Michael Johnston
- Professor // English
- Affiilated Faculty // Comparative Literature // SLC
Research Focus
Middle English literature, the history of the book, romance, Piers Plowman
Office and Contact
Room: SC 290
Email: mjohnst@purdue.edu
Biography
BA John Carroll University (2000); M.Litt., University of St Andrews (2002); Ph.D. Ohio State University (2007)
Michael Johnston (he/him) specializes in the history of the book in late medieval England. His first monograph, Romance and the Gentry in Late Medieval England, appeared with Oxford University Press in 2014. His second monograph, The Middle English Book: Scribes and Readers, 1350–1500, also appeared with Oxford University Press (2023). He is currently working on a catalogue of manuscripts of The Prick of Conscience, as well as a monograph about the manuscript tradition of this poem. As a side project, he has long been interested in the authorship of Piers Plowman, with two essays on this, here and here. At Purdue, he teaches a wide range of courses in early British literature, as well as introductory courses for the English major.