#  Spencer Lee Lenfield 

Class of 2012, Modern Europe

Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature, Harvard University

 

 

 



   ![Spencer Lee Lenfield](/sites/g/files/omnuum4926/files/styles/hwp_4_5__320x400/public/histlit/files/lee-lenfield_spencer.jpg?itok=wl-5JDdp) 

 



 





 

**Thesis Title:** *Mrs. Dalloway* and Virginia Woolf’s Conception of the Self

**What Now:** Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature, Harvard University  
I hope that I can share that your life path during college never need limit your life after, especially when it comes to languages! While in History and Literature as a Harvard undergrad from 2008–2012, I was in the Modern Europe field and mainly studied British and French material. But I also started Ancient Greek for fun as a junior, and that enabled me to spend 2012–15 in the United Kingdom at Oxford University reading for a second bachelor's degree in classics and philosophy on a Rhodes Scholarship. Taking breaks away from degree programs is also constructive: after Oxford, I worked for two years at Dumbarton Oaks, a beautiful research center in Washington, D.C., where I directed multiple video projects and worked on public relations and outreach initiatives. I then left in the summer of 2017 to take a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship in Korea, where I taught middle school English while studying Korean (which I'd started in 2015). From 2018–24, I was a Ph.D. student in Yale's Department of Comparative Literature, where I wrote a dissertation on translation, adaptation, and retelling between Korean and Korean diasporic literature. Sidelines are also great: from my undergraduate years to the end of graduate school, I also wrote on a regular basis as a freelance journalist, essayist, and reviewer on the side. In 2024, Harvard's Department of Comparative Literature hired me as a professor, which means my office is now in Dana Palmer House just across from Hist & Lit. Please come anytime to talk about career paths, ideas, languages, or books!   
  
**Read More:**

- ["Mysterious Displays of Will"](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.nybooks.com_online_2023_01_04_mysterious-2Ddisplays-2Dof-2Dwill_&d=DwMFaQ&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=JVn1Vz6qni5dqoP9wb8HHABLpDDKd1F3u8_MxbW3jQ8&m=vBqw-uB6rdtiSOfn2_knF7X2ub35A64lkOPwTnVe5zCdO2sx_VVHx0ezhS4Tug_R&s=SGOWZhzm4WCMC-iU6QE9vF1ypbfb3elnwUasYEdHxHY&e=) in *The New York Review of Books* (January 2023)
- ["Why So Serious?"](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__yalereview.org_article_sang-2Dyoung-2Dpark-2Dqueer-2Dfiction&d=DwMFaQ&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=JVn1Vz6qni5dqoP9wb8HHABLpDDKd1F3u8_MxbW3jQ8&m=vBqw-uB6rdtiSOfn2_knF7X2ub35A64lkOPwTnVe5zCdO2sx_VVHx0ezhS4Tug_R&s=XMJsJhenQpJsc3gfYyAk7Ak2_k21figcrukP8WL4dig&e=) in *The Yale Review* (May 2022)
- ["Estranged Modernisms"](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.guernicamag.com_estranged-2Dmodernisms_&d=DwMFaQ&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=JVn1Vz6qni5dqoP9wb8HHABLpDDKd1F3u8_MxbW3jQ8&m=vBqw-uB6rdtiSOfn2_knF7X2ub35A64lkOPwTnVe5zCdO2sx_VVHx0ezhS4Tug_R&s=ZsGfxUhTgFpJ7XIX3VZb7XIOISlX8MZVLJauokGCpSk&e=) in *Guernica* (April 2022)



 

 

 





 

 

- ## Career Paths
    
     [Academia and Education](/alumni/academia-and-education)