Dr Anne Marie Hagen

Home institution

University of Edinburgh

Biography

Anne Marie Hagen studied History, Sociology and English at the University of Oslo and obtained an MSc (Distinction) in Material Cultures and the History of the Book at the University of Edinburgh (2010). In 2015 she completed her PhD in English Literature at the University of Edinburgh; her PhD dissertation examined the development of the publishing firm Thomas Nelson & Sons into a publisher of books for children in the period 1850-1918. In 2012-2013 Anne Marie held a Department of English/CRC studentship to work on cataloguing and conservation of the Thomas Nelson Papers. Prior to her PhD study, she interned as an editor for Fledgling Press and worked as an archival research specialist for a marine exploration and recovery company. Anne Marie is a tutor in the Department of English Literature at the University of Edinburgh.

Specialising in publishing history, Anne Marie’s research interests include children’s literature, ‘middlebrow’ publishing, book design and printing, British fiction of the Victorian, Edwardian and interwar periods, and the history of reading. At present she researches the relationship between medical theories and commerce, particularly the transmission and reception history of medical and psycho-pedagogical ideas in publishing and their impact on the publication of books for children.

Project

An Eye for Books: Medicine, Pedagogy, and Publishing in Edinburgh, 1900-1939

This project will investigate the influence of pseudo‐medical theories of perception, vision, and comprehension on the publication of books for children 1900‐1939, a formative period in stateprovided education in Britain, through a study of the print network of teachers and publishers in Edinburgh.