Dr Laura Lonsdale, MA (Oxon), PhD.
Associate Professor in Modern Spanish Literature, Fellow of The Queen's College

Teaching and Research

I work primarily on the literature of modern Spain, from the 19th century to the present day. In recent years my research has focused on literary multilingualism and translation, though I also have longstanding interests in women's writing and Spanish theatre. I welcome applications from graduate students in connection with any of these areas of interest. 

Selected Publications

Monographs and edited volumes:

Multilingualism and Modernity: Barbarisms in Spanish and American Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. New Comparisons in World Literature (series editors Pablo Mukherjee and Neil Lazarus).

The Routledge Companion to Iberian Studies, co-edited with Javier Muñoz-Basols and Manuel Delgado. Routledge, 2017.

Articles and book chapters:

'Call it Translation: Henry Roth in Spain, or Translating the Multilingual Novel.' Journal of Literary Multilingualism (2024) 1-25.

'The Force of Foreign Words: Multilingualism and the Language(s) of Barbarism in Contemporary Writing from the Americas.' In Barbarian: Explorations of a Western Concept in Theory, Literature, and the Arts, vol. 2, by Markus Winkler and Maria Boletsi in collaboration with others, 325-339. J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2023.

''O local sen paredes': The Multilingual Ecology of Manuel Rivas’s A desaparición da neve (The Disappearance of Snow).' In Multilingualism and World Literature, ed. Jane Hiddleston and Wen-chin Ouyang. Bloomsbury, 2021.

'Feathers, Scales, and Hollow Eggs: Lightness and Weight in Mercè Rodoreda’s La plaça del Diamant.' In Gravity and Grace: Essays for Roger Pearson, ed. Charlie Louth and Patrick McGuinness, 195-206. Legenda, 2019.

'Jorge Semprún and the Languages of Democracy.' Nottingham French Studies 56.2 (2017): 151–162. Special issue: 'The Multilingual Spaces of French and Francophone Writing,' ed. Delphine Grass and Charlotte Baker. 

'Of Treasure Maps and Dictionaries: Searching for Home in Carlota Fainberg, Bilbao-New York-Bilbao and L'últim patriarca.' in The Routledge Companion to Iberian Studies as above, 613-25.

'The Perils and Possibilities of Mistranslation: Equivocation and Barbarism in For Whom the Bell Tolls.' Readings 1.1 (April 2015). www.readingsjournal.net

'The Gift: Love and Aesthetics in El amor es un juego solitario.' In Esther Tusquets: Scholarly Correspondences, ed. Nina Molinaro and Inmaculada Pertusa, 42-54. Cambridge Scholars, 2014.

'Valle-Inclán and the City: From the Popular Novel to the Esperpento.' Modern Language Review 108:1 (Jan 2013): 142-61

'Valle-Inclán's Dead Bodies.' Modern Language Review 106.2 (April 2011): 448-62.

'A Question of Values: Narrative Consciousness in Esther Tusquets’ El mismo mar de todos los veranos.’ Bulletin of Hispanic Studies 88.1 (Jan 2011): 79-95.

'Don Juan in Exile.' In Staging Exile, Migration and Diaspora in Hispanic Theatre and Performance Cultures, ed. Helena Buffery, 95-106. Peter Lang, 2011.

Selected conference and research papers

'Going underground: "La verdad de las sepulturas’"in Valle-Inclán, Lorca and Zambrano.' AHGBI conference, University of Birmingham, March 2024.

'Graveyard Politics: Earth and Unearthing in Frank McGuinness's Carthaginians and Antonio M. López's Al hoyo/ Into the Pit.' Underground Imaginaries, ESCL/ SELC conference, Universidad de Alcalá, May 2023.

'Call it Translation: Henry Roth in Spain, or Translating the Multilingual Novel.' Stylistic Border Crossings In and Beyond Translation, online conference hosted by the British Centre for Literary Translation and the East Centre at the University of East Anglia, March 2023.

'The Bridge and the Vacancy: Translation and Multilingualism in Poetic Collaboration.' Keynote, Multilingualism in World Literatures workshop, Uppsala University, Sweden, May 2019.

'Barbarisms: Multilingualism and Modernity in Narratives of the Spanish-speaking World.' Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation seminar, TORCH, University of Oxford, November 2015. www.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/people/laura-lonsdale

'The Bull and the Bridge: Cultural and Linguistic Crossing in Hemingway and Arguedas.' For the 'Bridging Languages: Multilingualism and Modernity' panel at the Modernist Studies Association conference, University of Pittsburgh, November 2014.

'Semprún's 'New Mother Tongue' and the Experience of Exile.' Multilingual French Identities, conference held at Lancaster University, January 2014.

'Multilingual Narrative and Antonio Muñoz Molina's Carlota Fainberg.' Dept of Hispanic Studies Research Seminar, University of Cork, September 2013.

'Bilingualism and the Novel: A Literary Perspective.' AHGBI conference, University of Oxford, March 2013.

Translations

Antonio M. López, Into the Pit [Al hoyo], in Nadie vendrá a rescatarnos/ No-one is coming to save us. Perpetuumobile, 2023.

Ana María Matute, The Island [Primera memoria]. London: Penguin, 2020.

Ramón del Valle-Inclán, The Dead Man's Finery and The Captain's Daughter [Las galas del difunto and La hija del capitán]. Translation, introduction and notes. Oxford: Oxbow (Aris & Phillips), 2013.

Ana María Matute, extract of Olvidado rey Gudú [Gudú, The Forgotten King]. In The Spanish Riveter: Writing from Spain, pp. 122-125 (April 2023). 

Podcasts

https://www.podcasts.ox.ac.uk/people/laura-lonsdale

Lorca's Bodas de sangre [Blood Wedding]. Oxford Spanish Literature Podcast, 2020.

Why should we read translated texts? With Jane Hiddleston. Linguamania, 2020.

'Barbarisms: Multilingualism and Modernity in Narratives of the Spanish-speaking World.' Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation seminar, 2015.