Catherine Belsey

Catherine Belsey (born 1940) is a British literary critic and academic. She chaired the Centre for Critical and Cultural Theory at Cardiff University (1988-2003) before moving to Swansea University (2006–14). Her book Critical Practice (1980) was an influential poststructuralist text in suggesting new directions for literary studies. She is currently Visiting Professor of English at the University of Derby and Fellow of the English Association and Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales. She has consistently aligned herself with international innovations in the theory and practice of criticism. Belsey has written about the effect of romance novels on modern society.

Works

• Critical Practice (1980, 2002)
• The Subject of Tragedy: Identity and Difference in Renaissance Drama (1985)
• John Milton: Language, Gender, Power (1988)
• Desire: Love Stories in Western Culture (1994)
• Shakespeare and the Loss of Eden (1999)
• Poststructuralism: A Very Short Introduction (2002)
• Culture and the Real (2005)
• Why Shakespeare? (2007)
• Shakespeare in Theory and Practice (2008)
• A Future for Criticism (2011)
• Romeo and Juliet: Language and Writing (2014)

• Janjua, Qaisar Iqbal. "Catherine Belsey's Critical Practice". 
• Bach, Rebecca Ann. "Book Review: Catherine Belsey's Shakespeare and the Loss of Eden". 
• Dooley, Gillian Mary. "Catherine Belsey, A Future for Criticism" (PDF).