Overview

Dr Harry R. McCarthy is Lecturer in Early Modern Literature. The thread that runs through Dr McCarthy's work is an interest in the body and the various ways in which it is marked, categorised, and exhibited, particularly in performance. His latest monograph, Boy Actors in Early Modern England: Skill and Stagecraft in the Theatre, examines what it meant, and took, to perform as a boy actor on early modern English stages. This work speaks readily to the teaching he contributes to undergraduate and postgraduate modules at Exeter. His new research project interrogates how early modern children were subject to structures of racial formation and how depictions of childhood in the literature and drama of the period were informed by notions of whiteness. He has also recently completed a new critical introduction to Shakespeare and Peele's Titus Andronicus for the Oxford World's Classics series. 

When people refer to Dr McCarthy, they use the pronouns he, him, and his. He is committed to anti-racist pedagogy and the diversification of early modern studies, and tweets in a personal capacity at @HarryMcCarthy.

You can find Dr McCarthy in Queen's BG.20. During Term 2 (2024) his office hours are Thursday 5-6pm and Friday 1.30-3.30pm. You can sign up for an in-person or online office hour here. 

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Research

My research centres on early modern theatre and questions concerning the body, chiefly in performance. My latest monograph, Boy Actors in Early Modern England: Skill and Stagecraft in the Theatre, examines what it meant, and took, to perform as a boy actor on early modern English stages. I have a particular interest in non-Shakespearean early modern drama, specialising in underperformed plays by neglected writers: this was the subject of my recent chapter in The Arden Handbook of Shakespeare and Early Modern Drama, which is accompanied by an online database of non-Shakespearean productions from the second decade of the twenty-first century. 

Revisiting my earlier work on literary and theatrical constructions of early modern childhood and youth now has me thinking about how the framework of premodern critical race studies might be applied to children in this period, and I am now in the early stages of developing a monograph project titled Early Modern Racial Childhoods, which will interrogate how early modern children were subject to structures of racial formation and how depictions of childhood were informed by notions of whiteness. In addtion to this longer-form project, I recently completed a new introduction to Titus Andronicus for the Oxford World's Classics series. 

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External impact and engagement

Media

I have always enjoyed sharing my research and views on drama, literature, and education through the media. Recent contributions include an interview about my research for the 'A Bit Lit' YouTube Channel, an interview as part of Professor Abigail Williams' Radio 4 'Pride or Prejudice: How We Read Now' series, and, most recently, a contribution to Radio 3's Sunday Feature on the playwright Robert Greene, presented by Professor Nandini Das. 

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Teaching

Modules taught

• EAS1041 - Rethinking Shakespeare
• EAS2026 - Desire and Power: English Literature 1570-1640
• EAS3003 - Dissertation
• EAS3179 - Life and Death in Early Modern Literature

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Biography

I grew up in Abingdon, just outside Oxford, where I attended local comprehensive schools before starting a BA in English and French at Exeter in 2011. I left Exeter in 2015 to pursue an M.St. in English (1550-1700) at the University of Oxford, and returned in 2016 after being awarded a South, West, and Wales DTP PhD scholarship which allowed me to continue to pursue my interests in the training, rehearsal, performance, and afterlives of early modern boy actors. My thesis, "Boy Actors on the Early Modern English Stage: Performance, Physicality, and the Work of Play," became the first by a UK scholar to win the Shakespeare Association of America's J. Leeds Barroll Dissertation Prize in 2021. Between 2020 and 2023, I held a Research Fellowship at Jesus College, Cambridge, and returned to Exeter as Lecturer in Early Modern Literature in September 2023. 

I was the Performance Reviews Editor for Shakespeare Bulletin until 2017​, and also worked as Editorial Assistant for the journal. In 2021, I was appointed to the Advisory Board of Shakespeare Survey. I also serve as the Membership Secretary for the Malone Society. 

I am committed to anti-racist pedagogy and advancing racial justice in the field of early modern studies and beyond. You can read my thoughts on the issue here.

My pronouns are he/him/his. I tweet at @HarryMcCarthy. 

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