The BARS First Book Prize
Call for 2026 Nominations
Awarded biennially for the best first monograph in Romantic Studies, this prize is open to first monographs published between 1 January 2023 and 31 December 2025. The prize will be awarded at the ‘Romantic Retrospection’ conference at the University of Birmingham in 2026. In keeping with the remit of the British Association for Romantic Studies, the prize is designed to encourage and recognise original, ground-breaking, and interdisciplinary work in the literature and culture of the period c. 1780-1830. The prize is awarded to the value of £300.
Eligibility and Nomination Procedures
The prize is open to scholarly monographs published in English by authors who have not published a monograph before. Books may be nominated by publishers, by members of BARS, or by authors themselves, using the form at the link below. Nominations should attest to the significance of the book’s scholarly contribution, detailing its particular strengths and describing the nature of its originality in no more than 300 words. To ensure this remains a prize for Early Career Academics, the book’s official date of publication will be no later than 10 years after the award of the author’s PhD.
The BARS Executive has appointed a panel of judges consisting of: Susan Civale (Canterbury Christ Church University); Daisy Hay (University of Exeter); Andrew McInnes (Edge Hill University); Cleo O'Callaghan Yeoman (University of Stirling); Emily Paterson-Morgan (The Byron Society); Amy Wilcockson (Queen Mary University of London). The panel is chaired by Ross Wilson (University of Cambridge).
Deadlines
Nomination forms, accompanied by e-copies or hardcopies of the book submitted, should be received by the chair of the panel no later than 12th January 2026. Successful entrants will be notified shortly prior to the ‘Romantic Retrospection’ conference where the prize itself will be awarded.
Email address for all submissions and queries: barsfirstbook@english.cam.ac.uk.
Postal address for hardcopies of books: Prof. Ross Wilson, Emmanuel College, St Andrew’s Street, Cambridge, CB2 3AP.
The 2023 Award
The 2023 shortlist was as follows:
- Lindsey Eckert, The Limits Of Familiarity: Authorship and Romantic Readers (Bucknell University Press, 2023)
- Jillian M. Hess, How Romantics and Victorians Organized Information: Commonplace Books, Scrapbooks, and Albums (Oxford University Press, 2022)
- Laura Kremmel, Romantic Medicine and the Gothic Imagination (University of Wales Press, 2022)
- Stephanie O’Rourke, Art, Science, and the Body in Early Romanticism (Cambridge University Press, 2022)
The panel of judges, chaired by Simon Kövesi and comprising Mary Fairclough, Yimon Lo and Brianna Robertson-Kirkland, awarded the prize to Stephanie O’Rourke's Art, Science, and the Body in Early Romanticism, with an honourable mention for Jillian M. Hess's How Romantics and Victorians Organized Information: Commonplace Books, Scrapbooks, and Albums.
The 2021 Award
The 2021 shortlist was as as follows:
- Will Bowers, The Italian Idea: Anglo-Italian Radical Literary Culture, 1815-1823 (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
- Amelia Dale, The Printed Reader: Gender, Quixotism, and Textual Bodies in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Bucknell University Press, 2019)
- Hrileena Ghosh, John Keats’ Medical Notebook: Text, Context, and Poems (Liverpool University Press, 2020)
- Gerard Lee McKeever, Dialectics of Improvement: Scottish Romanticism, 1786-1831 (Edinburgh University Press, 2020)
The panel of judges, chaired by Francesca Saggini and comprising David Fallon, Tess Somervell and Angela Wright, awarded the prize to Gerard Lee McKeever's Dialectics of Improvement: Scottish Romanticism, 1786-1831, with an honourable mention for Hrileena Ghosh's John Keats’ Medical Notebook: Text, Context, and Poems.
The 2019 Award
The 2019 shortlist was as as follows:
- Melissa Bailes, Questioning Nature: British Women’s Scientific Writing and Literary Originality: 1750-1830 (Virginia University Press, 2017)
- Manu Samriti Chander, Brown Romantics: Poetry and Nationalism in the Global Nineteenth Century (Bucknell University Press, 2017)
- Thomas H. Ford, Wordsworth and the Poetics of Air (Cambridge University Press, 2018)
- Dahlia Porter, Science, Form, and the Problem of Induction in British Romanticism (Cambridge University Press, 2018)
The panel of judges, chaired by Claire Connolly, awarded the prize to Thomas H. Ford's Wordsworth and the Poetics of Air. The judges' report can be read on the BARS Blog.
The 2017 Award
The 2017 shortlist was as as follows:
- Julia S. Carlson, Romantic Marks and Measures: Wordsworth’s Poetry in Fields of Print (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016)
- Siobhan Carroll, An Empire of Air and Water: Uncolonizable Space in the British Imagination, 1750-1850 (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015)
- Devin Griffiths, The Age of Analogy: Science and Literature Between the Darwins (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016)
The panel of judges, chaired by Nigel Leask, awarded the prize to Julia S. Carlson's Romantic Marks and Measures: Wordsworth’s Poetry in Fields of Print. The judges' report can be read on the BARS Blog.
The 2015 Award
The 2015 shortlist was as as follows:
- Jeremy Davies, Bodily Pain in Romantic Literature (Routledge, 2014).
- Mary Fairclough, The Romantic Crowd: Sympathy, Controversy and Print Culture (Cambridge University Press, 2013).
- Maureen McCue, British Romanticism and the Reception of Italian Old Master Art, 1793-1840 (Ashgate, 2014).
- Orianne Smith, Romantic Women Writers, Revolution, and Prophecy: Rebellious Daughters, 1786–1826 (Cambridge University Press, 2013).
The panel of judges (Emma Clery (Chair), Ian Haywood, David Higgins and Susan Valladares) awarded the prize to Orianne Smith's Romantic Women Writers, Revolution, and Prophecy: Rebellious Daughters, 1786–1826. The judges' report can be read on the BARS Blog.