Alex Calder

Originally from Caithness in the Highlands of Scotland, I am a PhD candidate working on modern and contemporary Literature at the Faculty of English and Selwyn College, University of Cambridge. My project takes a holistic approach to the complete works of fiction, drama, and criticism of the Scottish author Ali Smith in the context of contemporary literature. I focus on questions of social marginalisation, relational subjectivity, artistic and intertextual dialogue, and possibilities for connection through formally innovative literary aesthetics. I draw upon multiple theoretical approaches (including feminism, queer studies, and ecocriticism) to analyse Smith’s writing as a locus for critical reflections on strangers, refugees, the marginal, and other ways of seeing in an increasingly globalised and precarious world. Prior to studying at Cambridge, I completed an MA (Hons) in English at the University of Aberdeen in 2018 and was awarded the Lucy Fellowship for the highest first-class degree. I completed an MSc in Literature and Modernity at the University of Edinburgh, and graduated with Distinction in 2019. I acted as co-convenor for the Twentieth Century and Contemporary Literature Graduate Research Seminar across 2021. My research has been published in Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction and open-access in Alluvium.