Staff Profile

Background

I joined the School of English Literature, Language and Linguistics at Newcastle University as an Academic Track (NUAcT) Fellow in 2019, having previously held positions at Jesus College, Oxford, the University of Exeter, and Magdalene College, Cambridge, where I was appointed to the Lumley Fellowship in the Humanities. Since 2014 I have held visiting fellowships at Harvard, Yale, and at the Institute of English Studies in London. In 2021 I was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. In 2022 I was awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize for my work in literary studies and book history. 

My research focuses on the communication of political ideas during the period known at the 'Enlightenment', although I also have longstanding interests in poetry, intellectual history, book history, and bibliography from the early modern period up to the present day. My first book, Literature and Party Politics at the Accession of Queen Anne (2017), arose out of an AHRC-funded doctoral project and was shortlisted for the 2019 University English Book Prize. My second book, The Paper Chase (2020), investigates a three-hundred year old mystery involving an anonymous sectarian pamphlet, a masked woman, a down-on-his-luck printer, and a plot to overthrow the government. It was longlisted for the HWA Non-Fiction Crown. My third book, Alexander Pope in the Making, was published by Oxford University Press in 2021.

I enjoy communicating my research in various different ways, ranging from scholarly articles and monographs to works of creative non-fiction aimed at general readers, combining detailed archival investigation with evocative storytelling. In previous roles I have organised public workshops with the Historical Association, the Bodleian Libraries, and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. Recently I have been interviewed and consulted on programmes for the BBC and Sky Arts. I am a member of the Materiality, Artefacts and Technologies in Culture and History Research Group (MATCH) and of the Newcastle Intellectual History Research Group.

Qualifications

MA (Oxon); MA (Exon); DPhil (Oxon)

Previous Positions

Lumley Fellow in the Humanities, Magdalene College, University of Cambridge; Impact Manager, University of Exeter; Retained Lecturer in English Literature, Jesus College, University of Oxford

Visiting Positions

Visiting Research Fellow, Institute of English Studies, University of London; James M. Osborn Fellow in English Literature and History, Beinecke Library, Yale University; Katharine F. Pantzer Jr. Fellow in Descriptive Bibliography, Houghton Library, Harvard University

Current Research

I am currently engaged in four major projects. (1) A substantial exploration of clandestine printing and the underground book trade in early eighteenth-century England that aims to transform our current understanding of politics, culture, and society in that era. (2) A work of creative non-fiction exploring the forgery of rare books, to be published by Chatto & Windus. (3) A scholarly edition of Pope's early poems for volumes one and two of The Oxford Edition of the Writings of Alexander Pope. (4) An edited collection of essays on Jonathan Swift in Context, for Cambridge University Press.

Postgraduate Supervision

My own work straddles literary studies, political thought, bibliography, and intellectual history, so I particularly welcome applications from postgraduate research students who wish to explore areas across those disciplines. My research on Pope, Swift, and literary culture during the Stuart and Hanoverian periods means I am particularly interested in supervising topics that bridge the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Undergraduate

SEL1004: Introduction to Literary Studies II

SEL2202: Writing New Worlds, 1688-1789

• Articles

  • Hone J. Pope and the Blounts: Books Formerly at Mapledurham House. The Library 2023, 24(3), 343-370. In Press.
  • Hone J. David Edwards and the Later Stuart Underground Press. The English Historical Review 2022, 137(584), 80–108.
  • Hone J. Stop Press. History Today 2021, 71(7), 28-39.
  • Hone J. John Darby and the Whig Canon. The Historical Journal 2021, 64(5), 1257-1280.
  • Hone J, McLaverty J. The Progress of Johnson’s Shakespeare: Subscription, Text, and Printing. The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 2019, 113(2), 121-147.
  • Hone J. Pope, Bathurst, and the Duchess of Buckingham. Studies in Philology 2018, 115(2), 397-416.
  • Hone J, Skjönsberg M. On the Character of a “Great Patriot”: A New Essay Ascribed to Bolingbroke. Journal of British Studies 2018, 57(3), 445-466.
  • Hone J. Bolingbroke and Poetry. The Review of English Studies 2018, 69(292), 874-895.
  • Hone J. Daniel Defoe and the Whig Tradition in Satire. ELH 2017, 84(4), 865-890.
  • Hone J. Isaac Newton and the Medals for Queen Anne. Huntington Library Quarterly 2016, 79(1), 119-148.
  • Hone J. A New Portrait of Defoe in the Pillory. Notes and Queries 2016, 63(1), 70-71.
  • Hone J. Pope’s Lost Epic: Alcander, Prince of Rhodes and the Politics of Exile. Philological Quarterly 2015, 94, 245-266.
  • Hone J. Pope and the Politics of Panegyric. The Review of English Studies 2015, 66(273), 106-123.
  • Hone J. Politicising Praise: Panegyric and the Accession of Queen Anne. Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies 2014, 37(2), 147-157.

• Authored Books

  • Hone J. Alexander Pope in the Making. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021.
  • Hone J. The Paper Chase: The Printer, the Spymaster, and the Hunt for the Rebel Pamphleteers. London: Chatto & Windus, 2020.
  • Hone J. Literature and Party Politics at the Accession of Queen Anne. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

• Book Chapters

  • Hone J. Politics. In: Cook D; Seager N, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Gulliver's Travels. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. In Press.
  • Hone J. Defoe and Satire. In: J. A. Downie and N. Seager, ed. The Oxford Handbook of Daniel Defoe. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021. In Press.
  • Hone J. The Last Stuart Coronation. In: P. Kewes and A. McRae, ed. Stuart Succession Literature: Moments and Transformations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019, pp.132-145.
  • Hone J. Legal Constraints, Libellous Evasions. In: P. Bullard, ed. The Oxford Handbook of Eighteenth-Century Satire. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019, pp.525-541.