I started my career teaching at Kalamazoo College (Michigan), Marquette University (Wisconsin), and Milwaukee Area Technical College, where I was Head of Humanities in the HEP program. Subsequently I was Profesor Asociado at the University of Extremadura, full Professor of Spanish and Comparative Literature at the University of Edinburgh, and full Professor of Spanish Literature at Lunds Universitet (Sweden).

I am an Officer of the Order of Civil Merit (Spain), an Officer of the Order of Isabel la Católica (Spain), and a Knight of Columbus (USA).

I hold a doctorate in Spanish Literature from Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, a doctorate in Linguistics from Universidad de Salamanca, and a doctorate in English Literature from Universidad de Extremadura.

At Edinburgh I was the founding director of the Centre for Contemporary Latin American Studies and the first University Dean International for Latin America.

I was an associate researcher at the University of Cambridge twice and a Research Fellow at the Universiteit van Amsterdam. I served in the Spanish Army as a staff translator.

Since 2021 I am an Honorary Scholar at the University of Liverpool.

As a philologist and a historian, my research and teaching are interdisciplinary and address interrelated cultural, historical and philosophical questions. My area of expertise is Spanish literature and history. As a comparatist, I have published extensively on Spanish-English and Spanish-Scandinavian literatures.

My work includes Sus nombres son leyenda. Españoles que cambiaron la Historia (Espasa), Historia y política en La familia de Pascual Duarte (Castalia), and as editor Unamuno’s complete fiction (Cátedra), A History of the Spanish Novel (Oxford UP) and The Picaresque Novel in Western Literature (Cambridge UP).

I am a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, a member of the US National Collegiate Hispanic Honor Society ‘Sigma Delta Pi’, and a ‘Funcionario Docente de Carrera’ with the Spanish Ministry of Education.

I serve as the Director of the ‘Biblioteca Unamuno’ (Universidad de Salamanca) and as an Editor of the Bulletin of Hispanic Studies. In 2010-2012 I was the Principal Investigator of a research project for the Leverhulme Trust.

Main publications.

Books.
(2023), Políptico cervantino: Cervantes y la novela moderna. Madrid: Visor.
(2022), Lazarillo de Tormes en Escocia. Edinburgh: Consulado de Espana.
(2019), Literatura y filosofía en Niebla de Unamuno: Kierkegaard y el modernismo. Universidad
de Salamanca.
(2018), Sus nombres son leyenda. Españoles que cambiaron la Historia. Madrid: Espasa.
(2016), Historia y política en La familia de Pascual Duarte. Barcelona: Castalia.
(2015), La construcción modernista de Niebla de Unamuno. Barcelona: Anthropos.
(2009), La novela picaresca en Europa, 1554-1753. Madrid: Visor.
(2008), El género picaresco en la crítica literaria. Madrid: Biblioteca Nueva.
(2007), Etnografía y politología del 98: Unamuno, Ganivet y Maeztu. Madrid: Biblioteca Nueva.
(2006), Cervantes en Inglaterra: el Quijote en los albores de la novela británica. Liverpool:
Liverpool University Press. 2nd edition: Cervantes en Inglaterra: el Quijote y la novela
inglesa del siglo XVIII. Alcalá: Centro de Estudios Cervantinos, 2014.
(2004), Sociopragmática y retórica interpersonal. Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press.
(2002), Charlotte Temple. Estudio de tradiciones, géneros y fuentes. Universidad de
Extremadura.

Critical editions.
(2017), Miguel de Unamuno, Novelas completas, with critical introduction (pp. 15-165) and
endnotes (pp. 1269-1342). Madrid: Cátedra.
(2013), Pío Baroja, Camino de perfección. Madrid: Alianza.
(2013), Textos del Desastre. La última gran crisis (1898), with critical introduction (pp. 9-
111). Barcelona: Castalia.

Books translated.
(2018), Henrik Ibsen, El pato salvaje. Madrid: Alianza.
(2014), with K H Andersen, Henrik Ibsen, Un enemigo del pueblo. Madrid: Alianza. 2nd ed.
April 2018. 3rd ed. 2020.
(2011), Susannah Haswell Rowson, Charlotte Temple. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
(1997), Frontpage 97. Madrid: Anaya.

Multi-author volumes edited.
(2015), A History of the Spanish Novel. Oxford University Press. 2nd edition 2016.
(2015), The Picaresque Novel in Western Literature: from the Sixteenth Century to the
Neopicaresque. Cambridge University Press. 2nd edition 2017.
(2015), El Unamuno eterno. Barcelona: Anthropos.
(2009), The Cervantean Heritage: Influence and Reception of Cervantes in Britain. London:
Legenda/MHRA.
(2005), with Curado, Rico, Edwards, Alejo, Languages for Academic and Professional
Purposes in the 21st Century University Framework. Universidad de Extremadura.