2011-06-01T12:00:00.003-04:00

My passion is the cultural history of nineteenth-century Britain.

In addition to writing and lecturing on a broad range of subjects related to literature, art, and theatre, I write a blog called The Victorian Peeper, in which I share my boundless enthusiasm for the amazing (and sometimes appalling) age of the Victorians (1837-1901). The blog has a companion Facebook page (www.facebook.com/VictorianLondon) and Twitter page (www.twitter.com/Tetens).

As a doctoral student in the School of English at the University of Leicester (UK), I'm researching representations of Islam in Victorian drama and the position of Muslims in Victorian society more generally. I hold undergraduate and graduate degrees from Michigan State University with additional training in archives management and documentary editing from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (U.S. National Archives). You can visit my Academia.edu profile, which includes PDFs of most of my publications, here.

I am also the director of communications for two major academic units at Michigan State University: the College of Music and the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities. As an arts administrator, I have extensive experience in creating and managing projects that improve understanding between cultural organizations and the publics they serve. You can visit my LinkedIn profile here.

I welcome your comments and questions. Contact me by e-mail at tetenskr@msu.edu.

Research interests

Nineteenth-century British history; the life and career of the English actor-manager Henry Irving (1838-1905) and his circle; the life and career of the Irish theatrical entrepreneur Thomas Monck Mason (1803-1889); Italian, French, and German opera in nineteenth-century London; representations of India and the "East" on the Victorian stage; theatrical practice in British India; theatrical practice in the Ottoman Empire, especially court theatre in Constantinople c.1875-1900; Islam and Muslim agency in Victorian Britain and British India; representations of Islam and Muslims in nineteenth-century British literature and drama; Victorian pantomime; performance studies; theatre and anthropology; humanities computing and multimedia applications for the study of theatre history.

Representative publications

Copies of the publications listed here are available as PDFs at my Academia.edu profile page; click here.

"Continental Opera in the London of William IV: Thomas Monck Mason and the King's Theatre, 1832," forthcoming 2012 (PDF unavailable).

"The Lyceum and the Lord Chamberlain: The Case of Hall Caine's Mahomet," in Richard Foulkes, ed., Henry Irving: A Re-Evaluation of the Pre-Eminent Victorian Actor-Manager (Ashgate, 2008).

"Commemorating the French Revolution on the Victorian Stage: Henry Irving's The Dead Heart," Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film, vol. 32, no. 2 (Winter 2005): 36-69.

“Staging the French Revolution,” Browning Society Notes, vol. 30 (March 2005): 17-28.

"'A Grand Informal Durbar': Henry Irving and the Coronation of Edward VII," Journal of Victorian Culture 8.2 (Autumn 2003): 257-291.

"An Interview with John H. B. Irving [Sir Henry Irving's great-grandson] on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday," First Knight: Journal of The Irving Society, vol. 8, no. 2 (December 2004): 28-33.

Biographical essays on Charles Walter Couldock (actor, 1815-1898), Charles Gayler (playwright, 1820-1892), and Frederick Barkham Warde (actor, 1851-1935) in Garraty and Carnes, eds., American National Biography, Oxford University Press, 1999.

Representative conference papers and invited lectures

"'I Feel My Darkness Now!'": Ellen Terry's Iolanthe and the Representation of Blindness on the Victorian Stage," The Arts and Culture in Victorian Britain, North American Victorian Studies Association (annual conference), Yale University (November 2008).

"Scheherazade on the English Stage: The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments and the Georgian Repertoire," The Georgian Playhouse and its Continental Counterparts, 1750-1850 (conference), Society for Theatre Research, Theatre Royal, Richmond (September 2008).

"Islam, the Victorian Stage, and Henry Irving's Abandoned Production of Mahomet," Henry Irving: A Life in the Victorian Theatre (conference), University of Leicester (July 2005).

"Continental Opera in the London of William IV: Thomas Monck Mason and the King's Theatre, Haymarket, 1832," Fifth Biennial International Conference on Music in Nineteenth-Century Britain, University of Nottingham (July 2005).

"Staging the French Revolution," The Browning Society spring meeting, Institute of Historical Research, University of London (May 2004). Reprinted in Browning Society Notes, vol. 30 (March 2005): 17-28.

Fellowships and grants

John M. Ward Fellowship in Dance and Music for the Theatre, Houghton Library, Harvard University, 2004-05.

Society for Theatre Research (UK) grants, 1993 and 2004.

Media

Historical consultant, “Bram Stoker” one-hour biographical documentary, Working Dog Productions (New York) for A&E Television Networks, 2004.

Kristan Tetens