Rosemary Doreen Ashton, (''née'' Thomson; born 11 April 1947) is a Scottish literary scholar. From 2002 to 2012, she was the Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

. Her reviews appear in the '' London Review of Books''.

Education and career

Born in

Renfrewshire Renfrewshire () ( sco, Renfrewshire; gd, Siorrachd Rinn Friù) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. Located in the west central Lowlands, it is one of three council areas contained within the boundaries of the historic county of Re ...

, she was educated at the universities of

Aberdeen Aberdeen (; sco, Aiberdeen ; gd, Obar Dheathain ; la, Aberdonia) is a city in North East Scotland, and is the third most populous city in the country. Aberdeen is one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas (as Aberdeen City), and ...

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: ''Heidlberg'') is a city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Neckar in south-west Germany. As of the 2016 census, its population was 159,914 ...

, and

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...

, where her doctoral research was on the reception of German literature in British magazines in the early 1800s. After lecturing at the

University of Birmingham The University of Birmingham (informally Birmingham University) is a Public university, public research university located in Edgbaston, Birmingham, United Kingdom. It received its royal charter in 1900 as a successor to Queen's College, Birmingha ...

, she started her long teaching and research association with UCL in 1974. She is a fellow of the

British Academy The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the same year. It is now a fellowship of more than 1,000 leading scholars spa ...

, of the Royal Society of Literature, and of the Royal Society of Arts, and has served on a number of editorial and literary boards, including the George Eliot Fellowship, the advisory board of Carlyle Studies Annual, the advisory board of the Centre for Anglo-German Cultural Relations at

Queen Mary, University of London , mottoeng = With united powers , established = 1785 – The London Hospital Medical College1843 – St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College1882 – Westfield College1887 – East London College/Queen Mary College , type = Public researc ...

, and the board of the Dr Williams’s Centre for Dissenting Studies. She is a senior research fellow at the

Institute of English Studies The Institute of English Studies (abbreviated as IES) is a centre of excellence in the research, promotion and facilitation in the field English Literature and Language. With a specialisation in book history, palaeography and textual scholarsh ...

in the School of Advanced Studies,

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

. She was the creator of the UCL Bloomsbury Project, which was established to investigate 19th-century Bloomsbury’s development "from swampy rubbish-dump to centre of intellectual life", tracing the origins, Bloomsbury locations, and reforming significance of hundreds of progressive and innovative institutions.

Honours

In the

1999 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 1999 for various Commonwealth realms were announced on 30 December 1998, to celebrate the year passed and mark the beginning of 1999. The ''Honours list'' is a list of people who have been awarded one of the various orders, d ...

, Ashton was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) "for services to comparative literature". In 2000, she was elected a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA), the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and social sciences.

Works

*''Little Germany: exile and asylum in Victorian England'', Oxford University Press, 1986, *''G.H. Lewes: An Unconventional Victorian'', Pimlico, 1991, *''George Eliot: a life'', Penguin Books, 1996, *''142 Strand: A Radical Address in Victorian London'', Random House UK, 2006, *
Victorian Bloomsbury
', Yale University Press, 2012, *''One Hot Summer: Dickens, Darwin, Disraeli, and the Great Stink of 1858'', Yale University Press, 2017,

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ashton, Rosemary 1947 births Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Officers of the Order of the British Empire Academics of University College London Living people Women biographers Fellows of the British Academy Heidelberg University alumni Scottish literary critics Alumni of the University of Aberdeen German literature academics Scottish linguists