Fabia Buescher, Selwyn

Degree: PhD
Course: English
Supervisor: Prof Jan Schramm
Dissertation Title: The Ideology of Sacrifice in the Mid-Nineteenth-Century Care Community

Biographical Information

I completed a BA in English literature and linguistics at the University of Zurich and an MPhil in English literature at Cambridge. In my PhD thesis I work at the intersection of care ethics, war studies and sacrifice studies to argue for a reconsideration of care work in literature and culture during the Crimean War (1853-56). My PhD project focuses on a range of Victorian writers and genres to generate a holistic account of the mid-Victorian imagination of care and ethics. Starting with the domestic realist novel before moving to newspapers, photography, poetry, memoirs and travel writing, I trace the development of the figure of the nurse as she moves from the domestic setting into the war zone, examining the complex interplay between sacrifice, violence and humanitarian aid. My PhD is generously funded by the German Academic Scholarship Foundation (Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes).

 

Email: fb586@cam.ac.uk

 

Research Interests

My research interests more broadly include: medical humanities, care ethics, war literature, affect studies, feminism, disability studies, ecocriticism, the nineteenth-century realist novel.

 

Selected Publications

 

Conference papers:

  • "Narratives of Pain: Representing the Wounded Soldier in the Crimean War", DACH Victorianists Conference, December 2025.
  • "'A useful, steady daughter': Charlotte Yonge's Tractarianism and the Ideology of Female Self-Sacrifice", BAVS annual conference, University of Oxford, July 2025.
  • “Charlotte Yonge's Tractarian Realism”, Nineteenth-Century Legacies Conference, Royal Holloway University of London, June 2025.
  • “‘Wanted, a companion for a lady’: Caregiving and Emotional Work in Wilkie Collins’ Poor Miss Finch”, Labour in the Long Nineteenth Century Conference, University of Southampton, January 2024.
  • “Disability Friendship in Dinah Mulock Craik’s John Halifax, Gentleman”, Victorian Recollections, Revolutions and Realities Conference, Carroll University, May 2023.