Dr Lucas Thompson
Discipline of English and Writing
Lucas Thompson's work explores the intersection of literature and philosophy, focusing on the rich aesthetic experiences and forms of knowledge available to readers. He has published widely on the philosophical and aesthetic dimensions of various literary texts, as well as making contributions to Film Studies, Comparative Literature, and Television Studies. Before joining the Discipline of English & Writing at Sydney, he held various teaching roles at the United States Studies Centre, the University of New South Wales, and the University of Wollongong.
- Literature and Philosophy
- Literary Aesthetics
- Anglophone Literature, 20th-Century and Contemporary
- Postcritique and Postcritical Approaches to Reading
- Sound Studies
- Ordinary Language Philosophy
- Stanley Cavell
- Film and Television
Dr Thompson's forthcoming book, Metaphors We Read By: Rethinking Literary Experience and Interpretation (Edinburgh University Press, 2025), proposes a metaphorical approach to reading that offers new ways of understanding literary experience and interpretation. In doing so, it makes important contributions to current debates around method and interpretation, as well as literary aesthetics, postcritique, and ordinary language philosophy. Metaphors We Read By analyses a wide range of contemporary and twentieth-century novelists, including Marilynne Robinson, Toni Morrison, George Saunders, Elena Ferrante, Karl Ove Knausgård, Joy Williams, Ben Lerner, and John Williams.
Dr. Thompson's current book project, "The Mind's Ear: Literature and the Auditory Imagination," investigates how imagined sounds of all kinds (including dialogue, natural and machine-made noises, music, etc.) are activated for readers during literary experience. The project will provide a rich account of how sounds are generated and sustained in the imagination, exploring the wide variety of techniques that novelists deploy in order to activate the auditory imagination.
- MLA
- ANZASA
- Editorial Advisory Board, The David Foster Wallace Studies Journal, 2018-present
- Managing Editor, The Australasian Journal of American Studies, 2017-August, 2019
- Editor, Philament: A Journal of Literature, Arts, and Culture, 2011-2013
- Editor, The Australasian Journal of American Studies, August, 2019-present
| Project title | Research student |
|---|---|
| "A Moment of Induced Bafflement": Ambiguity and Ethics in the Short Fiction of George Saunders | Lisa-jane ROBERTS |
Selected publications
(Bloomsbury Academic, 2017)
Publications
Books
- Thompson, L. (2025). Metaphors We Read By: Rethinking Literary Experience and Interpretation (forthcoming). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
- Thompson, L. (2017). Global Wallace: David Foster Wallace and World Literature. New York: Bloomsbury Academic. [More Information]
Book Chapters
- Thompson, L. (2024). Rethinking Dramatic Irony with George Eliot's 'Silas Marner' (forthcoming). In Garry L. Hagberg (Eds.), Literature, Voice, Meaning: Philosophical Aspects. New York: Palgrave-Macmillan. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2023). David Foster Wallace and European Literature. In Clare Hayes-Brady (Eds.), David Foster Wallace in Context, (pp. 57-66). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. [More Information]
- Gleeson-White, S., Thompson, L. (2020). Teaching Anzia Yezierska's 'Bread-Givers' in Australia. In Roberta Rosenberg and Rachel Rubinstein (Eds.), Teaching Jewish American Literature, (pp. 308-311). New York, United States: Modern Language Association of America.
Journals
- Thompson, L. (2021). Private screenings: Ingmar Bergman's 'Cries and Whispers' and cinematic fiction. Textual Practice, 35(10), 1647-1666. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2020). 'Nathan for You' and the New Sincerity aesthetic. New Review of Film and Television Studies, 18(4), 431-451. [More Information]
- Clarke, F., Thompson, L. (2020). Editorial Note. Australasian Journal of American Studies (AJAS), 39(1), 1-4. [More Information]
Magazine / Newspaper Articles
- Thompson, L. (2023). "Degraded, humiliated, made of no account": Should we be educating or punishing prisoners? [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2022). A funhouse mirror of the soul: Belated thoughts on Frederick Buechner's saints. ABC Religion and Ethics. [More Information]
- Howard, J., Newell, B., Atherton, C., Hesse, I., Parr, J., Thompson, L., Sharpe, M. (2021). Freud, Nietzsche, Paglia, Fanon: our expert guide to the books of The White Lotus. The Conversation. [More Information]
Reference Works
- Thompson, L. (2021). Robinson, Marilynne. In Patrick O'Donnell, Stephen J. Burn and Lesley Larkin (Eds.), The Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Fiction, 1980-2020. Hoboken, United States: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2019). Postcritique. Wikipedia. Wikimedia. [More Information]
2025
- Thompson, L. (2025). Metaphors We Read By: Rethinking Literary Experience and Interpretation (forthcoming). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
2024
- Thompson, L. (2024). Rethinking Dramatic Irony with George Eliot's 'Silas Marner' (forthcoming). In Garry L. Hagberg (Eds.), Literature, Voice, Meaning: Philosophical Aspects. New York: Palgrave-Macmillan. [More Information]
2023
- Thompson, L. (2023). "Degraded, humiliated, made of no account": Should we be educating or punishing prisoners? [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2023). David Foster Wallace and European Literature. In Clare Hayes-Brady (Eds.), David Foster Wallace in Context, (pp. 57-66). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. [More Information]
2022
- Thompson, L. (2022). A funhouse mirror of the soul: Belated thoughts on Frederick Buechner's saints. ABC Religion and Ethics. [More Information]
2021
- Howard, J., Newell, B., Atherton, C., Hesse, I., Parr, J., Thompson, L., Sharpe, M. (2021). Freud, Nietzsche, Paglia, Fanon: our expert guide to the books of The White Lotus. The Conversation. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2021). Liked Netflix's The Chair? Here are 4 moving, funny novels set in English departments. The Conversation. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2021). Private screenings: Ingmar Bergman's 'Cries and Whispers' and cinematic fiction. Textual Practice, 35(10), 1647-1666. [More Information]
2020
- Thompson, L. (2020). 'Nathan for You' and the New Sincerity aesthetic. New Review of Film and Television Studies, 18(4), 431-451. [More Information]
- Clarke, F., Thompson, L. (2020). Editorial Note. Australasian Journal of American Studies (AJAS), 39(1), 1-4. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2020). Marriage as Madness: 'Love Crazy' and the Hollywood Comedy of Remarriage. Conversations: The Journal of Cavellian Studies, 8, 92-125. [More Information]
2019
- Thompson, L. (2019). David Foster Wallace's Germany. Comparative Literature Studies, 56(1), 1-30. [More Information]
- Clarke, F., Thompson, L. (2019). Editorial Note. Australasian Journal of American Studies (AJAS), 38(2), 1-2. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2019). Flights of Fancy: On Elaine Scarry's 'Dreaming by the Book'. Australasian Journal of American Studies (AJAS), 38(2), 51-60.
2018
- Thompson, L. (2018). 'PsyOps Works Best When You Mean It': Literary Manipulation in Phil Klay's 'Redeployment'. Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, 60(2), 191-204. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2018). Explainer: what happened to the Presidential arts medals? The United States Studies Centre - Analysis. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2018). Wallace and Race. In Ralph Clare (Eds.), The Cambridge Companion to David Foster Wallace, (pp. 204-219). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [More Information]
2017
- Thompson, L. (2017). Global Wallace: David Foster Wallace and World Literature. New York: Bloomsbury Academic. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2017). Reverse Engineering Cormac McCarthy's Sentences. The Cormac McCarthy Journal, 15(1), 88-95. [More Information]
2016
- Thompson, L. (2016). 'Sincerity with a Motive': Literary Manipulation in David Foster Wallace's 'Infinite Jest'. Critique, 57(4), 359-373. [More Information]
2015
- Thompson, L. (2015). 'Books are Made out of Books': David Foster Wallace and Cormac McCarthy. The Cormac McCarthy Journal, 13(1), 3-26. [More Information]
- Morrissey, T., Thompson, L. (2015). 'The Rare White at the Window': A Reappraisal of Mark Costello and David Foster Wallace's 'Signifying Rappers'. Journal of American Studies, 49(1), 77-97. [More Information]
- Thompson, L. (2015). David Foster Wallace and 'Blurbspeak'. The Los Angeles Review of Books. [More Information]
2014
- Thompson, L. (2014). Programming Literary Influence: David Foster Wallace's 'B.I. #59'. Texas Studies in Literature and Language, 56(2), 113-134. [More Information]
In the media
- 26/7/2019 – Interviewed on The History Channel’s Dynasties: Families that Changed the World.