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Friday, 29 April 2016

When Associate Professor Robert Stuart first joined UWA, Perth appeared a sleepy country town, quiet and isolated. It was 1975 and the city certainly didn’t have the hustle and bustle of Toronto where he had been working previously.

“Back then the only job in modern French history I could find was at UWA. It was definitely a big culture shock for my wife and me. We were used to a big city life so it took some time to acclimatise, but I enjoyed working at UWA and the campus from the start,” he says.

Professor Stuart taught French history in his first year, but soon began teaching units on 20th century European history in general.

“The Head of Department told me that something needed to be done to increase enrolments,” he says.

“So I widened the scope of my units and we had an influx of students. I have spent the best part of my career teaching these kinds of general modern European courses and it has been very rewarding.”

An avid science fiction and fantasy reader, Professor Stuart has been able to combine this passion with his interest in history in the most unlikely but fulfilling way at UWA.

“The history program offers staff a lot of flexibility in developing units that incorporate our own interests. So around 10 years ago I decided to combine my lifelong interest in science fiction and fantasy with my academic interest in historiography,” he says.

'Mythistory: Science Fiction, Fantasy and the Historical Imagination' was the result and has proved to be an exceptionally popular course.

“Every credible science fiction story needs a dense historical background. In the unit we look at the ways in which stories such as 'Star Wars' and 'Lord of the Rings' have combined cultural creativity and historical memory to design fantastic pasts, imagine alternative presents, or extrapolate futures.”

“The students love it as they are usually just as interested in the genre as I am. There have been times where I’ve basically had to kick students out of a tutorial because the discussion and debate would have gone on forever if I let it. It has been an absolute joy to teach.”

Finding that publishers were becoming less interested in  his studies of French history and Marxism, both see as declining fields, Professor Stuart has also changed his research focus to incorporate the fantasy genre.

“My research looks into the ideological dimensions of Tolkien’s fantasies. This is a topic that I find very interesting, and given Tolkien’s resurgence in popularity thanks to Director Peter Jackson, publishers are certain to be interested,” he says.

“What I’m really interested in with this research is understanding how people have interpreted the political messages in Tolkien’s books, as well as Tolkien's own political commitment. It’s a very large project and requires me to read all the major texts that scholars have written on Tolkien’s works. The problem is that following the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings films more and more people are writing about him, so I have a lot of text to get through.”

In the meantime, the Professor is responsible for a second level unit aimed at students interested in historical theory who are very engaged and will potentially go on to do honours in the discipline.

“I’m retiring at the end of next year, and this course is a great way to finish my teaching career.  We have some brilliant students at UWA and it’s been such a privilege to teach these extraordinary young people.”

Professor Stuart says while he’ll miss the students and his wonderful colleagues, he’ll always be a historian. Given the amount of Tolkien-related reading ahead of him he’s certainly going to be kept busy, even in retirement.

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