Many of the most significant European writers and literary movements of the modern period have traversed national, linguistic, and disciplinary borders.
Founded on the shared research interests of staff in the Department of Comparative Literature, Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics, and other academic schools and departments at the University of Kent, the Centre for Modern European Literature and Culture aims to promote and to facilitate collaborative and interdisciplinary research that can do justice to precisely these kinds of border crossings.
Ranging across English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish literature, the Centre focuses in particular on the European avant-garde, European modernism and postmodernism, literary theory, the international reception of European writers, and the relations between modern European literature and the other arts, including painting, photography, film, music, and architecture.
Centre members Ben Hutchinson and Shane Weller edit the book series Palgrave Studies in Modern European Literature, published by Palgrave Macmillan, intended for all readers with an interest in modern European literature.
The Centre’s activities include a lecture and seminar series and the regular organisation of conferences. It also works with the editors of Skepsi, the postgraduate online journal of European thought at Kent.