Dinah Hazell specializes in medieval English literature and cultural studies, with a focus on social commentary, and also works in Tolkien studies, approached from a medieval perspective. She has designed the curriculum for courses taught at San Francisco State University in the Age of Chaucer, medieval protest literature, The Lord of the Rings, fairy tales, and Sherlock Holmes, and presented guest lectures in those classes. A strong proponent of electronic scholarship, she designed and co-edited the online journal Medieval Forum, and contributed modern English translations of Middle English romances and complaint literature to a special edition of MF.

After receiving her bachelor's degree, Dinah earned her master's degree with a thesis on poverty in the fourteenth-century poem Piers Plowman. Her doctoral dissertation studies literary appropriation, comparing twelfth-century Old French poems to their fourteenth-century Middle English redactions.

Volunteer activities have included tutoring at the literacy program Project Read, participating in an auxiliary that raised funds for Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, and editing newsletters for various organizations. An avid gardener, Dinah's home is surrounded by extensive herbaceous border beds and English cottage gardens that attract a variety of birds from finches to hawks, which provide delightful backyard birdwatching.

 

Online Publications

Medieval

"Sexuality, Love and Loyalty: Sir Gowther as Secular Romance"

"The King as 'Evil Counselor' in King Edward and the Shepherd"

"Trewe Man" or "Wicke Traitour": The Steward in Late Middle English Literature."

"Rethinking Marie."

"Sir Tryamour - A Modern English Translation and Commentary"

"Success and Succession in Sir Tryamour"

"False Friends" and Other Perils in Textual Glossing of Middle English Romance

 

Modern

"The Yellow Brick Road to Utopia."

 

Print Publications

Poverty in Late Middle English Literature: the Meene and the Riche. Four Courts Press (2009).

"The Medieval Peasant." Misconceptions About the Middle Ages. Routledge (2008).

The Plants of Middle-earth: Botany and Sub-creation. Kent State University Press. (January 2007).

"Poverty and Plenty: Chaucer's Povre Wydwe and Her Gentil Cok." Mediaevalia 25 (2004): 25-65.

Entry on J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings. History of Childhood. Macmillan Reference USA/Gale Group. (October 2003).

"The Blinding of Gwennere: Thomas Chestre as Social Critic." Arthurian Literature XX (October 2003).

"Empedocles, Boethius and Chaucer: Love Binds All." Carmina Philosophiae XI (2002).