- Room 4, 4 Portland Villas, Drake Circus, Plymouth, PL4 8AA
- +44 1752 585137
- ben.o.smith@plymouth.ac.uk
Profiles
Dr Ben Smith
Lecturer in English and Creative Writing
School of Humanities and Performing Arts (Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business)
Lecturer in Creative Writing.
English Dept. Employability Lead.
Qualifications
PhD English, University of Exeter.
MA English, University of Exeter.
BA English, University of Exeter.
Teaching interests
Undergraduate Teaching
I lead the following modules across the undergraduate Creative Writing curriculum:
- Dramatic Writing (ENGL503 Stage 2)
- The Short Story (ENGL606 Stage 3)
- Contemporary Poetry (ENGL609 Stage 3)
These modules cover a wide range of forms, styles and practices, allowing students to build up a varied portfolio and a broad range of Creative Writing skills across their degree.
Postgraduate Teaching
I lead the MA Fiction module (CWMA701), which allows students to build on the skills developed at BA level and take their first steps in writing full-length novels and short story collections.
Supervision
I am currently on the supervisory team for a PhD on Historical Fiction. I welcome enquiries from prospective PhD candidates interested in any area of Creative Writing, especially those with an interest in Literatures of the Environment, Ecocriticism, Climate Change and the Anthropocene.
Research interests
Contemporary Fiction and Poetry, Literature and the Environment, Ecocriticism, Climate Change and the Anthropocene.
Creative practice & artistic projects
Drawing on my interest in poetry and the environment, I have worked with a wildlife film-maker to produce a short film, The Wet Desert, which explores the landscape and ecology of Dartmoor.
Journals
Academic Articles
“Beating the Bounds: Mapping theBorders of Self and Landscape in the Work of John Burnside and Tim Robinson”. GreenLetters (Vol 17, No.1) Twentieth-centuryNature Writing Special Issue (Feb 2013).
Other Articles
“UKESM at the CrosscurrentsPoetry Event” The UK Earth System ModelNewsletter. (Summer, 2017)
“Singing at the Right Pace: TheSonglines of Alice Oswald and Thomas A. Clark”. PN Review (Issue 205, May/June 2012. p. 50).
Books
Fiction:
Doggerland. UK and Commonwealth: 4th Estate (April 2019)
---. Netherlands: Atlas Contact (2019)
Poetry:
Sky Burials. Worple Press (2014).
My poetry has been published widely in journals and magazines including Agenda, Poetry Wales, Orbis, Acumen, The London Magazine, Envoi, Succour, Canto and Earthlines.
My work has also be anthologised in The Tree Line: Poems for Trees, Woods and People (Worple Press, 2017) and Entanglements: An Anthology of Ecopoetry (Two Ravens Press, 2012).
Reports & invited lectures
Invited speaker at the University of East Anglia's 'Speculative Natures' Research Group, March 2018.
Conferences organised
Organisation Committee of the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment, UK and Ireland (ASLE-UKI) Annual Conference, Plymouth 2019.