Simon Kövesi is Professor of English Literature at Oxford Brookes University. He researches working-class writing from the Romantic period through to contemporary literature. His books include Eighteenth-Century English Labouring-Class Poets, 1700-1800 (3 vols, 2003), James Kelman (2007), New Essays on John Clare: Poetry, Culture and Community (2015), and John Clare: Nature, Criticism and History (2017). He is currently working on a book entitled Literature and Poverty: 1800–2000, and a paperback edition of Pierce Egan's 1821 smash hit Life in London. He appears as a boxer-cum-fool in the 2015 feature film By Our Selves, made by Andrew Kötting.