Prof Peter Otto
Head of English
Biography
Peter Otto's recent research has focussed on the emergence of modern notions of virtual reality in the literature, popular entertainments and art of the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. Other research interests include, Romanticism, William Blake, Gothic Fictions, New Media and the relation between romanticism and contemporary culture. He has co-edited two collections of articles on Romanticism and authored two books on William Blake - Constructive Vision and Visionary Deconstruction (1991; 2001, Oxford UP) and Blake's Critique of Transcendence (2000; 2006 Oxford UP). A microfilm collection of Gothic Texts (338 volumes), coedited with Alison Milbank and Marie Mulvey-Roberts, and an accompanying monograph were published by Adam Matthew Publications in 2002-3. A second microfilm collection, Entertaining the Supernatural: Animal Magnetism, Spiritualism, Secular Magic and Psychical Science (220 volumes) was published in 2007.
Current research
Peter Otto's recent research has focussed on the relation between modernity and three "social" movements of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries: Romanticism, Mesmerism and Millenarianism. Other research interests include, Virtual Reality, William Blake, Gothic Fictions, and the relation between romanticism and contemporary culture. He has co-edited two collections of articles on Romanticism and authored two books on William Blake - Constructive Vision and Visionary Deconstruction (1991; 2001, Oxford UP) and Blake's Critique of Transcendence (2000, Oxford UP). A microfilm collection of Gothic Texts (338 volumes), coedited with Alison Milbank and Marie Mulvey-Roberts, and an accompanying monograph was published by Adam Matthew Publications in 2002-3.
Teaching
- 106-019 Blake
- 106-052 Gothic Fictions
- 106-423 Romanticism and Modernity
Full subject descriptions are available on the University of Melbourne Handbook.
Publications
Books
- OTTO, Peter, Marie Mulvey-Roberts and Alison Milbank. Gothic Fictions: A Guide. Marlborough, Wilt.: Adam Matthew Publications, 2002.
- OTTO, Peter. (Editor, with Marie Mulvey-Roberts and Alison Milbank.) Gothic Fictions: A microfilm collection of primary texts Marlborough, Wilt.: Adam Matthew Publications, 2002-3):
- Part 1: Matthew Lewis and Gothic Horror - Beckford to Lewis (23 reels)
- Part 2: Matthew Lewis and Gothic Horror - MacKenzie to Zschokke (21 reels)
- Part 3: Gothic Terror: Radcliffe and her Imitators - Boaden to Meeke (25 reels)
- Part 4: Gothic Terror: Radcliffe and Her Imitators - Pickard to Wilkinson (23 reels)
- Part 5: Domestic and Sentimental Gothic - Bennett to Lamb (21 reels)
- Part 6: Domestic and Sentimental Gothic - Lathom to Warner (21 reels)
- Part 7: Gothic History, Satire and Chapbooks - The Affecting history of Louisa to Wonderful Tales and Austen to Ireland (20 reels - Forthcoming).
- Part 8: Gothic History, Satire and Chapbooks - Lambe to White (20 reels - Forthcoming).
- OTTO, Peter. Constructive Vision and Visionary Deconstruction:Los, Eternity, and the Productions of Time in the Later Poetry of William Blake (1991; rpt. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2001).
- OTTO, Peter. Blake's Critique of Transcendence: Love, Jealousy and the Sublime in 'The Four Zoas'. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. 365 pages.
Book chapters
- OTTO, Peter. "Romantic Medievalism and Gothic Horror: Wordsworth, Tennyson, Kendall, and the dilemmas of antipodean gothic", in Medievalism and the Gothic in Australian Culture, edited by Stephanie Trigg (Brepols (Belgium) and Melbourne University Press, 2002 ).
- OTTO, Peter. "Gothic Fiction" in Gothic Fiction: A microfilm collection of primary texts (Marlborough, Wilt.: Adam Matthew Publications - in Press, 2002), edited by Peter Otto, Marie Mulvey-Roberts and Alison Milbank.
- OTTO, Peter. "From the Religious to the Psychological Sublime". In Severe Contentions of Friendship: Festschrift for John E. Grant, edited by Alexander Gourlay. West Cornwall, CT: Locust Hill Press, 2002.
- OTTO, Peter. "Literary Theory". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, ed. Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999. Pp. 378-85.
- OTTO, Peter. "Re-framing the Moment of Creation: Blake's Re-visions of the Frontispiece and Title-page to Europe". In Blake, Politics, and History, ed. by Jackie DiSalvo, G. A. Rosso and Christopher Z. Hobson. Wellesley Studies in Critical Theory, Literary History, and Culture. New York and London: Garland, 1998. Pp. 235-46.
Journal articles
- OTTO, Peter. "A Sublime Allegory", The Eighteenth Century: Theory and Interpretation 21 (Winter 2002). (In press - 9,500 words.)
- OTTO, Peter. "The Regeneration of the body: Sex, Religion and the Sublime in James Graham's Temple of Health and Hymen". Romanticism on the Net 23 (September 2001) (15,500 words) http://www.erudit.org/revue/ron/2001/v/n23/005991ar.html
- OTTO, Peter. "'A Pompous High Priest': Urizen's ancient phallic religion in The Four Zoas", Blake: An Illustrated Quarterly 35 (2001), pp. 4-22 (15,500 words).
- OTTO, Peter. "Supervision Then and Now", Graduate News (July 2001), pp. 1-2.
- OTTO, Peter. "Imagination". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 2500 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "Gothic Fictions". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 2000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "The Sublime". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 2000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "William Blake (1757-1827)". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 2000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1793)". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 1000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "Philippe Jacques Loutherbourg (1740-1812)". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 1000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein". In Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850, edited by Chris Murray. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2002. (In Press - 1000 words)
- OTTO, Peter. "The Sublime". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, edited by Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, p. 723.
- OTTO, Peter. "Imagination". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, edited by Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, p. 553.
- OTTO, Peter. "Genius". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, edited by Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, pp. 518-19.
- OTTO, Peter. "Allegory". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, edited by Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, pp. 403-4.
- OTTO, Peter. "Originality". In An Oxford Companion to the Romantic Age: British Culture 1776-1832, edited by Iain McCalman. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999, pp. 629-30.