Oxford University Press pays tribute to Professor Laura Marcus

Colleagues at Oxford University Press were saddened to hear of the loss of OUP Delegate, Professor Laura Marcus FBA, this week following a short illness.

Laura was Goldsmiths Professor of English Literature in the Faculty of English and Fellow of New College. Alongside an influential career as a literary scholar with work spanning modernism, Virginia Woolf, and fiction and film, she held the role of Delegate for Oxford University Press for almost ten years. In this role, Laura read and evaluated hundreds of proposals across the span of literary studies and music and had a shaping influence on the Literature list, working closely with its editors. Colleagues at all levels of OUP found her to be a wonderful and supportive adviser, full of warmth and of interest in their work.

Miles Young, Warden of New College said, “New College grieves for Laura Marcus: she loved this college which had been her Oxford home for over ten years, and we loved her. Continuing a distinguished succession of Goldsmiths’ Professors, she added a particular lustre to the title through the creative breadth of her research and writing. She will be missed as a colleague who represented the epitome of academic courtesy, conscience and companionship.”

Nigel Portwood, CEO of Oxford University Press, spoke on behalf of the Press, "We are deeply saddened and shocked at the sudden loss of Laura. She was the Press’s Literature Delegate for nine years, and also was a member of our Finance Committee since 2017. She believed passionately in the work of OUP and she brought extraordinary scholarship, wisdom, and enthusiasm to everything that she was involved in. Above all, it was her compassion and gentle humour that touched our lives, and it is that which we will sorely miss".

A full tribute to Laura and her work is available on the University of Oxford English Faculty website.