LAURA EASTLAKE

Laura Eastlake is a Senior Lecturer in English Literature. She is a Director of EHU Nineteen Centre for Nineteenth Century Studies and Fellow with the Institute for Social Responsibility. She holds an MLitt and PhD from the University of Glasgow and has taught English and Classics at the universities of Glasgow and Stirling. 

She is a literary scholar and historian of the nineteenth century with research interests in classical receptions studies, masculinity studies, and the cultural legacies of substances like sugar. Her work explores the legacies of the Victorian age and how they continue to shape culture, health policy and heritage in the present.

She is the author of Ancient Rome and Victorian Masculinity (Oxford University Press, 2019) and has curated exhibitions on topics including science and medicine in the nineteenth century, Victorian humour, and the history of the ‘femme fatale’ from the ancient world to the silver screen.

Her current research explores Britain’s cultural relationships with refined sugar from the nineteenth century to the present. Working with museums and the UK drinks industry, this project will think about how we navigate cultural, health, and policy relationships with contested substances. 

She teaches on Edge Hill's MA Nineteenth Century Studies as well as undergraduate modules on Victorian Literature, Vampire Fictions, Form, Critical Theories and work placement modules.