Hes Bradley is a lecturer in English and Creative Writing. They started at Buckingham in a full-time position in 2025 having worked as a visiting lecturer teaching Creative Writing. They have previously worked as a teaching fellow at the Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham and at Oxford Brookes University as an associate lecturer and research assistant for the Poetry Centre where they were part of the team that produced ‘My Teeth Don’t Chew on Shrapnel’: An Anthology of Poetry by Military Veterans (Oxford Brookes Poetry Centre, 2020). They have also worked outside of academia in community gardening, social prescribing, and teaching public courses in creative writing and workshops on early modern ecology. Their research interests include early modern literature, gender and queer theory, and creative-critical practice. They recently worked on a project to stage and workshop John Stephens’ Cynthia’s Revenge (1613), a play with no prior performance history, with funding from the Malone Society and University of Birmingham’s Barry Jackson fund.
They are currently working on a monograph entitled The Person in the Moon: The Queer Lunar Character in Early Modern Drama (Bloomsbury, 2027), a novella adaptation of Sir Gawan and the Green Knight, and a poetry collection.
Qualifications
- BA in English Literature, University of Cambridge
- MA in Shakespeare and Creativity, Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham
- PhD in Early Modern Drama, Oxford Brookes University
Modules Taught
- Creative Writing 1 and 2
- Shakespeare
- Renaissance
- Reading Gender
- Rewriting Empire
- Inklings
Recent Publications
- ‘An Adaptation is Vampiric: The romance and horror of adapting in AMC’s Interview with the Vampire (2022-)’ in Journal of Adaptation in Film & Performance, 18.3 (2025)
- Performance Review: ‘Galatea, by John Lyly, adapted by Emma Frankland and Subira Joy, edited by Andy Kesson for Brighton Festival, Adur Recreation Ground, Shoreham-on-Sea, West Sussex, UK, 18 May 2023’ (Cahiers Élisabéthains, 2023)
- ‘A different future on the moon? Queer Genre and Time in A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, chapter in Critical Insights: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Salem Press, 2020)
- ‘Shakespeare Unbard: Negotiating Civic Shakespeare’, chapter in Paul Edmondson and Ewan Fernie (eds) New Places: Shakespeare and Civic Creativity (Bloomsbury, 2018) with Richard O’Brien. This chapter is based on a performance which they co-wrote with Richard O’Brien, ‘Shakespeare Unbard’, performed at the RSC (front-of-house), University of Birmingham AGM, and filmed by the University of Birmingham.
- Poetry in publications including a contribution to 100 Shakespearian Women edited by Chris Laoutaris and Paul Edmondson (in press), Impossible Archetype, The Q&A Queer Zine, Troublemaker Firestarter, Expressionist Journal (September 2023); Naked Cat Lit Mag, Green Ink Poetry, Neologism Journal, Yes Poetry, Aesthetica. Their work has been shortlisted for the Aesthetica Creative Writing Award and nominated for the Monarch Queer Literary Awards.