English at Leicester

Famous names

Find out about some of the famous names associated with English at the University of Leicester.

Notable associates

Philip Larkin

The poet Philip Larkin worked in the college library between 1946 and 1950 and was a long-term companion of Monica Jones, a lecturer within the School.

Kingsley Amis

In prose, English at Leicester has long been associated with the campus novel. Kingsley Amis, who invented the genre, visited his friend Larkin in Leicester; Larkin was living in Dixon Drive, and it was this address that supplied the surname of Jim Dixon, the protagonist of Amis' Lucky Jim.

Notable alumni

Jeffrey Boakye

Jeffrey Boakye (BA English 1st Class Hons, 2003) is an acclaimed author, journalist and broadcaster with interests in race, gender, education and popular culture.  His books include Hold Tight: Black Masculinity, Millennials and the Meaning of Grime (2017), a Rough Trade Book of the Year; What is Masculinity?, co-authored with Darren Chetty (2019); Black, Listed (2019); Musical Truth: A Musical Journey Through Modern Black Britain (2021), shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize and nominated for a Carnegie Medal; and I Heard What You Said (2022). Jeffrey also co-hosts the hit BBC Radio 4 programme 'Add to Playlist' with Cerys Matthews.

Malcolm Bradbury

The novelist Malcolm Bradbury was an undergraduate in the 1950s, and while still a student he began to write his first campus novel, Eating People is Wrong. This novel is a fiction, but, as Professor Bradbury was happy to acknowledge when writing an afterword decades later, was rooted in his experience as a student at Leicester. The fictional characters of the novel are not representations of those who taught Malcolm Bradbury, but are nonetheless given traits that recognisably have their origins in the teaching staff in English.

Adele Parks

English at Leicester has continued to inspire students with literary ambitions. Adele Parks, author of several bestselling novels, is one of our graduates.

Will Tudor

Will Tudor is an actor and graduate of English at Leicester. Perhaps best known for playing Olyvar in the popular HBO TV drama Game of Thrones, Will also plays Odi in Channel 4's Humans and Tristan in the film Tomorrow, directed by Martha Pinson and executive produced by Martin Scorsese.

An interview with Will Tudor

Hear Will talking about his time at Leicester.

Listen to the interview

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