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Grace Elisabeth Lavery is an associate professor of English critical theory and gender and women's studies at UC Berkeley, whose research focuses on the history of language and aestheticism in 19th century Victorian English society, along with topics involving the language and literature of sexuality and gender.

Education

Lavery graduated under advisor Paul Saint-Amour with a English Ph.D. in 2013, with a thesis titled "Empire in a Glass Case: Japanese Beauty, British Culture, and Transnational Aestheticism".

Career

As a first publication, Lavery released Quaint, Exquisite in 2019 on a subject connected to Lavery’s post-doctoral research: Victorian era sensibilities in relation to Japan as viewed through a queer theory lens. One major focus of the book is on the idea of orientalism and how that colored English understanding of Japan as the "Other Empire". A 2022 memoir titled Please Miss was Lavery’s second published book and covered a wide range of topics beyond Lavery’s own life and background. An introspection on being trans through a wide variety of genres and non-sequitur asides, the book psychoanalyzes the trans experience and aspects of life that represent it.

Lavery's third book, Pleasure and Efficacy, was released in 2023 and discussed the meaning of being transgender and how transitioning works in relation to how the topic is discussed in various genres of literature. The book also includes philosophical views of writers from the 19th century and how understanding of "transness" is complicated and nuanced, unlike how it can commonly be portrayed in current times. Pleasure and Efficacy was announced as a finalist for the 2024 National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism. In 2024, Closures, Lavery’s fourth book, was published on the topic of the American sitcom and its usage of heterosexuality to define the nuclear family and cause conflict and issues that reinforce the scenario. Lavery explains how the storylines in sitcoms use "external agents" to create strife that ultimately promotes the heteronormativity seen in the nuclear family value system.

Lavery received a $125,000 advance from Substack to publish a newsletter on their platform.

Personal life

In 2018, Lavery officially began transitioning. Lavery in later interviews noted happiness to have done so before entering the academic space with a preferred name.

Lavery married Daniel M. Lavery in 2019 and they moved from California to New York. In 2020, they formed a throuple with Lily Woodruff and they had a son in 2024.

Bibliography

• — (January 26, 2024). Closures: Heterosexuality and the American Sitcom. Duke University Press. p. 128. ISBN 9781478059134.
• — (May 30, 2023). Pleasure and Efficacy: Of Pen Names, Cover Versions, and Other Trans Techniques. Princeton University Press. p. 304. ISBN 9780691243931.
• — (February 8, 2022). Please Miss: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Penis. Basic Books. p. 174. ISBN 9781541620643.
• — (May 28, 2019). Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan. Princeton University Press. p. 219. ISBN 9780691183626.

References

1. "Grace Lavery". english.upenn.edu. University of Pennsylvania. 2024. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
2. Friedman, Dustin (Summer 2020). "Lavery, Grace. Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan". Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies. 16 (2). Retrieved July 3, 2024.
3. ^ Wark, McKenzie (February 2022). "Cocky as Hell". Liber. Vol. 1, no. 1. Archived from the original on January 18, 2023. Retrieved January 17, 2023.
4. Plagmann, Saeri (June 1, 2023). "The Pen Ten: An Interview With Grace E. Lavery". PEN America. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
5. Stewart, Sophia (January 25, 2024). "2024 National Book Critics Circle Awards Finalists Announced". Publishers Weekly. Retrieved July 6, 2024.
6. Watson-Fore, McKenzie (June 3, 2024). "Closures: Heterosexuality and the American Sitcom – Grace Lavery". Full Stop. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
7. Smith, Ben (April 11, 2021). "Why We're Freaking Out About Substack". The New York Times. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
8. Pettit, Emma (January 20, 2019). "The Anxiety of 'Doing Womanhood Correctly' in Academe". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved July 4, 2024.
9. Clifton, Mallen (February 9, 2022). "An Exchange of Letters: Interview with Grace Lavery, author of Please Miss". Berkeley Fiction Review. Archived from the original on November 27, 2022. Retrieved July 4, 2024.
10. Sicha, Choire (April 10, 2024). "Keeping Up With the Laverys". The Cut. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
11. Reviews for Closures:
    • Bartholomew, Isabel (May 25, 2024). "What Was the Sitcom? On Grace Lavery's "Closures"". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
    • Watson-Fore, McKenzie (June 3, 2024). "Closures: Heterosexuality and the American Sitcom – Grace Lavery". Full Stop. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
    • "Closures: Heterosexuality and the American Sitcom". Publishers Weekly. November 9, 2023. Retrieved July 6, 2024.
12. Clare, Stephanie D. (April 2024). "Grace E Lavery. Pleasure and Efficacy: Of Pen Names, Cover Versions and Other Trans Techniques". The Review of English Studies. 75 (319): 245–247. doi:10.1093/res/hgad122. Retrieved July 6, 2024.
13. Reviews for Quaint, Exquisite:
    • Friedman, Dustin (Summer 2020). "Lavery, Grace. Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan". Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies. 16 (2). Retrieved July 3, 2024.
    • Brink, Emily Eastgate (Spring 2022). "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan by Grace Elizabeth Lavery". Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide. 21 (1). doi:10.29411/ncaw.2022.21.1.7. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
    • Biswas, Preeshita (Fall 2022). "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan by Grace E. Lavery (review)". Victorian Review. 48 (2): 333–337. doi:10.1353/vcr.2022.a900632. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • "What We Are Reading Today: Quaint, Exquisite by Grace E. Lavery". Arab News. September 3, 2021. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan, by Grace E. Lavery". Times Higher Education. June 27, 2019. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Agathocleous, Tanya (Winter 2021). "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan by Grace Lavery (review)". Victorian Studies. 63 (2): 275–277. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Pennington, H.L. (December 2019). "Quaint, exquisite: Victorian aesthetics and the idea of Japan". Choice Reviews. ProQuest 2319145378. Retrieved July 5, 2024 – via ProQuest.
    • Wang, Orrin N.C. (Autumn 2021). "Recent Studies in the Nineteenth Century". SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500–1900. 61 (4): 707–755. doi:10.1353/sel.2021.a910836. ProQuest 2895607251. Retrieved July 5, 2024 – via ProQuest.
    • Banerjee, Jacqueline (July 26, 2019). "Transnational flows: Nineteenth-century responses to Japanese culture". Times Literary Supplement. No. 6069 – via Gale.
    • Kalnay, Erica Kanesaka (2020). "Grace E. Lavery, Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan". Victoriographies. 10 (1): 115–117. doi:10.3366/vic.2020.0372. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Gordon, Peter (May 13, 2019). ""Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan" by Grace E Lavery". Asian Review of Books. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Dixon, Laurinda S. (2020). "Grace E. Lavery Quaint, Exquisite. Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan". Journal of Japonisme. 5 (2): 211–216. doi:10.1163/24054992-00052P04. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Han, Jonathan (April 2020). "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan. By Grace E. Lavery". Essays in Criticism. 70 (2): 246–251. doi:10.1093/escrit/cgaa006. Retrieved July 5, 2024.
    • Green, Laurence (December 2019). "Quaint, Exquisite: Victorian Aesthetics and the Idea of Japan". The Japan Society Review. 14 (6). Retrieved July 6, 2024.
    • Frey, Angelica (September 2, 2019). "How Victorian Intellectuals Idealized Japan and Its Culture". Hyperallergic. Retrieved July 6, 2024.

• Living people
• University of California, Berkeley faculty
• 21st-century American women academics
• American women literary critics
• American LGBT academics
• Transgender academics
• American transgender women
• Transgender women writers
• 21st-century American non-fiction writers
• 21st-century American LGBT people