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Davy Notebooks Project ‘Science and/or Poetry: Interdisciplinarity in Notebooks’ conference
Participation in conference - Academic
Davy Notebooks Project Online Volunteers’ Meeting (24 July 2023, on Teams)
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Laughing gas and the scientific pursuit of the sublime
Festival/Exhibition/Concert
The Science of Life and Death in Frankenstein
Invited talk
'Laughing gas and the scientific pursuit of the sublime'
Festival/Exhibition/Concert
Honorable Mention for the Morton N. Cohen Award for a Distinguished Edition of Letters
Prize (including medals and awards)
- Digital Humanities
- FASS Health Hub
- Lancaster Centre for Digital Humanities
- Literature, Science and Medicine