Emma Cole

Emma Cole is Lecturer in Liberal Arts and Classics at the University of Bristol. She is a scholar of the reception of Greek and Roman literature, and her area of expertise lies in the reception of Greek tragedy in contemporary theatre. Her first monograph, Postdramatic Tragedies, was published through the Classical Presences series at Oxford University Press in 2019; it analyses receptions of Greek and Roman tragedy that come under the banner of ‘postdramatic theatre’, and argues that classical tragedy has played a crucial role in the development of the postdramatic, and that the postdramatic provides key insight into the role of tragedy in modernity. She has previously published the co-edited collection Adapting Translation for the Stage (with Geraldine Brodie, for Routledge’s Advances in Theatre and Performance Studies series, shortlisted for the 2019 TaPRA prize for editing), alongside articles and chapters on Sarah Kane, Martin Crimp, and Katie Mitchell. She has also written for a number of popular publications including The Theatre Times, The Conversation, and Exeunt Magazine.

Throughout 2019-2021 Emma is completing an AHRC Leadership Fellowship for the project Punchdrunk on the Classics. The project will pioneer a new direction of research in classical reception regarding the classics and immersivity. The research project builds upon Emma’s prior work as academic consultant on Punchdrunk’s Kabeiroi (2017) and involves her being seconded to the theatre company in a knowledge-exchange arrangement. The fellowship will result in a monograph, as well as a series of collaborative events between academics and practitioners on knowledge exchange and the creative industries and the classics and immersivity.