Patricia Fumerton Interview
Patricia Fumerton is Distinguished Professor of English at University of California, Santa Barbara. At UCSB, she is the director and founder of the Early Modern Center, English Broadside Ballad Archive, and Maker Lab (Print Shop). In this excerpt from our interview, Patricia explains the current focus of her research.
How did you get to where you are today, professionally?
How I ended up where I am today is a 70-year-long history. Let’s just say, I was born in Toronto, Canada, as fourth of five children, only one of which was a boy. My parents were loving but sexist. My way of rebelling was to become best at something professional that a girl back then normally wouldn’t do. I have now achieved the highest level possible in any professor’s career—rank of Distinguished Professor—in the University of California system, at UC-Santa Barbara. My specific field is English Renaissance (1550-1700) Literature and Culture.
I ended up working on the text, art, and music of street literature out of guilt at focusing, in my first of three monographs, on canonical “high” literature (aimed at only 10% of the early modern population). I wanted to go down and dirty and find out what the majority of the Renaissance population, specifically the man or woman on the streets of London, 1550-1700, read and cherished. It was broadside ballads—single sheets printed on only one side, consisting of verse, familiar tune titles, and many illustrations that were sold for the cheapest price of any literature of the time, ½ to 1 pence (the price of a loaf of bread or pint of ale).