Biography

In college, I came to study German almost accidentally, drawn by inspiring professors. There I found my intellectual home, but I became part of other communities as well, through soccer, running, and volunteer programs. I taught a writing class at the local arts council and directed a mentoring program that matched Princeton students with local children. Thanks to a DAAD Fellowship for study in Berlin in 2007-2008, I was able to continue research I had done for my senior thesis on medieval Geman courtly love poetry. At Cambridge and later at UC Berkeley, I deepened and broadened my study of medieval German literature. My MPhil and PhD research focused on the aesthetics and politics of courtly lyric. I examined the literary techniques that poets used to craft individual personae to distinguish themselves as members of an aesthetic elite. Since finishing the PhD, I have worked in politics and government in Washington state, where I am now a speechwriter for the Senate Democratic Caucus at the state legislature.