
Professor Lara Feigel
Professor of Modern Literature and Culture
- Co-Director of the Centre for Modern Literature and Culture
Research interests
- Culture
- Literature
Biography
Professor Lara Feigel works on twentieth-century literature and culture. She is both a literary critic and a cultural historian and she is invested in finding new ways to represent the complex relationships between life, literature and history. As a result, much of her work crosses genres and disciplines. Her first monograph entitled Literature, Cinema, Politics, 1930-1945, Reading Between the Frames (Edinburgh University Press, 2010) tells the story that unfolded between 1920s cinematic modernism and postwar cinematic neorealism, exploring the rise and fall of a distinct genre of politically committed, cinematic literature.
Her second book entitled The Love-charm of Bombs: Restless Lives in the Second World War (Bloomsbury, 2013) is an experiment in life-writing, exploring the wartime lives and writing of five writers (Elizabeth Bowen, Henry Green, Graham Greene, Rose Macaulay, Hilde Spiel). In The Bitter Taste of Victory: Life, Love and Art in the Ruins of the Reich she tells the complex story of how culture was used in the reconstruction of Germany, and of the effect postwar Germany had on the cultural ambassadors who were sent there.
Free Woman: Life, Liberation and Doris Lessing (Bloomsbury, 2018), is a work that fuses memoir, literary criticism and biography to investigate political, cultural, sexual and psychological freedom in Lessing’s life and work. In 2020, she published her first novel, The Group (John Murray), which is an essayistic investigation of contemporary women’s lives, loosely responding to Mary McCarthy’s The Group. She is currently working on a project about DH Lawrence, and his resonance in the twenty-first century.
She is also the co-editor (with John Sutherland) of the New Selected Journals of Stephen Spender (Faber, 2012) and (with Alexandra Harris) of a collection of essays exploring modernist aesthetic responses to the seaside (Modernism on Sea, Peter Lang, 2009). Her research has been enabled by a five-year European Research Council Starting Grant (see www.beyondenemylines.co.uk) and a three year Phillip Leverhulme Prize. Dr Feigel is also the co-director (with Ben Schofield) of the Centre for Modern Literature and Culture and runs the Ivan Juritz Prize for Creative Experiment (www.ivanjuritzprize.co.uk).
Her official website: www.larafeigel.com
Research Interests and PhD Supervision
- Second World War lives and literature
- Culture and Occupation
- Literature and politics in mid-century Anglophone Culture
- Feminist writing from the 1950s to the present, with a particular focus on motherhood and writing the self
- Life-writing and auto-fiction and the connections between experimental creative non-fiction and the novelistic tradition
- Doris Lessing, DH Lawrence
Professor Feigel welcomes PhD applications related to any aspect of her research. For more details, please see Lara's full research profile.
Look! We Have Come Through! Living With D.H. Lawrence
Feigel, L., 18 Aug 2022, London: Bloomsbury. 272 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Ivan Juritz Prize 2020
Feigel, L., 2021, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 35, 5, p. 707-708 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
Ivan juritz prize for creative experiment, 2018
Feigel, L., 21 Apr 2019, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 33, 4, p. 495-496 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
'This is something which we know, in our bones, we cannot do’: Hopes and fears for a united Europe in Britain after the Second World War
Feigel, L. & Miller, A., 2019, The Road to Brexit: A cultural perspective on British attitudes to Europe. Haberman, I. (ed.). Manchester University Press, ManchesterResearch output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
Fiction during the second world war
Feigel, L., 1 Jan 2018, The Oxford History of the Novel in English: Volume 7: British and Irish Fiction Since 1940. Oxford University Press, p. 37-52 16 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
Free Woman: Life, Liberation and Doris Lessing
Feigel, L., 8 Mar 2018, London: Bloomsbury. 336 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Introduction: Narratives of identity and nationhood in occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Olivergbr, E., 1 Apr 2018, In: German Life and Letters. 71, 2, p. 131-138 8 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
Narratives of Identity and Nationhood in Occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Oliver, E., 2018, Wiley. (German Life and Letters; vol. 71, no. 2)Research output: Book/Report › Anthology › peer-review
Introduction to Ivan Juritz Prize 2016
Feigel, L., 26 Apr 2017, (E-pub ahead of print) In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. p. 593-594 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Bitter Taste of Victory: In the Ruins of the Reich
Feigel, L., 28 Jan 2016, 1 ed. Bloomsbury. 464 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
'The sermons in the stones of Germany Preach Nihilism': 'Outsider rubble literature' and the reconstruction of Germany, 1945-1949
Feigel, L., Jun 2016, (E-pub ahead of print) In: Comparative Critical Studies. 13, 2, p. 233-253 21 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Transformative Power of Culture in Occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Morley, E., 2016, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. (Comparative Critical Studies; vol. 13, no. 2)Research output: Book/Report › Anthology › peer-review
Prize for creative responses to modernism
Feigel, L. & Carter, E., 16 Feb 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 1, p. 9-10 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
'The only diary I have kept': Visionary witnessing in the second world war short story
Feigel, L., 10 Nov 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 7, p. 1289-1309 21 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Writing war, writing lives
McLoughlin, K., Feigel, L. & Martin, N., 10 Nov 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 7, p. 1219-1223 5 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Love-charm of Bombs: Restless Lives in the Second World War
Feigel, L., 17 Jan 2013, London: Bloomsbury. 528 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
New Selected Journals, 1939-1995
Spender, S., Feigel, L. (Editor) & Sutherland, J. (Editor), 5 Jul 2012, London: Faber. 816 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Reading the ruins: Modernism, bombsites and British culture
Feigel, L., 20 Jul 2012, In: TLS: the Times literary supplement. 5703, p. 22-22 1 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Writing Between the Lives: Life Writing and the Work of Mediation
Feigel, L. & Saunders, M., 1 Sept 2012, In: Life writing. 9, 3, p. 241-248 8 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
'The Photograph my Skull Might Take': Bombs, Time and Photography in British and German Second World War Literature
Feigel, L., 2011, Bombing, States and Peoples in Western Europe, 1940-1945. Baldoli, C., Knapp, A. & Overy, R. (eds.). London: Continuum, p. 121-135 15 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Literature, Cinema and Politics, 1930-1945, Reading between the Frames
Feigel, L., 2010, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Kiss Me Quick: the Aesthetics of Excess in 1930s Literature and Film
Feigel, L., 2009, Modernism-on-Sea: Art and Culture at the British Seaside. Feigel, L. & Harris, A. (eds.). Peter Lang, p. ? - ?Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Modernism-on-Sea: Art and Culture at the British Seaside
Feigel, L. (Editor) & Harris, A. (Editor), 2009, Peter Lang.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Writing the Foundations of a Better World: The Role of Anglo-German Literary Exchange in the Reconstruction of Germany and the Construction of Europe, 1945-1949
Feigel, L., 2009, Europa! Europa?: The Avant-Garde, Modernism and the Fate of a Continent. Bru, S., Baetens, J., Hjartarson, B., Nicholls, P. & Orum, T. (eds.). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, p. 229 - 243 15 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Childhood and Cinema
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Cinema and Modernism
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Freud's Drive: Psychoanalysis, Literature and Film
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
A Nosegay:A Literary Journey from the Fragrant to the Fetid
Feigel, L. (Editor), 2006, Old Street Publishing.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Research

Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War
The centre promotes the scholarly history of war in all it's dimensions, trains research students and hosts research projects and conferences
News
New book on the portrait of contemporary female life is released
Professor Lara Feigel launches her debut novel, 'The Group', a book about female friendship and anger.

Look! We Have Come Through! Living With D.H. Lawrence
Feigel, L., 18 Aug 2022, London: Bloomsbury. 272 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Ivan Juritz Prize 2020
Feigel, L., 2021, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 35, 5, p. 707-708 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
Ivan juritz prize for creative experiment, 2018
Feigel, L., 21 Apr 2019, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 33, 4, p. 495-496 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
'This is something which we know, in our bones, we cannot do’: Hopes and fears for a united Europe in Britain after the Second World War
Feigel, L. & Miller, A., 2019, The Road to Brexit: A cultural perspective on British attitudes to Europe. Haberman, I. (ed.). Manchester University Press, ManchesterResearch output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
Fiction during the second world war
Feigel, L., 1 Jan 2018, The Oxford History of the Novel in English: Volume 7: British and Irish Fiction Since 1940. Oxford University Press, p. 37-52 16 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
Free Woman: Life, Liberation and Doris Lessing
Feigel, L., 8 Mar 2018, London: Bloomsbury. 336 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Introduction: Narratives of identity and nationhood in occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Olivergbr, E., 1 Apr 2018, In: German Life and Letters. 71, 2, p. 131-138 8 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
Narratives of Identity and Nationhood in Occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Oliver, E., 2018, Wiley. (German Life and Letters; vol. 71, no. 2)Research output: Book/Report › Anthology › peer-review
Introduction to Ivan Juritz Prize 2016
Feigel, L., 26 Apr 2017, (E-pub ahead of print) In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. p. 593-594 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Bitter Taste of Victory: In the Ruins of the Reich
Feigel, L., 28 Jan 2016, 1 ed. Bloomsbury. 464 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
'The sermons in the stones of Germany Preach Nihilism': 'Outsider rubble literature' and the reconstruction of Germany, 1945-1949
Feigel, L., Jun 2016, (E-pub ahead of print) In: Comparative Critical Studies. 13, 2, p. 233-253 21 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Transformative Power of Culture in Occupied Germany
Feigel, L. & Morley, E., 2016, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. (Comparative Critical Studies; vol. 13, no. 2)Research output: Book/Report › Anthology › peer-review
Prize for creative responses to modernism
Feigel, L. & Carter, E., 16 Feb 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 1, p. 9-10 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
'The only diary I have kept': Visionary witnessing in the second world war short story
Feigel, L., 10 Nov 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 7, p. 1289-1309 21 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Writing war, writing lives
McLoughlin, K., Feigel, L. & Martin, N., 10 Nov 2015, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 29, 7, p. 1219-1223 5 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
The Love-charm of Bombs: Restless Lives in the Second World War
Feigel, L., 17 Jan 2013, London: Bloomsbury. 528 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
New Selected Journals, 1939-1995
Spender, S., Feigel, L. (Editor) & Sutherland, J. (Editor), 5 Jul 2012, London: Faber. 816 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Reading the ruins: Modernism, bombsites and British culture
Feigel, L., 20 Jul 2012, In: TLS: the Times literary supplement. 5703, p. 22-22 1 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Writing Between the Lives: Life Writing and the Work of Mediation
Feigel, L. & Saunders, M., 1 Sept 2012, In: Life writing. 9, 3, p. 241-248 8 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Editorial › peer-review
'The Photograph my Skull Might Take': Bombs, Time and Photography in British and German Second World War Literature
Feigel, L., 2011, Bombing, States and Peoples in Western Europe, 1940-1945. Baldoli, C., Knapp, A. & Overy, R. (eds.). London: Continuum, p. 121-135 15 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Literature, Cinema and Politics, 1930-1945, Reading between the Frames
Feigel, L., 2010, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Kiss Me Quick: the Aesthetics of Excess in 1930s Literature and Film
Feigel, L., 2009, Modernism-on-Sea: Art and Culture at the British Seaside. Feigel, L. & Harris, A. (eds.). Peter Lang, p. ? - ?Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Modernism-on-Sea: Art and Culture at the British Seaside
Feigel, L. (Editor) & Harris, A. (Editor), 2009, Peter Lang.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Writing the Foundations of a Better World: The Role of Anglo-German Literary Exchange in the Reconstruction of Germany and the Construction of Europe, 1945-1949
Feigel, L., 2009, Europa! Europa?: The Avant-Garde, Modernism and the Fate of a Continent. Bru, S., Baetens, J., Hjartarson, B., Nicholls, P. & Orum, T. (eds.). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, p. 229 - 243 15 p.Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
Childhood and Cinema
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Cinema and Modernism
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
Freud's Drive: Psychoanalysis, Literature and Film
Feigel, L., 2008, In: TEXTUAL PRACTICE. 22, 4, p. 783 - 791 9 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Book/Film/Article review › peer-review
A Nosegay:A Literary Journey from the Fragrant to the Fetid
Feigel, L. (Editor), 2006, Old Street Publishing.Research output: Book/Report › Book
Research

Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War
The centre promotes the scholarly history of war in all it's dimensions, trains research students and hosts research projects and conferences
News
New book on the portrait of contemporary female life is released
Professor Lara Feigel launches her debut novel, 'The Group', a book about female friendship and anger.
