Lilyemma Whalley

Profile

Project Title: ‘Only loved beyond that line, with a love that answers thine’: Animal service and companionship from childhood to adulthood in Victorian literature

Supervisor: Dr Angela Dunstan

My research focuses on animal studies in long nineteenth century literature, with particular attention to animal service and companionship across childhood and adulthood. I am especially interested in how human-animal relationships shape ideas of care, morality, domesticity and emotional development. My broader interests include visual culture, childhood studies, and the representation of domestic and natural environments in nineteenth century literature and culture. I work across literary, historical and visual materials to explore how animals mediate questions of identity, class, empire and ethical behaviour.

Previous qualifications:

MA, English Literature (Distinction), Queen Mary University of London, Dissertation – Imaginative Landscapes: Peter Pan, The Coming of the Fairies, and a longing for the pastoral.

BA (Hons), English Literature, Queen Mary University of London, Dissertation – ‘Down the Rabbit-Hole’ of the Conflict Between Girlhood and Womanhood in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Teaching

Teaching Associate – Queen Mary University of London (January 2025-present)

Postgraduate Representative, Executive Committee – British Association for Victorian Studies (February 2025-present)

Research Administration Assistant – Centre for the Study of the Nineteenth Century and its Legacies, Queen Mary University of London (September 2024-present)

Postgraduate Research Communications & Marketing Assistant – Queen Mary Students’ Union (April 2024-present)

Receptionist / Reception Supervisor – Queen Mary Students’ Union (September 2021-present)

Founder / Music Journalist – Blonde Vibrations (September 2021-present)

Research Assistant – Nineteenth-Century Reception of Greco-Roman Antiquity, Queen Mary University of London (January 2023-April 2023)

Research

Publications

Beach, M., Anakwue, N., Freeman-Jones, L. and Whalley, L. (2024), PGR students aren’t hard to reach – and student staff can help, Wonkhe. Available at: https://wonkhe.com/blogs-sus/pgr-students-arent-hard-to-reach-and-student-staff-can-help/

‘Loving Fellow-Creatures’: Female Friendship with Animals in Victorian Literature – British Association of Victorian Studies Annual Conference (2026, forthcoming)

Animals Everywhere! Zoos, Exotic Pets, and the Victorian Fascination with Animals – Sutton Trust Webinar (2026, forthcoming)

“You have no right to grow here!”: Capturing Girlhood and Growing Pains in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Ragged School Museum Symposium (2025)

Childhood Tails: Animal and Child Companionship in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Peter and Wendy – Queen Mary University of London Colloquium (2024)