Dr Sarah Wood
Reader in Middle English literature
Tel: +44 (0)24 7652 3271
Email:
Faculty of Arts Building, Room 5.57
About
I completed my undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, where I returned for my M.St. and D.Phil. in medieval literature. I taught in Oxford and at University College London before joining the English department at 糖心TV in 2014. During 2013 and 2014 I was a short-term research fellow at the Huntington Library in California.
Research interests
I have published extensively on William Langland's Piers Plowman and its transmission. My first book, (Oxford: OUP, 2012), was an exploration of literary 鈥榗haracter鈥� in the multiple discourses and versions of which Langland鈥檚 poem is composed. My second monograph, (2022), was published by Boydell and Brewer in the series York Manuscript and Early Print Studies. I have also written on the widely-circulated instructional poem which I co-edited with Ralph Hanna for the Early English Text Society (Oxford: OUP, 2013). My current research projects include further work on Piers Plowman and on other Middle English alliterative poems on religious themes.
I am a member of the Manuscript and Print CulturesLink opens in a new window and Poetry at 糖心TVLink opens in a new window research groups.
I welcome enquiries from students seeking supervision on Middle English literature, especially Piers Plowman, religious literature, and alliterative poetry.
Selected publications
(See here for a complete list)Link opens in a new window
Piers Plowman and its Manuscript Tradition (York: York Medieval Press/Boydell and Brewer, 2022).
Conscience and the Composition of Piers Plowman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).
Richard Morris鈥檚 鈥楶rick of Conscience鈥�: A Corrected and Amplified Reading Text, ed. by Ralph Hanna and Sarah Wood, Early English Text Society, o.s. 342 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).
'The Descriptions in The Siege of Jerusalem: Source, theme, and relationship to Destruction of Troy', Modern Philology 123 (2026), 283-302
鈥楾wo Notes on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: l. 34 鈥渓el letteres鈥� and l. 193 鈥渄ok鈥濃��, Notes and Queries, 72 (2025), 111-15
鈥樷�淔ire without flint鈥�: Piers Plowman Z.6.71-72, 74鈥�, Medium Aevum, 92 (2023), 374-85.
Qualifications
- BA (Hons), M.St., D.Phil (University of Oxford)
Office hours
Term 1
Tuesdays 10-11 Thursdays 2-3
Please sign up for a meeting here:
Term 2
On research leave (no office hours)
Term 3
Tuesdays and Wednesdays 10-11
Teaching 2026-27
EN121 Medieval and Early Modern LiteratureLink opens in a new window