Dr Matt Crofts

Mentally ill patients dancing at a ball at Somerset County Asylum. Process print after a lithograph by K. Drake, ca. 1850/1855. https://wellcomecollection.org/works/xswz3swa

CFP: Sensation Fiction and the Health Humanities A VPFA Study Day Loughborough University, 27 March 2026 The Health Humanities and Victorian popular fiction intersect in revealing ways, offering insights into how 19th-century literature shaped and reflected contemporary understandings of health, illness, and the body. Popular narratives not only mirrored anxieties surrounding public health and medical progress but also contributed to shaping public perceptions of health and healing. Health Humanities approaches re-examine these texts to uncover how cultural narratives and literary representations influenced attitudes toward physical and mental well-being, gendered experiences of illness, and the ethics of care in an age of rapid scientific change. Health Humanities is a particularly useful approach to sensation fiction because it illuminates the ways in which these emotionally charged, often morally ambiguous narratives explore and interrogate concepts of the body, illness, and mental health. Sensation fiction, with its focus on secrets, trauma, nervous disorders, and abnormal psychological states, frequently dramatizes the anxieties of Victorian society surrounding health, gender, and identity. By applying the lens of Health Humanities, scholars can uncover how these texts reflect and shape contemporary medical discourse. Interdisciplinary approaches also highlight how sensation fiction critiques institutional medicine, domestic care practices, and the pathologization of women’s experiences. Ultimately, Health Humanities allows us to see sensation fiction not just as entertainment, but as a culturally significant form that negotiates the meanings of illness, morality, and human vulnerability in a rapidly changing world. 20-minute papers are invited on any aspect of the health humanities and sensation fiction. Topics may include, but are not limited to the following: • Madness, Hysteria, and the Sensation Heroine • The Role of Doctors and Medical Authority in Se…

🚨Call for Papers!
❓Sensation Fiction and the Health Humanities: A VPFA Study Day
🗺️Loughborough University
📅27 March 2026
💷 FREE
For full CfP: victorianpopularfiction.org/studyday/for...
Contact the organiser Anne-Marie Beller (@braddonite.bsky.social) at a.m.beller@lboro.ac.uk for more information

THE QUATERMASS EVENT takes over QUAD in Derby on Saturday 6 December 2025 from 12pm. All three Hammer films plus full supporting programme and guests. Booking and details available at derbyquad.co.uk

This evening’s meeting of the Ghoul Guides Association is Lauren’s thought on Wednesday season 2 so far, as well as some recommending reading if you’re looking for some more dark academia, mystery or weirdness.

Spotify link (or find us on other platofrms!) open.spotify.com/episode/6IkC...

Please allow me to recommend some summer reading, followed with an invitation to join our book discussion. Everybody is welcome so please share widely (this poster has the correct start time of 5.30pm!) The text and audiobook are available on Internet Archive/Gutenberg. @vpfa.bsky.social

Ghouls, what does the sublime, the British Empire and custard creams all have in common? Pteridomania, baby!

On this meeting of The Ghoul Guides Association, Lauren deep dives the Victorian cult of the fern - and its Gothic influences.

Listen now: open.spotify.com/episode/30WD... #GothsAssemble

Can't wait to listen to this, such a great combination of games critics. What at amazing idea for an episode.

Image of the hardback copy of The Gothic at War, which features a wartime painting by Turner

I came home last night to find this waiting for me: my first academic monograph. The Gothic at War is developed from my PhD research, with new work on Clara Reeve & Charlotte Smith, exploring the Gothic as a literature of conflict. Thank you to @uniwalespress.bsky.social for being great publishers!

Poster showing events. 23 May Romano Lav, Glasgow. 27 May Tate Streatham Library. 28 May Foyles Charing Cross. 26 June Toopings Edinburgh

Happy to share some events I will be doing upon publication of ‘The Roma’. Thank you to my wonderful publicist Jessie for this lovely design. We will update and share further details soon, and hope to see many of you there. Some signup links below 👇

Amazing! Huge congrats.

Congrats, Jess

navsa.org/2025/03/18/c...
Please spread the word about this lovely conference:
Undercover Agents: Women, Crime, and Detection in the Global Nineteenth Century
University of St. Andrews
28-29 August 2025

Myself & Maddy Potter are putting together a proposed new companion to #Dracula. We want to engage much more with new areas & the novel's multimedia afterlife to show the value of the text today. Feel free to message any questions. Full CFP here:
call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/01/...

eBay has quickly become my biggest and most dangerous form of procrastination

Love this!

These are a great collection of interests, thanks for sharing!

On the left, a screenshot of Revenant journal's website, with a black-and-white photo of sunshine bouncing off a stone altar. The table of contents is shown beneath it, in crimson accent boxes. On the right, a still from the TV show THE WALKING DEAD in which main character Rick (Andrew Lincoln) stands in front of a chain link fence holding back a horde of clamoring zombies.

Revenant journal wades hip-deep into "Post-Apocalyptic Waste" in new issue #10, incl. essays from Mark Fryers on sensationalist ecohorror in the UK series DOOMWATCH + Ann-Gee Lee & Bradley Wiggins on sustainable zombies in THE WALKING DEAD. @mattcrofts.bsky.social #horror
www.revenantjournal.com

New issue of Revenant Journal, Post-Apocalyptic Waste, is out now! It's a fantastic issue that bridges #waste studies, #Gothic, and #apocalyptic fiction across its 12 articles & even includes amazing creative pieces, such as Olivia Steen's artwork 'The Impossible Heap'
www.revenantjournal.com

I pointed this article out to Janine yesterday! Glad you're sharing it

Helena Bonham Carter as Mrs Lovett and Johnny Depp as Sweeney Todd in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)

One from the vaults: my 2018 article 'Tim Burton's Pop-Victorian Gothic Aesthetic' is free to read on the Gothic Studies website until the end of January! Even better - so is the complete back catalogue of GS & other EUP journals:
www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.7...

A great part of researching is referencing things you love. My latest publication on #Blade for @baconetti.bsky.social's #Vampire handbook not only quotes the iconic #Community line about Blade not giving vampires 'a square inch of leeway' but also #VentureBros 'Blacula' hunter, Jefferson Twilight ⚔️

Castlevania: how the video game was inspired by classic Dracula horror films Christopher Lee’s Dracula remains was one of the game’s biggest early influences.

I have a new piece on The Conversation on how Hammer's Dracula films became a key influence on early #Castlevania games. It's a small part of the story of how the world's most famous #vampire travelled the globe & continues to be influential today

theconversation.com/castlevania-...