Professor Janet Montefiore

My recent research has mainly centred on the works of Rudyard Kipling. In addition to my book Rudyard Kipling (2007), I am general editor of Kipling titles for Penguin Classics,  for which I have edited The Man Who Would Be King and Other Stories(2011), and my edited book In Time’s Eye: Essays on Rudyard Kipling (Manchester University Press) has just appeared (2013). In June 2013, I became editor of the Kipling Journal.  I have directed three international conferences on Kipling’s work, all sponsored by the Kipling Society:  the conference marking the centenary of Kipling’s award of the Nobel Prize in 1907  at Kent University (September 2007),  the conference ‘Rudyard Kipling as an International Writer’ at the Institute of Advanced Studies at London University (October 2011), and most recently the symposium ‘Rudyard Kipling in America’ at Marlboro College, Vermont (October 2013   As well as Kipling studies I retain my long-standing interest in gender studies, in women’s poetry and in mid 20th century writing.  I have handed over the Directorship of the Centre for Gender, Sexuality and Writing to Dr Cregan-Reid and Dr Cox, but I continue to research on this area, most recently working on  Sylvia Townsend Warner, on W.H.Auden and on women’s poetry, including feminism and poetry in post-war Britain.

As I am now semi-retired, I am not taking on new Ph Ds; but I am happy to be consulted by Kent postgraduate students working in any of the above areas.

I am a Council member of the Kipling Society, for which I edit the quarterly  Kipling Journal.  I am also a member of the  W.H. Auden Society, and the Sylvia Townsend Warner Society. I am consultant on women’s poetry and poetics for Liverpool University Press, and a member of the editorial board of the US-based journal The Space Between: Literature and Culture, 1914-1945.