Nandini Das is professor of Early Modern Literature and Culture in the English faculty at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

. She is a specialist in Shakespeare studies, Renaissance romance writing, early travel literature, and encounters between different cultures.

Early life

Nandini Das grew up in India and studied the sciences at school, and after working as a software programmer in the publishing industry for a year, decided to return to academic research. Aged about 10, she was inspired by seeing

Vanessa Redgrave Dame Vanessa Redgrave (born 30 January 1937) is an English actress and activist. Throughout her career spanning over seven decades, Redgrave has garnered numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Television Award, two ...

in William Shakespeare's ''

As You Like It ''As You Like It'' is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 and first published in the First Folio in 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has b ...

'' on Indian television. She earned a BA in English from

Jadavpur University Jadavpur University is a public state university located in Jadavpur, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. It was established in 1905 as ''Bengal Technical Institute'' and was converted into Jadavpur University in 1955. In 2022, it was ranked fourth am ...

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

, India, after which she moved to Britain on a

Rhodes scholarship The Rhodes Scholarship is an international postgraduate award for students to study at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom. Established in 1902, it is the oldest graduate scholarship in the world. It is considered among the world' ...

to study English at

University College, Oxford University College (in full The College of the Great Hall of the University of Oxford, colloquially referred to as "Univ") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. It has a claim to being the oldest college of the univer ...

(BA). She subsequently earned her M.Phil and PhD at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

.Professor Nandini Das.
Research England. Retrieved 12 September 2018.

Career

Das was professor of English literature at the University of Liverpool until October 2019, when she became a Tutorial Fellow at Exeter College, Oxford and Professor of Early Modern Literature and Culture in the English faculty at Oxford. Her research relates to cultural and intellectual history for the period 1600 to 1750 including fiction, accounts of early travel and encounters between different cultures.Prof Nandini Das.
University of Oxford. Retrieved 12 September 2018. She has edited a scholarly edition of Robert Greene's ''Planetomachia'' (1585) in 2007 and is the volume editor for Elizabethan Levant trade and South Asia of

Richard Hakluyt Richard Hakluyt (; 1553 – 23 November 1616) was an English writer. He is known for promoting the English colonization of North America through his works, notably ''Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America'' (1582) and ''The Pri ...

's Principall Navigations, Voyages, Traffikes, and Discoveries of the English Nation.'' She is project director of the Travel, Transculturality and Identity in England, c.1550-1700 (TIDE) project. She is a fellow of the

Higher Education Academy Advance HE (formerly the Higher Education Academy) is a British charity and professional membership scheme promoting excellence in higher education. It advocates evidence-based teaching methods and awards fellowships as professional recogniti ...

, a member of the council of

Research England Research England is a part of United Kingdom Research and Innovation (UKRI) that oversees the functions of UKRI in relation to university research and knowledge transfer in England. This includes: * providing funding to English universities for res ...

, and a member of the Peer Review College of Britain's

Arts and Humanities Research Council The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), formerly Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB), is a British research council, established in 1998, supporting research and postgraduate study in the arts and humanities. History The Arts an ...

. In September 2018, she presented ''Tales of Tudor Travel: The Explorer's Handbook'' on BBC4 television.

Selected publications

* ''Robert Greene's Planetomachia'' . Ashgate, Aldershot, 2007. (Editor) * ''Renaissance Romance: The Transformation of English Prose Fiction, 1570-1620''. Ashgate, Burlington 2011. * '' Yearbook of English Studies: Travel and Prose Fiction in Early Modern England''. MHRA, Leeds, 2011. (Editor) * ''Enchantment and Dis-enchantment in Shakespeare and Early Modern Drama''. 2016. (Co-edited with Nick Davis) * ''Hakluyt's Principall Navigations, Voyages, Traffikes, and Discoveries of the English Nation, 1598-1600. Volume VI: Elizabethan Levant Trade and South Asia''.

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, Oxford, 2017. (Editor) * ''The Cambridge History of Travel Writing''.

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press A university press is an academic publishing hou ...

, Cambridge, 2018. (Editor with Tim Youngs)

References

Living people Academics of the University of Liverpool Jadavpur University alumni British academics of English literature Indian emigrants to England Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge Alumni of University College, Oxford British women academics Year of birth missing (living people) {{England-academic-bio-stub