Lindsay DiCuirci, an alumna of The Ohio State University’s PhD in English program, was named the recipient of not one, but two prestigious book awards: the Early American Literature Book Prize from the Society of Early Americanists and the St. Louis Mercantile Library Prize from the Bibliographical Society of America. The awards are in recognition of DiCuirci’s latest book, Colonial Revivals: The Nineteenth-Century Lives of Early American Print (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019). 

According to the publisher’s website, “Colonial Revivals traces the labors of a nineteenth-century cultural network of antiquarians, bibliophiles, amateur historians, and writers as they dug through the nation’s attics and private libraries to assemble early American archives.” DiCuirci situates her research in relation to what the publisher identifies as “four regional colonial cultures that loomed large in nineteenth-century literary history”: Puritan New England, Cavalier Virginia, Quaker Pennsylvania and the Spanish Caribbean. 

In the Early American Literature Book Prize announcement, selection committee members emphasized “that there were more prize submissions this year than ever,” making DiCuirci’s accomplishment all the more impressive. One member of the committee is quoted as describing DiCuirci’s work as “elegantly conceptualized” and “beautifully written.” 

DiCuirci graduated from Ohio State’s PhD in English program in 2010 and currently serves as an associate professor of English at the University of Maryland—Baltimore County. 

The Ohio State Department of English congratulates her on her noteworthy achievement!