
- Assistant Professor
- stephen.tardif@utoronto.ca
- PIMS 49
- 416.926.7139
Stephen Tardif is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, in the Christianity & Culture Program at St. Michaelâs College. He also offers courses in the Book & Media Studies Program.
His research explores the connection between literary form and projects of self-formation in Victorian Britain. His publications include articles and essays on Gerard Manley Hopkins, Thomas Hardy, and James Joyce. He is also co-editor of The Hopkins Quarterly, an international journal of critical, scholarly, and appreciative responses to the lives and works of Hopkins, and his circle.
At St. Mikeâs, Professor Tardif offers courses on a range of topics from contemporary literature to ancient intellectual culture. He serves as a faculty advisor to the Christianity and Culture Programâs student club and its undergraduate journal, Saeculum, and to the Collegeâs Dante Lecture Committee as well.
Professor Tardif earned his PhD in English from Harvard University in 2016. He has been a fellow at the Mahindra Humanities Center and a pre-doctoral visiting scholar at the Academy of Arts and Sciences, and his research has been supported by the Andrew A. Mellon Foundation.
A native of Toronto, Professor Tardif received his M.A. in English in 2007 from the University of Toronto and his B.A. Hons. in 2006 from St. Michaelâs College where he majored in English and Christianity & Culture.
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- Areas of Expertise
- 19th-century British literature
- Poetry
- Literary form
- Self-formation
- Aestheticism
- Theory
- G.M. Hopkins
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- Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles
ââThe Wreck of the Deutschlandâ and the Birth of the Poet: Literary Form, Performative Utterance, and Hopkinsâ âGift of Tears,ââ Victorian Poetry 54.3 (Fall 2016).
In Preparation
âSome Versions of Sacrifice: William Empson, RenĂŠ Girard, and Postsecular Critique,â for LIT: Literature Interpretation Theoryâs special issue on âReligion, Criticism, and the Postcritical.â
Book Chapters & Reviews
Review of Michael D. Hurley, Faith in Poetry: Verse Style as a Mode of Religious Belief for Religion & Literature (forthcoming in Religion & Literature).
âJoyceâs Dantean Piety, or The Survival of Acceptable Ideasâ in Dante and The Christian Imagination. Ed. Domenico Pietropaolo and Jenna Sunkenberg. Ottawa: Legas Publishing, 2015.
âRhyming Events and the Pessimistic Muse: Repetition and Representation in âUnder theWaterfallââ in Thomas Hardy, Poet: New Perspectives. Ed. Adrian Grafe and Laurence Estanove. Jefferson, NC: Macmillan, 2015.
âGetting Back to (Human) Nature: Personality as Sacrament in G.M. Hopkinsâ Poetryâ in Figures of the Sacred. Ed. Jennifer Kilgore-Caradec, Ineke Bockting, and Cathy Parc. Bern: Peter Lang, 2013.
Other Writing
âNotre Dameâs Epic Beauty Blurs the Lines of our Easy, Cliched Divisions,â National Post, 23 April 2019.
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- Presentations
Invited Lectures
âThe Dative Reduction: Hopkinsâ Sacrificial Aesthetics,â Institute of Theology, Imagination and the Arts, University of St. Andrewâs School of Divinity, 26 April 2019.
âThe Garden of the World: Victorian Visions of Italy,â Canadian Institute for Mediterranean Studies, University of Toronto, 17 January 2019.
âFlaws of Attraction in Pride and Prejudice,â University of St. Michaelâs College, 3 June 2018.
âThe Ghost in Tennysonâs Machine,â Franciscan University of Steubenville, 3 February 2017.
âCreation in the Singular Number, or Walter Paterâs âOne Book,ââ Mahindra Humanities Center, Harvard University, 23 April 2014.
âHopkinsâs Hamlet: Approaching âThe Wreck of the Deutschland,ââ College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, 16 September 2013.
Conference Papers
âLiberal Media: Paterâs Style and Wildeâs Genres,â NAVSA, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, 17â19, October 2019.
âStreaming the Gospel: The Young Popeâs Postmodern Apostolate,â Catholic Imagination Conference, The Hank Center, Loyola University, Chicago, 19â21 September 2019.
âOutward Form: Romola, Silas Marner, and the Shape of George Eliotâs Self-Formation,â NAVSA, University of Florida, St. Petersburg, Florida, 11â14 October 2018.
âThe Inhuman Touch: Hopkins, The Self, and The Senses,â Hopkins Conference, Roehampton University, London, UK, 21â24 June 2018.
âThe Social Scale of Hopkinsâ Sonnets,â NAVSA, Arizona State University, Phoenix, Arizona, 2â5 November 2016.
âForm and Its Symptom: Making Tennyson through In Memoriam,â ACLA, University of Washington, Seattle, 26â27 March 2015.
âRhyming Events and the Pessimistic Muse: Imperfect Repetitions in Hardyâs Poetry,â Conference on the Poetry of Thomas Hardy, Universite dâArtois, Arras, France, June 2012.
âImpious Allusions: Paradoxes of Piety in Dante and Joyce,â Conference on Dante and the Christian Imagination, University of St. Michaelâs College, University of Toronto, March 2012.
âPersonality as Sacrament in G. M. Hopkinsâ Poetry,â Conference on Religion and Poetry, Institut Catholique de Paris, Paris, France, April 2011.
âHopkinsâ âTo R.B.â and Bridgesâ âTo G.M.H,ââ Hopkins Conference, Gonzaga University, Spokane, Washington, July 2010.
Panels Organized
âPhilosophy and Literature Without Interdisciplinarityâ (with Abigail Modaff), ACLA, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 27â30 March 2016.
âForm and its Function: The Practices of Literary Productionâ (with Stephen Thompson), ACLA, University of Washington, Seattle, 26â27 March 2015.
Public Talks & Workshops
âPhilosophy and Literature,â Workshop Series, Kintore College, Fall 2018 & Fall 2019.
ââDo Whatever He Tells youâ: Consecration to Mary, Abandonment to Christ,â Lecture, Canadian Catholic Students Association Conference, University of St. Michaelâs College, 16 November 2019.
âHumility, Passion, Gratitude; or, How to Succeed in University,â Convocation Speech, Hawthorn School for Girls, 18 June 2019.
âExcellence in Education as Excellence in Character,â Keynote Address, Kintore College, 25 September 2018.
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- Education
PhD, English (2016) â Harvard University, USA
MA, English (2007) â University of Toronto
BA Hons. (High Distinction) (2006) â University of Toronto