Nicholas McDowell
AUTHOR

Nicholas McDowell

Tap the gear icon above to manage new release emails.
Nicholas McDowell was born and grew up in Belfast, where he was educated at The Royal Belfast Academical Institution. He read English at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and then moved to Oriel College, Oxford, to complete M.Phil. and D.Phil. degrees. He was a Research Fellow of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, from 1998 before joining the Department of English at the University of Exeter in 2001, where he is now Professor of Early Modern Literature and Thought. His visiting positions have included Membership of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.

His principal area of research is the literary, cultural and intellectual history of Britain and Ireland from c. 1500-1780. His books include The English Radical Imagination: Culture, Religion, and Revolution, 1630-1660 (Oxford UP, 2003); Poetry and Allegiance in the English Civil Wars: Marvell and the Cause of Wit (Oxford UP, 2008); The Oxford Handbook of Milton (Oxford UP, 2009); and The Complete Works of John Milton. Volume 6: Vernacular Regicide and Republican Writings (Oxford UP, 2013). His major new biography of Milton in his formative years, Poet of Revolution: The Making of John Milton, was published by Princeton University Press in 2020 in hardback, e-book and audiobook formats, and in paperback in 2022. It won the James Holly Hanford award of the Milton Society of America. His most recent books are The Oxford Handbook of English Prose, 1640-1714 (2024) and Comic Enlightenment: Rabelais and English Literature, published by Princeton University Press in August 2026.
Read more Read less

The Best Fiction Podcasts for Listeners Who Love a Good Story

You can’t beat a good story. Luckily, humans are great at storytelling, and the best fiction podcasts are all the proof that the modern listener requires. Get the popcorn ready; it’s storytime.

Featured Article: The Best Fiction Podcasts for Listeners Who Love a Good Story

Best Sellers

Product list
  • Poet of Revolution cover art
    Preview

    $25.71 or free with 30-day trial