Lannan Foundation

Tom Paulin, critic, playwright, and "School of Ulster" poet was born in England and raised in Belfast in Northern Ireland. Of this experience he has said, "All my imaginative writing, and much of my critical writing, has been affected by the experience of growing up in the North of Ireland." Currently a lecturer in English at Hertford College, Oxford, he is a well-known broadcaster and a regular member of the panel for the BBC Television program Newsnight Review. Much of his early poetry reflects the political situation in Northern Ireland and the sectarian violence the province has witnessed since the late 1960's. His most recent book, The Invasion Handbook, is the first installment of an epic poem about World War II. His non-fiction includes Ireland and the English Crisis, and most recently (with Amit Chaudhuri), D. H. Lawrence and "Difference": The Poetry of the Present.

Tom Paulin Bio and Cross Links

James Shapiro is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University and has taught as a Fulbright lecturer at Bar Ilan and Tel Aviv Universities. He is the author of three books including, Shakespeare and the Jews, an in-depth look at England's Elizabethans and how they imagined Jews to be utterly different from themselves in religion, race, nationality, and even sexuality. Shapiro co-edited the Columbia Anthology of British Poetry and served as the associate editor of the Columbia History of British Poetry. He is currently at work on A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare.

James Shapiro Bio and Cross Links