Dr. habil. Natália Pikli

Biography:

I graduated at Eötvös Loránd University in 1995-96 as a member of Eötvös Collegium, with MA diplomas in English and Hungarian (with teaching degrees), and I pursued my doctoral studies at ELTE under the supervision of Professor István Géher, with a summa cum laude defense in 2003. My doctoral dissertation (The Prism of Laughter. Shakespeare’s ‘very tragical mirth’) was later published in Germany. In 2018 I completed the so-called ‘habilitation’ process at ELTE. My monograph based on the habiliation manuscript was published by Routledge with the title Shakespeare’s Hobby-Horse and Early Modern Popular Culture in 2022. I worked as a full-time teacher of Hungarian Literature and English as a Foreign Language in Radnóti Miklós Grammar School, Dunakeszi between 1996 and 2008. During this time I was a guest lecturer at ELTE and Eötvös Collegium. I received full tenure at the Department of English Studies, ELTE, in 2008, and have been working here ever since, first as Senior Lecturer, then as Associate Professor. I received a doctoral grant to do research at the Shakespeare Institute, Stratford-upon-Avon in 1997, and later on I received bursaries for research trips to Cambridge University Library, funded by ESSE in 2013 and by Erasmus in 2019. Thanks to the staff mobility program of Erasmus, I taught classes at Charles University, Prague, the University of Konstanz, and the University of Florence. I was guest lecturer at the Hungarian University of Theatre and Film Arts, Budapest, between 2016 and 2019. Between 2018 and 2023 I was the President of the Hungarian Shakespeare Committee, of which I was also a founding member in 2013. In October 2020 I was appointed Head of the Doctoral Program “Medieval and Early Modern English Culture and Literature” at ELTE, and currently I am co-leading two research groups: ELTE-CEMS (Centre for Early Modern Studies Research Group) with Andrea Velich and EASPop (English and American Popular Culture Research Group) with Vera Benczik and Lili Zách. I also teach classes at the Theatre Studies BA specialization and MA programs at ELTE. I publish regularly in English as well as in Hungarian, and I also direct amateur theatre productions with grammar school and university students. I write theatre reviews for the online cultural journal prae.hu.

Research:

Early modern (popular) culture and literature, theatre, drama, and cheap print, Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Contemporary (late 20th and 21st century), popular culture, with a focus on the reception of Shakespeare. Contemporary theatre and drama in the UK and in Hungary, Caryl Churchill.

Selected publications:

• Shakespeare's Hobby-Horse and Early Modern Popular Culture. New York-Abingdon: Routledge, 2022.
• "Institutional heritage and 'that Shakespearean hazard' 1989–2019: The case of the Katona József Theatre and SzFE's Ódry Theatre." Theatralia 24 (2021): 65-82.
• "Folklorizáció, közköltészet, könyvpiac: A kora újkori angol morristánc az olcsó nyomtatványok tükrében." Doromb: Közköltészeti tanulmányok 8. Ed. Csörsz Rumen István. Budapest: Reciti Kiadó (2020): 53-76.
• "‘As for that light hobby-horse, my sister': Shakespearean Influences and Popular Discourses in Blurt Master Constable." Shakespeare Survey 70: Creating Shakespeare. Ed. P. Holland. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 259-271.
• "'Váz-király', 'kapca-, rongykirály' vagy 'bolondkirály'?: Arany János Hamlet-fordításának karneváli rétege." "Eszedbe jussak”: Tanulmányok Arany János Hamlet-fordításáról. Ed. Paraizs Júlia. Budapest: Reciti Kiadó, 2015. 105-140.

Selected conferences

Teaching

Supervision

Further information