Shannon GaykVirginia Seminar Project: Pilgrim

Shannon Gayk is associate professor of medieval literature at Indiana University in Bloomington. She is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Notre Dame, where she earned her Ph.D. in 2005. Her recent books explore the relationships among aesthetics, ethics, and theology in late-medieval England and include Image, Text, and Religious Reform in Fifteenth Century England (Cambridge UP, 2010), and several collections of essays, including Form and Reform: Reading Across the Fifteenth Century (Ohio State UP, 2011), and a special issue on “The Sacred Object” in The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies (2014), and a special double-issue of Exemplaria on new approaches to Early English literary genres (2015). As a fellow at the National Humanities Center in 2014-2015, she focused on completing several projects, including a book provisionally titled, “Instruments of Christ” that looks at performances of the passion from 1800-1800. Her Virginia Seminar book, Saunter: Medieval Pilgrimages in Modern England, narrates a set of journeys through medieval sacred places and practices, devoting attention not only to the physical and aesthetic elements of the places themselves but also to the histories of these spaces and their modern uses.

To find more information about Shannon’s work, click here.

“The Sacred Object,” in a special issue of The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, forthcoming 2014

Favorite books: Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Really any type of poetry

Favorite book to teachPiers Plowman – a difficult but transformative medieval poem about social justice, community, and what it means to live a good life.

Favorite classes to teach: Medieval drama, nature writing

Writing quirk: I write best if I begin before the sun rises. I also find that there is no better remedy for a writing block than a long walk in the woods. I used to carry a pencil and keep notecards in my pockets during those walks for moments of clarity, but now I use my phone as a recorder.