Dr Roger Christofides

Personal Statement

I work on Renaissance literature, especially Shakespeare. My current research focuses on the various ways representations of race, ethnicity and religion from the sixteenth and seventeenth century counterpoint twenty-first century discourses of difference. My most recent book, Othello’s Secret: The Cyprus Problem, reveals how Shakespeare’s play preempts the ethnic wars and division of modern Cyprus. Other research interests include religious iconography and its influence on Renaissance literature, including how that iconography is refashioned in popular culture for today’s more secular consumers, the use of critical theory in Shakespeare studies, and the representation of Cyprus in English literature and travel writing.