The Joys of Teaching Literature, started in September 2010 and with a Spanish version since July 2021, is a blog for ranting and raving about teaching and researching English Literature, Cultural Studies, and Gender Studies, and other aspects of the Anglophone world. I publish a post once a week, usually on Monday. Please, download the yearly volumes for free or read the volume collecting some of the entries (Passionate Professing: The Context and Practice of English Literature, 2023). The comments option is not available, sorry, but you may contact me through my e-mail address, Sara.Martin@uab.cat. The contents of this blog are protected by a type 4 Creative Common License (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (by-nc-nd)).

  • A BAD BEGINNING TO MY READING YEAR…

    I read in one sitting on January 1st Caroline Darian’s memoirs (in Spanish translation by Lydia Vázquez) Y dejé de llamarte papa (2025, Et j’ai cessé de t’appeler Papa). Caroline’s actual surname is Pelicot, but she is using a mixture of her brothers’ names (David and Florian) for her penname. In this touching book she…

  • UN MAL COMIENZO PARA MI AÑO COMO LECTORA…

    El 1 de enero leí de una tacada las memorias de Caroline Darian (traducidas al castellano por Lydia Vázquez) Y dejé de llamarte papa (2025, Et j’ai cessé de t’appeler Papa). El apellido real de Caroline es Pelicot, pero en este emotivo libro utiliza una mezcla de los nombres de sus hermanos (David y Florian)…

  • A LIMINAL POST: BETWEEN 2025 AND 2026

    I’m writing today out of stubbornness, because if I let a third blank week go by I fear that I might give up entirely this blog. I’m procrastinating my proper academic writing (an article and a book chapter have been waiting for too long), and I worry that if I also delay writing yet another…

  • UN POST LIMINAL: ENTRE 2025 Y 2026

    Hoy escribo un poco por terquedad, porque si dejo pasar una tercera semana en blanco temo que pueda abandonar por completo este blog. Estoy procrastinando mi escritura académica propiamente dicha (hay un artículo y un capítulo de libro que llevan demasiado tiempo esperando), y me preocupa que si retraso la escritura de otra entrada en…

  • STRAWSON’S DIACHRONICS VS. EPISODICS: BEGINNING TO THINK ABOUT AUTOBIOGRAPHY

    I was planning to teach this academic year an elective subject on narrative non-fiction of a journalistic type but I will be teaching instead autobiography and memoirs. I have included non-fiction as one of the four categories of contemporary prose students need to read in my Contemporary English Literature subject (the other three are varieties…