Current C.V.
ASHER S. GELZER-GOVATOS
Employment
2023-2025 Postdoctoral Researcher, Ogden Honors College, Louisiana State University
2020-2023 Visiting Assistant Professor of English, Doane University.
Education
2020 PhD in Comparative Literature, Washington University in St. Louis.
2016 MA in Comparative Literature, Washington University in St. Louis.
2008 BA Summa cum laude in Philosophy, The University of Tulsa.
Research & Teaching Areas
20th Century British and American Literature, Ancient & Contemporary World Literature, Philosophy & Literature, Religion & Literature, Global Contemporary Catholic Literature, Kierkegaard, Film & Media Studies
Book Project
From the Papers of One Still Living: Kierkegaard and British Literature, 1932-1995.
My first book discovers an important philosophical and literary resource for British writers of the twentieth century: the work of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard. Following Kierkegaard’s translation into English in the 1930s, he became a constant reference point for authors seeking both to recover the possibilities of ethical literature and to chart a new aesthetic path out of modernism, one that avoided both realism and postmodernism. Looking at the work of many authors – including Aldous Huxley, Graham Greene, Muriel Spark, Flann O’Brien, Iris Murdoch, W.H. Auden, and R.S. Thomas – I show how Kierkegaardian notions of the stages of life, indirect communication, and the need to connect with the “single individual” drove these authors to devise new forms of writing about spiritual belief and ethical behavior amidst major changes in British national and religious identity. Ending with a close reading of David Lodge’s Kierkegaard-heavy 1995 novel Therapy, I trace the decline of this significant tradition in British literature as Kierkegaard moved from the midcentury “prophet of now” to, by century’s end, just one more therapeutic option among many.
Peer Reviewed Articles
“Aldous Huxley’s Degenerative Fiction.” Accepted for publication in Twentieth-Century Literature.
“Bleak House and Kierkegaard in a Leveling Age.” Coauthored with Joshua Brorby. Accepted for publication in Dickens Studies Annual.
“On the Difference between a Genius and an Apostle: Auden, Kierkegaard, and the Vocation of Poetry.” Philosophy & Literature 47.1 (April 2023).
“‘A Sensuous Embodiment’: Sacramental Poetics in T.S. Eliot’s Ariel Poems.” Religion & Literature 52.2 (Summer 2021).
Invited Talks
“Narrative Leaps: Kierkegaard, World War II, and the Crisis of the Novel,” given to the Voegelin Interdisciplinary Humanities Faculty Seminar, Louisiana State University, March 2024.
“Marilynne Robinson’s Non-Fiction,” given as part of a roundtable discussion on the works of Marilynne Robinson, Washington University in St. Louis, November 2018.
Conference Papers
“The Unlikely Alliance of Aldous Huxley and Soren Kierkegaard,” paper given at “Aliens and Allies,” annual meeting of the Southwest Region of the Conference on Christianity and Literature, Baylor University, Waco, September 2023.
“Flann O’Brien and the Risks of Re-enchantment,” paper given at “Gathering in the Strange,” annual meeting of the Southwest Region of the Conference on Christianity and Literature, Oklahoma Baptist University, Shawnee, September 2018.
“Toll-Free Lege: Kierkegaardian and Augustinian Voices in Muriel Spark’s Memento Mori,” paper given at “Kierkegaard, Augustine, and the Catholic Tradition,” Villanova University, Philadelphia, October 2016.
“Non-Prophet Organization: Charlatans, Tricksters, and Other Preachers in American Film,” paper given at Baylor Symposium on Faith & Culture, Waco, October 2014.
Reviews
“The Girl of Slender Meanings,” review of James Bailey’s Muriel Spark’s Early Fiction: Literary Subversion and Experiments with Form, in The University Bookman, July 2021.
“Kierkegaard Is for Lovers,” review of Clare Carlisle’s Philosopher of the Heart: The Restless Life of Søren Kierkegaard, in The University Bookman, November 2020.
Review of A.O. Scott's Better Living Through Criticism, in The Hedgehog Review (18.2), Summer 2016.
“A Perplexing Guide to Movie Watching,” review of David Thomson's How to Watch a Movie, in Books & Culture, Nov/Dec 2015.
Public Humanities Work
2020-Present: Co-Host and Producer, The Readers Karamazov.
I co-host and provide all editing and production support for The Readers Karamazov, a podcast about the intersection of literature and philosophy. The podcast aims to help the general reader make sense of the interaction between literary form and philosophical content in a diverse range of significant works of literature. Each season features a central “big book” (e.g. Middlemarch) and a selection of thematically related smaller books. Featured authors have included Jorge Luis Borges, Gao Xingjian, Aristophanes, Michelle Cliff, and many more. The podcast reaches listeners around the world and has over 10,000 total downloads.
Op-ed: “Why high schools should have mandatory film classes,” TheWeek.com, April 3, 2015.
Academic Awards and Honors
2019 Dissertation Fellowship, Washington University in St. Louis.
2018 Dean’s Award for Teaching Excellence, Washington University in St. Louis.
2018 Mellon Dissertation Seminar Participant, Washington University in St. Louis.
2008 McFarlin Faculty Award in Philosophy, University of Tulsa.
2006 Fellow, Tulsa Undergraduate Research Challenge, University of Tulsa.
Classes Taught
Louisiana State University
2025 Honors 2408: Modern Europe
2024 Comparative Literature 7130: Graduate Seminar - Literature of the Great War
2024 Honors 2030: Humanities Colloquium – European Modernism and the Arts
2024 Honors 2402: Classical Civilizations of the Mediterranean World
2024-5 Honors 2100: Great Conversations - Love and Friendship
2023-4 Honors 2000: Critical Analysis
2023 Honors 2408: Europe since 1789
Doane University
2023 English 102: Writing in Context
2022 English 362: Shakespeare in the Renaissance
2022 English 393: Chaucer & the English Language
2021 English 392: Shakespeare
2021-23 English 237: Introduction to Literary Fiction
2020-22 English 101: The Writing Seminar
2020 English 205: World Literature I
Washington University in St. Louis
2018 Introduction to Film Studies (TA)
2018 Junior Thesis Workshop, Interdisciplinary Project in the Humanities (TA)
2017 Literature of World War I (TA)
2017 College Writing 1: Text & Tradition
2016 College Writing 1
2016 Literary Modernities (TA)
2015 Classical to Renaissance Literature (TA)
Professional Affiliations
The Conference on Christianity and Literature
Professional Service
2024 Committee Member, Senior Capstone Defense, LSU
2024 External Reviewer, The Explicator Journal
2023-2024 Search Committee, Data Analyst Position, Ogden Honors College at LSU
2023 Course Design for Honors 3900 - Capstone Research and Writing, LSU
2021-2023 Judge, Marianne Clarke Writing Award, Doane University
2019-2020, 2017-18 Co-convener, Comparative Literature Association of Graduate Students, WUSTL
2017-20 Founder and Co-convener, Kierkegaard Reading Group, WUSTL
2017-19 Co-convener, Religion & Literature Reading Group, WUSTL
2017-18 Peer Mentor, Comparative Literature, WUSTL
Languages
Danish (intermediate), German (reading knowledge)