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Dr Jonathan Gibson

Photograph of Jonathan Gibson

Profile summary

  • Central Academic Staff
  • Senior Lecturer
  • Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
  • School of Arts & Humanities
  • English & Creative Writing
  • jonathan.gibson

Professional biography

I am a specialist in early modern literature and book history, particularly manuscript culture of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Before joining the Open University in February 2013, I worked at the English Subject Centre, Royal Holloway, University of London, a national body that organised activities and published material in support of the teaching of English Literature, English Language and Creative Writing at university level. I was educated at St. John’s College, Oxford and University College London and have held lectureships at the University of Exeter, Durham University and Queen Mary, University of London. My first academic job was a post as Research Assistant to Professor Derek Brewer at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. For several years, I was a Research Fellow at the Perdita Project  (first at The Nottingham Trent University, then latterly at the University of Warwick), a pioneering Digital Humanities project dedicated to the recovery and detailed description of early modern women's manuscript writing.

Research interests

I have published research on many different early modern topics, including Ralegh, Wroth, Shakespeare, Sidney, Spenser, translation, the protocols of early modern letter-writing, codicology and Elizabethan fiction. For the last few years, much of my research has focused on the materiality of early modern manuscripts. Over the past few years, I have analysed Elizabeth I's love letters to the Duke of Anjou, discussed the influence of Renaissance hand-writing manuals on Elizabethan and Jacobean manuscripts, surveyed verse miscellanies in print and manuscript, and reviewed Sir Robert Cecil's comments on his son's handwriting. My most recent article identifies points in the manuscript of Lucy Hutchinson's life of her husband John Hutchinson where pages have been removed (The Seventeenth Century 38.3). With Carlo Bajetta (University of the Valle d'Aosta), I am general editor of the new Oxford University Press edition of the complete works of Sir Walter Ralegh. 

I am a member of the Open University’s Medieval and Early Modern Research Group and of its Book History and Bibliography Research Group. I have organised two series of research seminars for the Book History group:  Paper, Pen and Ink: Manuscript Cultures in Early Modern England (2012-13) and Paper, Pen and Ink 2: Manuscript Cultures in the Age of Print (2014-15).

I have supervised three Ph.D. theses to completion at the OU: on Freudian approaches to ​A Midsummer Night's Dream​, on schools outreach at Shakespeare's Globe in London, and on terrorism and early modern drama. 

I would welcome Ph.D. applications on early modern topics, particularly the following: sixteenth- and seventeenth-century manuscript culture (particularly letters, miscellanies and poetry); Sir Walter Ralegh; Elizabeth I; editing; early modern book history; Elizabethan and Jacobean literature; Shakespeare.

Teaching interests

I am currently Chair of the level 2 module A233 Telling Stories: The Novel and Beyond, for which I have written and presented material on Hardy and Shakespeare. I am deputy chair of A240, a new level 2 module currently in production, and am writing a unit for it on More's Utopia. I have recently written material on Milton and Anne Southwell for A893, the new OU MA in English Literature. Previously, I was Chair of the level 3 module  A334 English Literature from Shakespeare to Austen. During the production of A334, I was Part 1 chair and module deputy chair and wrote for Book 1 on As You Like It, Othello and Petrarchist poetry . I was deputy chair for A334's predecessor, AA306 Shakespeare: Text and Performance. I have worked for the OU on validation and PhD viva panels and as an academic reviewer. I have written extensively on pedagogical topics, in particular assessment and inclusive teaching. 

Impact and engagement

In April 2012 I co-organised Describing, Analysing and Identifying Early Modern Handwriting: Methods and Interests, a one-day conference at Merton College, Oxford. In 2014 I was Academic Consultant for the app developed alongside the award-winning BBCTV series The Secret Life of Books. In October 2018 I co-organised Sir Walter Ralegh: A Quadricentennial Symposium at Senate House in London to mark the anniversary of Ralegh's execution. 

My research on Elizabeth I's love letters was undertaken under the auspices of 'Writing Abroad', an EU-funded project based at the Università della Valle d‟Aosta in Italy. I co-edited the book that resulted from this project, along with colleagues in Italy and France, Carlo Bajetta and Guillaume Coatalen. With Carlo Bajetta, I am general editor of the Oxford Ralegh. I am currently Academic Reviewer for the English programme at the American College of Thessaloniki in Greece, an OU partner institution.

Research groups

NameTypeParent Unit
Book History and Bibliography Research GroupGroupFaculty of Arts

Publications

Making the Memoirs: missing leaves in the manuscript of Lucy Hutchinson’s life of John Hutchinson (2023-06-06)
Gibson, Jonathan
The Seventeenth Century, 38(3) (pp. 403-412)

The Development of William Cecil's Italic Handwriting (2020)
Gibson, Jonathan
Etudes Anglaises, 73(3) (pp. 329-346)

Robert Cecil's Handwriting Advice to his Son (2020)
Gibson, Jonathan and Coatalen, Guillaume
Etudes Anglaises, 73(3) (pp. 313-328)

Synchrony and process: editing manuscript miscellanies (2012-01)
Gibson, Jonathan
Studies in English Literature 1500-1900 (SEL), 52(1) (pp. 85-100)

The legal context of Spenser's Daphnaïda (2004-02)
Gibson, Jonathan
The Review of English Studies, 55(218) (pp. 24-44)

King Lear and the patronage system (1999-10)
Gibson, Jonathan
The Seventeenth Century, 14(2) (pp. 95-114)

Significant space in manuscript letters (1997-04)
Gibson, Jonathan
The Seventeenth Century, 12(1) (pp. 1-10)

Textual Introduction (2018-02-15)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Clarke, Elizabeth; Norbrook, David and Stevenson, Jane eds. The Works of Lucy Hutchinson, Volume 2: Theological Writings and Translations (pp. 49-58)
ISBN : 9780199247356 | Publisher : Oxford University Press | Published : Oxford

Textual Introduction (2018-02-15)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Clarke, Elizabeth; Norbrook, David and Stevenson, Jane eds. The Works of Lucy Hutchinson, Volume 2: Theological Writings and Translations (pp. 181-187)
ISBN : 9780199247356 | Publisher : Oxford University Press | Published : Oxford

Miscellanies in manuscript and print (2018-01-10)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Bates, Catherine ed. A Companion to Renaissance Poetry (pp. 103-114)
ISBN : 9781118585191 | Publisher : Wiley-Blackwell | Published : Chichester

From Palatino to Cresci: Italian Writing Books and the Italian Scripts of Early Modern English Letters (2016)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Daybell, James and Gordon, Andrew eds. Cultures of Correspondence in Early Modern Britain. Material Texts (pp. 29-47)
ISBN : 978-0-8122-4825-8 | Publisher : University of Pennsylvania Press | Published : Philadelphia

Introduction (2014-12-10)
Bajetta, Carlo M.; Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan
In: Bajetta, Carlo M.; Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan eds. Elizabeth I’s Foreign Correspondence: Letters, Rhetoric, and Politics. Queenship and Power (xix-xxv)
ISBN : 978-1-137-44841-5 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

Six Holograph Letters in French from Queen Elizabeth I to the Duke of Anjou: Texts and Analysis (2014)
Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan
In: Bajetta, Carlo M.; Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan eds. Elizabeth I’s Foreign Correspondence: Letters, Rhetoric, and Politics (pp. 27-62)
ISBN : 978-1-137-44840-8 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

'Dedans la plie de mon fidelle affection': Familiarity and Materiality in Elizabeth’s Letters to Anjou (2014)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Bajetta, Carlo M.; Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan eds. Elizabeth I's Foreign Correspondence Letters, Rhetoric, and Politics (pp. 63-89)
ISBN : 978-1-137-44840-8 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

Anne Cook Bacon (2012)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Sullivan, jr., Garrett A. and Stewart, Alan eds. The Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature (pp. 29-30)
ISBN : 1405194499 | Publisher : Wiley-Blackwell | Published : Chichester

The manuscript (2011-12-22)
Gibson, Jonathan; Norbrook, David and Barbour, Reid
In: Barbour, Reid and Norbrook, David eds. The Works of Lucy Hutchinson. Volume 1: The Translation of Lucretius (cxxiv-cxxxiii)
ISBN : 199247366 | Publisher : Oxford University Press | Published : Oxford

The queen's two hands (2011-04-12)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Petrina, Alessandra ed. Representations of Elizabeth I in Early Modern Culture (pp. 47-65)
ISBN : 978-0-230-27817-2 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

Arthur Gorges (2011)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Sullivan jr., Garrett A. and Stewart, Alan eds. The Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature (pp. 392-393)
ISBN : 1405194499 | Publisher : Wiley-Blackwell | Published : Chichester

Elizabeth Jocelin (2011)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Sullivan, jr., Garrett A. and Stewart, Alan eds. The Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature (pp. 545-547)
ISBN : 9781405194495 | Publisher : Wiley-Blackwell | Published : Chichester

Casting off blanks: hidden structures in early modern paper books (2010-11-24)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Daybell, James and Hinds, Peter eds. Material Readings of Early Modern Culture: Texts and Social Practices, 1580-1730. Early Modern Literature in History (pp. 208-228)
ISBN : 9780230223523 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

Letters (2010-04-13)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Hattaway, Michael ed. A New Companion to English Renaissance Literature and Culture. Blackwell Companions to Literature and Culture (pp. 453-460)
ISBN : 978-1-4051-8762-6 | Publisher : Blackwell | Published : Chichester

Tragical histories, tragical tales (2009-09-10)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Pincombe, Mike and Shrank, Cathy eds. Oxford Handbook of Tudor Literature, 1485-1603 (pp. 521-536)
ISBN : 978-0-19-920588-2 | Publisher : Oxford University Press | Published : Oxford

Editing Perdita: texts, theories, readers (2009-02)
Gibson, Jonathan and Wright, Gillian
In: Hurley, Ann Hollinshead and Goodblatt, Chanita eds. Women Editing/Editing Women: Early Modern Women Writers and the New Textualism (pp. 155-173)
ISBN : 978-1-4438-0178-2 | Publisher : Cambridge Scholars Publishing | Published : Newcastle upon Tyne

The Perdita Project: women's writing, manuscript studies and XML tagging (2008-06-30)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Bowen, William R. and Siemens, Raymond G. eds. New Technologies and Renaissance Studies. Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies (324) (pp. 230-242)
ISBN : 978-0-86698-369-3 | Publisher : Iter Inc. in collaboration with ACMRS (Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies) | Published : Tempe, AZ

Introduction (2005)
Clarke, Elizabeth and Gibson, Jonathan
In: Seal Millman, Jill and Wright, Gillian eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Poetry (pp. 1-10)
ISBN : 978-0-7190-6917-8 | Publisher : Manchester University Press | Published : Manchester

Lady Mary Wroth, Pamphilia to Amphilanthus (2005)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Seal Millman, Jill and Wright, Gillian eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Poetry (pp. 35-66)
ISBN : 719069165 | Publisher : Manchester University Press | Published : Manchester

Jane Seager's translations of the ten sibyls' prophecies of the birth of Christ (2005)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Seal Millman, JIll and Wright, Gillian eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Poetry (pp. 15-19)
ISBN : 0-7190-6916-5 | Publisher : Manchester University Press | Published : Manchester

Anne Southwell's Poetry (2005)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Seal Millman, Jill and Wright, Gillian eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Poetry (pp. 57-76)
ISBN : 0-7190-6916-5 | Publisher : Manchester University Press | Published : Manchester

Introduction (2004)
Burke, Victoria E. and Gibson, Jonathan
In: Burke, Victoria E. and Gibson, Jonathan eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Writing: Selected Papers from the Trinity/Trent Colloquium (pp. 1-7)
ISBN : 0-7546-0469-1 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Katherine Parr, Princess Elizabeth and the crucified Christ (2004)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Burke, Victoria E. and Gibson, Jonathan eds. Early Modern Women's Manuscript Writing: Selected Papers from the Trinity/Trent Colloquium (pp. 33-50)
ISBN : 0-7546-0469-1 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Civil War in 1614: Lucan, Gorges and Prince Henry (2003)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Clucas, Stephen and Davies, Rosalind eds. The Crisis of 1614 and The Addled Parliament: Literary and Historical Perspectives (pp. 161-176)
ISBN : 978-0-7546-0681-9 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Remapping Elizabethan court poetry (2001)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Pincombe, Mike ed. The Anatomy of Tudor Literature: Proceedings of the First International Conference of the Tudor Symposium (1998) (pp. 98-111)
ISBN : 0-7546-0243-5 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Letters (2000)
Gibson, Jonathan
In: Hattaway, Michael ed. A Companion to English Renaissance Literature and Culture. Blackwell Companions to Literature and Culture (pp. 615-619)
ISBN : 9780631216681 | Publisher : Blackwell | Published : Oxford

Elizabeth I's Foreign Correspondence: Letters, Rhetoric, and Politics (2014-01-01)
Bajetta, Carlo M.; Coatalen, Guillaume and Gibson, Jonathan eds.
Queenship and Power
ISBN : 978-1-137-44840-8 | Publisher : Palgrave Macmillan | Published : Basingstoke

Early Modern Women's Manuscript Writing: Selected Papers from the Trinity/Trent Colloquium (2004)
Burke, Victoria E. and Gibson, Jonathan eds.
ISBN : 0-7546-0469-1 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

A companion to the Gawain-poet (1997)
Brewer, Derek and Gibson, Jonathan eds.
Arthurian Studies
ISBN : 9780859914338 | Publisher : D.S. Brewer | Published : Cambridge

Death and Transmediations: Manuscripts in the Age of Hypertext (2021-07-09)
Antonini, Alessio; Benatti, Francesca; Watson, Nicola; King, Edmund and Gibson, Jonathan
In : 32nd ACM Conference on Hypertext and Social Media, HT 2021 (30 Aug - 2 Sep 2021, Virtual Event USA) (pp. 17-26)