Staff Profiles

Modules taught

• U65071 Print & Society
• U65032 Cultures of Publishing
• U65005 Publishing & Book History: Theories and Approaches
• P65033 MA Publishing Dissertation

Jane's research and teaching focuses on book and literary history.  Her monograph Boys in Khaki, Girls in Print: Women's Literary Responses to the Great War 1914-1918(OUP 2005; paperback 2007) was joint winner of the 2006 Women’s History Network Book Prize and she has published widely on many aspects of war literature, book history, and women's writing. Her current research is a collaborative project with Dr Carol Acton (St. Jerome's, University of Waterloo, Canada) entitled Working in a World of Hurt: Trauma and Resilience in the Narratives of Medical Personnel in Warzones (Manchester University Press, 2015). A Trustee of the Wilfred Owen Literary Estate, she is the author of Wilfred Owen: An Illustrated Life (Bodleian Library Publishing, 2014) and is currently working on a new edition of Owen's Selected Letters for Oxford University Press.  With Ralf Schneider (University of Beilefeld) she is editing The Handbook of British Literature and Culture of the First World War (forthcoming, deGruyter).

Books

• Acton C, Potter J, Working in a World of Hurt, Manchester University Press (2015)
  ISBN: 978-0-7190-9036-3
  Abstract

  Working in a world of hurt fills a significant gap in the studies of the psychological trauma wrought by war. It focuses not on soldiers, but on the men and women who fought to save them in casualty clearing stations, hospitals and prison camps. The writings by doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers and other medical personnel reveal the spectrum of their responses that range from breakdown to resilience. Through a rich analysis of both published and unpublished personal from the First World War in the early twentieth century to Iraq in the early twenty-first, Acton and Potter put centre stage the letters, diaries, memoirs and weblogs that have chronicled physical and emotional suffering, many for the first time. Wide-ranging in scope, interdisciplinary in method, and written in a scholarly yet accessible style, Working in a world of hurt is essential reading for lecturers and students as well as the general reader.

  Website 
• Potter JE, Wilfred Owen: An Illustrated Life, Bodleian Library Publishing (2014)
  ISBN: 9781851243945
  Abstract Wilfred Owen's realistic portrayals of war gave voice to the soldier wounded, captured, or killed - not just in the Great War but in every war since, so great is the evocative power of his work. Although he saw only five poems published during his lifetime, Owen left behind a wealth of letters and poetry that together form a powerful legacy. This generously illustrated book tells the story of Owen's life and work, from his birth in 1893 to his tragic death just one week before the signing of the armistice that would end the war. Wilfred Owen is the poet of pity, the voice of the soldier maimed, blinded, traumatised and killed, not just in the Great War, but in all wars since, so resonant has his message become. Although he saw only five of his poems published in his lifetime, he left behind a portfolio of poetry and letters that created a powerful legacy. This generously illustrated book tells the story of Wilfred Owen's life and work anew, from his birth in 1893 until his death one week before the Armistice on 4 November 1918. It chronicles Owen's journey from a romantic youth, steeped in the poetry of Keats, to mature soldier awakened to the horrors of the Western Front. Drawing on rich archival material such as personal books, artefacts, family photographs and numerous manuscripts, the volume takes a fresh look at Owen's apprenticeship and eventual mastery of poetry, giving a comprehensive view of the relationship between his lived experience and his writing. Those already familiar with or well-versed in Owen's work will find new material in this book, and those coming to Owen for the first time will enjoy a well researched, yet accessible, illustrated introduction to one of the twentieth century's greatest poets.

Journal articles

• Potter J, Acton C, '“These frightful sights would work havoc with one’s brain”: Subjective Experience, Trauma, and Resilience in First World War Writings by Medical Personnel'
  Literature and Medicine 30 (1) (2012) pp.61-85
  ISSN: 0278-9671
  Abstract

  No abstract - authors offer a brief extract in lieu but it's not succinct or brief enough to warrant including here.

  Website 
• Potter J, 'Daughters of educated men'
  Women's History Magazine 59 (2008) pp.21-26
  ISSN: 1476-6760
  

Book chapters

• Potter J, 'The British Publishing Industry and the First World War' in Einhaus A, Baxter I (ed.), The Edinburgh Companion to the First World War and the Arts, Edinburgh University Press (2017)
  ISBN: 9781474401630
  Abstract in Section VI: Publishing and Material CultureWebsite 
• Potter JE, '"I can find no word to qualify my experiences except the word sheer": Wilfred Owen’s Letters and his baptisms of fire' in Nicolas Bianchi and Toby Garfitt (ed.), Writing the Great War = Comment écrire la Grande Guerre?, Peter Lang (2017)
  ISBN: 9781787073982
  Website 
• Potter JE, '"A Certain Poetess": Recuperating Jessie Pope (1868-1941)' in Smith AK, Cowman K (ed.), Far Beyond the Lines: Landscapes and Voices of the Great War, Routledge (2017)
  ISBN: 9781138079878 eISBN: 9781315228532
  Abstract A poetic voice characterised by futility, satire and horror, and articulated in the poems of Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon and other “soldier-poets,” has shaped a particular, dominant version of the First World War. Taken in conjunction with the graphic suffering and trauma rendered in prose, especially in nursing memoirs by such women as Mary Borden and Vera Brittain, the literary landscape of 1914–1918 is firmly rooted in a particular narrative of disillusionment and sorrow, if not protest. The priority accorded to such a resonant body of self-consciously literary work by both academics and the media alike has made it difficult to hear different voices, those of professional writers in tune with public opinion and the demands of the literary marketplace.Website 
• Potter JE, '‘“Khaki and Kisses”: Reading the Romance Novel in the Great War’' in ECG King and Shafquat Towheed (ed.), Reading and the First World War: Readers, Texts and Archives, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
  ISBN: 9781137302700 eISBN: 9781137302717
  Website 
• Potter J, ''I begin to feel as a normal being should, in spite of the blood and anguish in which I move': American Women's First World War Nursing Memoirs' in First World War nursing: new perspectives, Routledge (2013)
  ISBN: 9780415832052
  
• Potter J, 'English Poetry of the Great War' in Edinburgh Companion to Twentieth-Century British and American War Literature, Edinburgh University Press (2012)
  ISBN: 9780748638741
  Abstract The first reference to literary and cultural representations of war in 20th-century English & US literature and film Coving the two World Wars, the Spanish Civil War, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Troubles in Northern Ireland and the War on Terror, this Companion reveals the influence of modern wars on the imagination. These newly researched and innovative essays connect 'high' literary studies to the engagement of film and theatre with warfare, extensively cover the literary and cultural evaluation of the technologies of war and open the literary field to genre fiction. Divided into 5 sections: 20th-Century Wars and Their Literatures Bodies, Behaviours, Cultures The Cultural Impact of the Technologies of Modern War The Spaces of Modern War Genres of War Culture Key Features All-new original essays commissioned from major critics and cultural historians Reflects the way war studies are currently being taught and researched: in the volume's approach, structure and breadth of coverage For scholars: core arguments and detailed research topics For students: Historically grounded topic- and genre-based essays, useful for studying the modern period and war modules

Other publications

• Potter J, 'Good Old Anna by Marie Belloc Lowndes, new edition for British Literature of World War I series, volume 3, general editors Andrew Maunder and Angela K Smith'
  (2011) ISBN: 978 1 84893 042 1
  
• Potter JE, 'New edition of poems by three poets of the first world war: Ivor Gurney, Wilfred Owen, Isaac Rosenberg'
  (2011) ISBN: 9780141182070
  

Membership of professional bodies

Fellow, The English Association

Advisory Panel, Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum

Advisory Board, Teaching and Learning War Research Network 

Further information

Twitter: @drjanepotter