Student Bios

Liz graduated from Bucknell University too many years ago to remember, with a BA in Geology. It was an erstwhile pursuit, and she’s done nothing with Geology since. Looking for what might fuel her passion more thoroughly, Liz spent the next decade living in San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, and finally Philadelphia, where she’s now a full-time staff member with Villanova. In her heart of hearts she would have been an English major as an undergrad, and is attempting to rectify that grievous error by joining the VU Grad English department as a student. Still exploring all genres, Liz is reluctant to say what her focus will be, but at the moment she finds the relationship between the interior and exterior self, and how that relationship is addressed in novels, intriguing. Having already hiked Alaskan glaciers and sipped wine in a 16th-century french hamlet, Liz’s free time is now spent with her husband and two boys, finding the briefest respites in a glass of wine or a walk through the pa...

Sara earned her B.A. in English with her Secondary Education Certification from Immaculata University in 2010.  Since then Sara has been pursuing her career as a teacher, currently teaching high school English at her alma mater.  A New Jersey native but a Winter baby, Sara prefers the snow and the cold to the beach and the heat.  Sara spends her time ringing in two Handbell Ensembles, one of which is the Philadelphia Handbell Ensemble (www.phillybells.org). Sara enjoys reading the twisted works of Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, and Chuck Palahniuk but when she has a rare free moment, she enjoys spending it with her "fur-baby", Bacardi, and her friends and family.

A Pennsylvania native, AJ earned his BA in Philosophy from Eastern University in 2010. After working for three years as a sexton at a lovely church in Wynnewood and studying theology at Villanova, he moved to New Haven, CT to complete an MA degree in religious ethics at Yale Divinity School. He is currently interested in the intersections of literature and moral philosophy, meaning and literary form, and values in American literature; Dante, Eliot, and Adam Zagajewski are proving to be lasting companions. He’s married to Patti.

Rob comes to Villanova from outside the discipline of English. Prior to starting the program here, he studied musicology at Temple University’s Boyer College, where he also performed solo and chamber music as a classical guitarist and sometime choral singer. At Temple, he became keenly interested in opera, so following graduation, he started his career in the archives of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, then moved north to the Glimmerglass Festival for a brief summer in Cooperstown, and finally landed in the Education department of Seattle Opera, where he gave lectures, created programs, and wrote for the company. His scholarly interests center on the culture, literature, and music of the English Renaissance. At Villanova, he’d like to pursue a project grounded in rhetoric, gender, and performance studies that includes the work of Shakespeare, Morley, Sidney, Dowland, the other Robert Johnson, the more famous Ben Jonson, and (just so that no one feels excluded) the Daniel brothers. ...

James earned his B.A. in English (with minors in History and Creative Writing) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2015. His UNC honors thesis related John Berryman’s 1969 work The Dream Songs to the Biblical Book of Job. James is primarily interested in post-war and contemporary American poetry, but he also has an interest in the general history of poetry as well as the intersection of theology and literature. He has a pretty consuming obsession with Bob Dylan, and he also loves IPAs, steak, and Tar Heel basketball.

Kathryn has spent the last 15 years trying to unlock the secrets of living on the wrong side of the continent. Born in Cali and raised in God's Country (i.e. the Washington State), there are certain elements of East Coast living that still do not sit quite right for this country girl from the mountains.  And let's not even discuss humidity, or naked trees in winter.  After undergraduate degrees in English, Spanish and Education from Central Washington University (strangely, also the Wildcats) she dove into the deep end of crazy and moved sight unseen to New York for graduate school #1 and an MA in Biblical Literature and the New Testament.  She came to Philly for an actual job that could pay the bills and to do this thing called "adulting." Ten years in k-12 education renewed the dream to go back to collegiate teaching and she found her way to Villanova's MA in English. If you are lucky enough to have class with her then bring your appetite because she loves to sh...

Ann Marie graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 2015 with a B.A. in English and Spanish and a minor in Journalism, Ethics and Democracy. The more she reads, the more wide-ranging her interests become, but past work has focused on British Modernist poets T.S. Eliot and David Jones, examining their approaches to questions of temporality and systems of representing meaning. Broadly, she is very interested in religion and literature scholarship, particularly its intersection with philosophy of language. An ex-college newspaper editor, she’s retained a deep appreciation for the power of coffee and all things journalism, as well as the useful ability to write like mad under a deadline. In her spare time, Ann Marie enjoys exploring Philly, cooking, and talking about how much she loves her home state of Michigan.

Caitlin Moon graduated from the University of Delaware in 2015 with four majors: French Studies, German Studies, Italian Studies, and Art History, with minors in European and Medieval Studies. Due to research interests, she has also acquired a working knowledge of Spanish, classical Latin and Ancient Greek, as well as Old English, Old Norse, and Russian. Caitlin completed the Middlebury Deutsche Schule in 2011 and has studied in Italy, Germany, Belgium, and at Christ Church College, Oxford. She is the recipient of numerous academic awards. At Villanova, Caitlin will focus on Medieval Literature with a certificate in Women and Gender Studies. Her primary interest is the interdisciplinary relationship between Art and Literature, specifically medieval representations of women. Caitlin’s free time is spent traveling, antiquing, cooking, painting, watching foreign films, or translating poetry, as well as volunteering with elderly Russian immigrants. As a Medievalist, she plans to earn h...