In the summer of 2022, Dr. Margaret Payne, Molly Clemons, and Rose Duke explored the literature, landscape and architecture of Romantic England. Their adventures were in connection with Dr. John Mclaughlin's Spring 2022 Romantic Poetry and Pose class. The group of 22 spent two weeks exploring England through hikes and various tours through famous writers' homes.
Student Rose Duke prepared for the trip through extensive readings surrounding the foundational Gothic novels written during the romantic period. Her focus was to explore ways that the Romantics’ use of the Neo-Gothic intersected with theories of ecocriticism to further expand on how writers such as Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Austen, and the Shelleys used their surroundings to fortify the works they created. While visiting England, she captured a visual rendering of Neo-gothic architecture and its ties to literature by documenting the experience through a reflective and descriptive photo journal.
English major Molly Clemons embarked on the journey to examine the unique relationship between the writings of William and Dorothy Wordsworth and the nature of William's poems in relation to Dorothy's journal entries. Following this experience, Molly further her studies by completing an independent studies on Jane Austen and Dorothy Wordsworth.
Dr. Payne's embarked on this adventure with her students to continue her extensive research into women authors on ritual in women's literature.