David Farrier

Professor of Literature and the Environment

English Literature
School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures

Tel: +44 (0)131 650 3607
Email: David.Farrier@ed.ac.uk
Web: Edinburgh Research Explorer profile

Street: Room 2.52
50 George Square
City: Edinburgh
Post code: EH8 9LH

Office Hour: Tuesdays 1.00 - 2.00pm

Biography

Background

David Farrier studied at the University of Leeds (BA, MA, PhD). Before being appointed at Edinburgh in 2010, he was Lecturer in Postcolonial Literature for four years at the University of Leicester (where he was awarded a University Teaching Award in 2008). In 2017 he held a Leverhulme Visiting Fellowship at the University of New South Wales.

Research

Research summary

David's most recent books consider the new reality of the Anthropocene. Anthropocene Poetics: Deep Time, Sacrifice Zones, and Extinction (Minnesota Press, 2019) is a study of contemporary environmental poetry, and Footprints: In Search of Future Fossils (4th Estate/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2020) explores what traces of present societies will persist in the deep future. Footprints won the Royal Society of Literature's Giles St Aubyn award for unpublished non-fiction in 2017. David is particularly interested in how literature, especially poetry, responds to the challenges of the Anthropocene.

Past research interests

David is also the author of Postcolonial Asylum (Liverpool University Press, 2011), and Unsettled Narratives (Routledge, 2007).

Projects

Project activity

David convenes the Edinburgh Environmental Humanities Network.

He spent three months as a visiting scholar at the University of New South Wales in 2017, courtesy of a Leverhulme Fellowship.

In 2016 David was an expert advisor on 'Deep Time,' the 2016 Edinburgh International Festival opening evet, seen live by over 25,000 people.

Publications

We're gonna carry that weight a long time 12 May 2021 In: Emergence Magazine
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
How Cities will Fossilise 6 May 2021 In: BBC Future
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
How great art can help you travel through time 19 Apr 2021 In: The Daily Telegraph
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
Opinion: Our greatest libraries are melting away 7 Apr 2021 In: The Washington Post
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
A tale told to the future 31 Jan 2021
Research output: › Chapter (Published)
The dark side of the sea shanty 29 Jan 2021 In: Prospect
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
Hand in Glove 3 Sep 2020 In: Orion Magazine, vol. 39
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published)
On John Berger and Rediscovering Drawing 25 Aug 2020
Research output: › Other contribution (Published)
With apologies to Susan Sontag, we’re going to need metaphor to get through this global illness: David Farrier on the ways we talk about Coronavirus 15 May 2020
Literary essay › Other contribution (Published)
Desire paths 11 May 2020
Literary essay › Other contribution (Published)