Category Archives: Department history

Dennis Walder, Emeritus Professor of Literature  When I used to travel to Walton Hall for meetings I was fortunate to have Arnold Kettle, the Head of Department and sole Professor, sometimes invite me stay in the rambling old Kettle house … Continue reading →

Dr Lynda Morgan, Associate Lecturer It is February 1976. I am 23 years old, recently graduated with a degree in English and a teaching certificate, and I am about to walk into a shabby classroom at Sarah Siddons school, Paddington. … Continue reading →

Linda Anderson A Career of Two Halves Although every academic post carries its freight of blood, sweat and tears, I may well have had the two best jobs on offer in Creative Writing in higher education. I spent a decade … Continue reading →

Dennis Walder, Emeritus Professor of Literature It was the mid 1970s, I’d left South Africa, and was a Research Fellow at Edinburgh University, doing a PhD on Dickens and teaching there to supplement my income.  I had heard about a … Continue reading →

  Richard Allen, Emeritus Professor of English (Dean of Arts Faculty 1998-1999, 2000-2007) The first specialist Literature course, A302 The Nineteenth Century Novel and its Legacy, was half way through its first production when I joined the OU (but not … Continue reading →