Marielle Birks

OK, I am here for Gothic Polly Pocket

Patrick Leary Resource Development Grant Guidelines – RSVP The Research Society for Victorian Periodicals (RSVP) intends to grant one Patrick Leary Resource Development Grant each year to a single researcher or a team of researchers pursuing a project that…

Happy Monday! This is your friendly reminder that Leary Resource Development Grant applications are due this coming Sunday, March 15! Leary Grants offer up to $27,500 USD to support new tools, repositories, datasets, + other projects that deepen our engagement with the #19thC press.

Call for Proposals: Special / Themed Issues - International Nineteenth-Century Studies Association Call for Proposals Special / Themed Issues Advances in Nineteenth-Century Research, the journal of the International-Nineteenth Century Studies Association Follow on BlueSky Call for Book Reviews Adva...

A semi-regular reminder that @incsa.bsky.social's journal is open to receiving proposals for special issues. If you have an idea for a topic connected to 19thC studies in the broadest sense, do get in touch. Please share!

Details 👇
in-csa.com/themed-speci...

What did Beanie do before they met ITTO? Find out by backing our latest Kickstarter campaign for Beanie - a System Error One-Shot - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/simonbirks/beanie-a-system-error-one-shot

At one of my favourite Haunts (which has had a beautiful refurb since I last stopped in!) #ArmchairBooks #Edinburgh Such a treasure trove

Sequel to a Reminiscence The archive of enigmatic 19th-century writer Amy Levy has a new home at Cambridge University Library

Today on #IWD we honour Amy Levy, Jewish poet, novelist, essayist, and Cambridge Alumna.

🔎Levy's Archive at the UL: https://loom.ly/RHh3bbc

With thanks to @thefnl.bsky.social, Arts Council England, Rothschild Foundation, T. S. Eliot Foundation.

The Rossettis: Siblings and Spouses Discover a major new Rossetti exhibition in Wolverhampton as The Rossettis: Siblings and Spouses opens at Wightwick Manor and Gardens.

Just started @nationaltrust.org.uk Wightwick Manor exhibition about extended Rossetti family including newly acquired portrait of Christina. Wightwick's a beautiful house anyway and has permanent @demorganfoundation.bsky.social display www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/birmin...

‘A woman actually voted!’: Lily Maxwell and the Manchester by-election of November 1867 - The History of Parliament More than half a century before the partial enfranchisement of women in 1918, Lily Maxwell, a Manchester shopkeeper, cast a parliamentary vote. Dr Kathryn Rix

This #InternationalWomensDay we wanted to highlight Lily Maxwell, who was able to vote at a parliamentary by-election in 1867.

Dr Kathryn Rix explores how Maxwell was able to cast her vote over half a century before some women first gained the right to vote in 1918.

to write in long form is to reckon with yourself

Cover of 1994 book on architecture & social reform by Deborah Wiener. Cover depicts a London School Board building.

it’s #WHM, so I thought I’d post about books that explore women in/& architecture/built env’t & the women who write them. Women architectural historians go rather not seen. So today, an excellent book from 1994 & a link to a short piece I wrote about it. womenwritingarchitecture.org/annotation/e...

Marie Antointette Style this week #V&A

You can completely uninstall/disable copilot on Windows. Your system and local search will run faster afterward. www.howtogeek.com/how-to-rip-o...

Happy birthday to this beautiful gift of a human @simonbirks.com ! ❤️🎂❤️

CALL FOR PAPERS: PERFORMING EVIL: the mediation and display of diabolic spectres, 1700-2000'. 4 & 5 June 2026, Leuven. This conference explores the tangled histories of supernatural, diabolic evil and all kinds of spectral apparitions in the last three centuries – Walter Scott’s ‘malignant and unhappy beings’. Specifically, it is interested in how and why ghosts, spirits and related apparitional phenomena were framed as diabolic, demonic or malign manifestations from the afterlife. Diabolic connotations of ghosts and spirits did meaningful cultural work. They were mobilised to discredit ghost beliefs and spiritual practices, to delegitimise competing beliefs, or to invest doctrinal arguments with occult authority. They could also function as tools of scepticism and ridicule as well as triggers of wonder, fear and religiosity. Put differently, the nexus of ghosts and evil is deeply historical. And it was often articulated through performative means: in gestures and expressions of (dis)belief, in visual and textual representations, in séance rooms, on the stage and on the page. Emerging from this nexus are theatrical spirits of evil, staged, embodied, and made legible through mediation and display. In this sense, every ghost is a theatrical ghost. Through the focus on the construction and staging of diabolic spirits, this conference aims to develop a methodological framework for studying historical forms of occultism and demonology more broadly in terms of performance.

Exploring how the relationship of spectrality and evil has shifted in shape over time and across different cultures, the conference invites contributions that can consider a wide range of historical actors – clerics, mediums, ghost-hunters, debunkers, necromancers, stage performers, eyewitnesses. This conference aims to study cultural intersections and interactions to arrive at a more granular understanding of discursive, practical and material connections between spirits and evil. At the same time this lens zooms out, making visible broader dynamics of knowledge construction in specific historical moments. How, for instance, did hauntings and possessions shape communities and audiences? How did religious or folkloric ideas about the devil inform spectral encounters? We hope to bring together historians, art historians, theatre and literary scholars, folklorists and anthropologists from every stage in their career around the above questions. We welcome 20-minute papers on topics that include but are by no means limited to: - making spectral evil visible: performance, arts, media, technologies, popular cultures - making spectral evil invisible: popular and occult knowledge circulation - performing (un)belief: practices and rhetoric, summoning and debunking on the stage (from popular stages to the lecture hall and the laboratory) - materiality of spectres: the function of bodies and objects - diabolic spirits and (intellectual, vernacular, theological, folkloric) ideas about morality, mortality and temporality - occult performance and ‘cultural scripts’ of ghost encounters (from necromancy to poltergeists) - affect and emotions: fear, grief, trauma… and hope Send abstracts (c.250 words) and bios (c.100 words) to kristof.smeyers@kuleuven.be before 21 March 2026. Please do get in touch if you have any questions.

Hi everyone, I'm organising a conference in Leuven, 4-5 June, and you're all invited*! It's called 'Performing evil: the mediation and display of diabolic spectres 1700-2000' and here is the call for papers (get in touch if you'd like a pdf!). Please share widely!

*to submit an abstract before 21/3

18TH CENTURY BRITISH HISTORY PHD LIGHTNING TALKS CFP

Are you at the start of your PhD? Want to tell an eager and engaged audience about it in 5 mins? We want to hear the best PGR research about 18th Britain at our #LightningTalks event 29 April 2026.

Please see the poster for further information!

A foray into some exciting news from my other life with @bluefoxcomics.com; a blue fox creative team have had a second title release with Image Comics imprint Top Cow and it's big news, with issue one of their Lovecraft adaptation in shops today!

Skills Training in Archival Research (STAR) Workshop Join us for a hands-on workshop designed to help postgraduate students and researchers make the most of archival collections.

We have more Skills Training in Archival Research (STAR) workshops coming up!

Join staff at The London Archives for a hands-on workshop designed to help postgrad students and researchers make the most of archival collections.

📍 The London Archives
📅 1 April + 3 June
🕛️ 1-4:30pm

Just a little bit of something beautiful. Spring is fast approaching!

You now have until the 15th of February to send in your applications for our upcoming workshop on historical approaches to the non-human, ran in collaboration with @northernenvhistory.bsky.social.

Some fantastic applications in already, we look forward to reading yours!
🌿 🕷️ 🐀 🦠

The Senses and Medical Humanities A one-day workshop exploring sensory studies and medical humanities through short talks, creative activities, and networking.

Can you 'hear' disease? What does it feel like to 'smell' sickness?

We're excited to be hosting a one-day in-person workshop exploring sensory studies and medical humanities.

📅 Tue 24 Feb, 11am–4pm

Book your free spot 👇
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-senses...

A rare 19th/20th-century position open at Birkbeck!

don't forget to send in your abstracts for this VPFA study day. Women's bodily experiences are so often overlooked in fiction, so this study day is so important for bringing those to light.

On today’s episode of Knowing Animals, I speak to Zara-Louise Stubbs about animals and the ‘uncanny gastronomic’, focussing on her excellent 2023 @blpublishing.bsky.social collection.

The episode is available below or in all the usual podcast places.

knowinganimals.libsyn.com/episode-246-...

A Gas Balloon, a Fatal Flight to the North Pole, and the Lost Love Letter It Left Behind What happened to Nils Strindberg's missing missive? Plus: a Scoresby biography update and Arctic news.

There’s a lot going on in the world right now. Maybe you need a break. With cold bois and a missing love letter.

Introducing Arctic Archives, my newsletter uncovering gripping stories from the history of Arctic exploration and science. First up: the search for a lost message on Svalbard!

Novel Beginnings: Charles Dickens Birthday Virtual Conference — The Dickens Society Following the success of the virtual memorial conference, ‘Dickens and Death’, the Dickens Society is pleased to announce another virtual conference; ‘Novel Beginnings; Charles Dickens Birthday Virtua...

This Saturday, join us for a wonderful free online conference celebrating Dickens's birthday: www.dickenssociety.org/the-cricket/...

The Devil Wears Prada 2 | Official Trailer YouTube video by 20th Century Studios

ok so one of the gags of Milton's "Paradise Regained" is that Satan cannot remember literally anything that happened in the previous book ("Paradise Lost") and that is the gag they're doing here, which really does it for me

www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9HX...

I'm planning the annual charity teach-athon for Romancing the Gothic.

GOTHS FOR BREAKFAST is a full day of classes and workshops (more or less related to the Gothic) raising money for @magicbreakfastuk.bsky.social to feed hungry kids!

Looking for volunteer speakers! Get in touch!

Lead Curator: Modern Archives & Manuscripts (1601 – 1800) at British Library Explore an exciting academic career as a Lead Curator: Modern Archives & Manuscripts (1601 – 1800). Don't miss out on other academic jobs. Click to apply and explore more opportunities.

JOB ALERT: Lead Curator, Modern Archives & Manuscripts (1601-1800) at The British Library - closing date: 18th Feb

www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DQH179/l...

We don’t need AI training sponsored by the tech firms selling it. We need AI education to help people understand what it can’t do, and what dangers lie ahead if you entrust your life to it

Lecturer in Early Medieval History | King's College London

Anyway, good news! Open-ended lectureship in early medieval history at KCL.

www.kcl.ac.uk/jobs/136727-...