Graduation 2025: Katherine Howe

By: Communications

Katherine Howe smiling while wearing a graduation gown and cap

Tell us a bit about your PhD by Publication in American Studies.

My thesis is titled ‘Unrecoverable Truth: Historical Fiction in an American Context’. It argues that certain marginalised populations or ontological perspectives are very difficult to capture using traditional historical research, and that an interdisciplinary approach I call ‘critical discernment’ can use methods of historical fiction to make historiographic arguments that are unavailable to traditional history.

I am, as you can probably tell, very fun to talk to at parties.

What journey did you take to get to UEA?

I began writing historical fiction while a PhD student in American and New England Studies at Boston University in the US. My first novel was published in 2009. I left that programme to write full time, stopping at a stage that American graduate students call ‘ABD’, which stands for ‘all but dissertation’. I always regretted not having the opportunity to finish my doctorate.

I spent 15 years as a novelist and historian, writing 10 fiction and nonfiction books that have been published in both the US and the UK. One day I was giving a talk at Colgate, a university in New York State, when the professor who invited me to speak asked if I had ever heard of a PhD by Publication.

I had been aware of UEA's reputation in American Studies since I was in graduate school the first time. I emailed Prof Thomas Ruys Smith out of the blue, explaining who I was and asking for his thoughts. That is how an American writer wound up receiving her doctorate in American studies at a university in the UK.

Tell us a UEA memory you’ll always treasure.

I arrived for orientation straight from the train from Heathrow, schlepping my suitcase behind me. I had no idea where I was going. I was jetlagged, baffled, and had never been to the eastern part of England before – hauling my suitcase through indistinguishable hallways – until Matthew Sillence rescued me completely by happenstance.

One thing that I have appreciated about UEA is how welcoming and supportive the University has been to me as a postgraduate researcher. Graduate school can be a very stressful experience, and I had already been through it once before. It felt wonderful to be welcomed.

What’s next for you after graduation?

I am a bit unusual, in that I am completing my PhD while mid-career.

My next project will be to turn my attention to a novel that I have been planning, tentatively called Bonfire, set in New York City during the Gilded Age, and engaging in a critical way with the fiction Tom Wolfe wrote about the 1980s. I will be setting my story in the 1890s, backdating while updating.

Where is your future heading?

That's a great question. I will continue to make my life in the States, along the East Coast. Continue writing, perhaps pick up some teaching along the way.

I am open to opportunity wherever it may lie.

What will you miss about being on campus or in Norwich?

I have loved exploring Norwich. I particularly enjoy how walk-able it is, and poking around old inns and taverns along the riverbank.

Though I live in New England, which is old compared to where I grew up (Texas, aka ‘the new South’), I enjoy the architecture of England. It holds so many long memories and stories that I can never wholly know, but can sense are there.

I look forward to coming back.

Learn about American Studies at UEA

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