James MacKillop
Literature Criticism

James MacKillop has divided his career between arts journalism and Celtic scholarship. Over that past thirty years he has published more than 2000 reviews and feature articles in five publications. Since 1984 he has been a contributing editor of the Syracuse New Times, primarily as a theater and film critic; other assignments have dealt with travel and restaurants. His efforts have won the Syracuse Press Club Award for Criticism ten times. The collection Contemporary Irish Cinema (1999) broke new ground in an emerging field, and his "The Quiet Man Speaks" remains the most often cited critique of that John Ford classic. Since 1988, MacKillop has led theater tours of Ireland and London. Among MacKillop's seven books are the Oxford University Press Dictionary of Celtic Mythology (1998) and the Penguin Myths and Legends of the Celts (2005), the latter also appearing in Hungarian, Czech and Estonian translations. He is also currently the editor of the Irish series at Syracuse University Press. His eighth book, now being written under commission, explains how Irish studies entered academia from 1960 to the present. After completing a doctorate in English Literature at Syracuse University, MacKillop was a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University. He won a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for Independent Study and was a Professeur Invité at the Université de Rennes II, Haute Bretagne. He was awarded the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching. On national television he captained the Wayne State University team on the GE College Quiz Bowl and was later a finalist on Jeopardy!.

Website: www.jamesmackillop.com

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