Dr Lucy Thompson

Lucy’s research focuses on surveillance, gender, and disability in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literature. She explores how scrutiny – both state and social – shaped cultural attitudes, particularly in the Romantic period. Her book, Gender, Surveillance, and Literature in the Romantic Period (Routledge, 2022), examines how surveillance became embedded in literary culture between 1780 and 1830.

Her recent work engages with Critical Disability Studies, considering how literature reflects and shapes perceptions of impairment and care. Her chapter on disability, caregiving, and surveillance in William Godwin’s Mandeville appears in Care and Disability: Relational Representations (Routledge, 2025). She has also developed A Guide to Surveillance Terminology, a resource supporting students and researchers in surveillance studies.

Her PhD students work on Gothic literature, fin de siècle fiction, periodical culture, disability studies, and representations of non-human figures in literature. She welcomes PhD applications on surveillance, disability, gender, and self-regulation in Romantic and nineteenth-century fiction, as well as interdisciplinary projects engaging with medical humanities and cultural history.

Routledge author profile