St Hilda's College
A significant chapter in St Hilda’s history draws to a close today with the retirement of Fellow Dr Georgina Paul. With decades of devoted service to the College, she leaves a legacy that will resonate long into the future.
Dr Paul is, fittingly, a daughter of St Hilda’s: she earned her BA in Modern Languages here before pursuing her DPhil in German (punctuated by two years on a Hanseatic Scholarship at the Universität Hamburg). Her academic path also included an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation fellowship at the Humboldt Universität Berlin in the immediate post-reunification period.
In 1990, she joined the Department of German Studies at the University of Warwick as a lecturer, before returning to Oxford in 2006 as Fellow and Tutor in German at St Hilda’s.
Her research focuses on contemporary German literature, particularly writing from the GDR (East Germany) and the post-reunification era. Her doctoral work examined the eminent East German writer Christa Wolf, and she has published widely on German women’s writing, gender studies, and classical reception in contemporary poetry, including responses to Homer and Ovid. Her first retirement project is to bring to completion a monograph in a new area of enquiry for her: namely the dialogues and collaborations between the artists of the Blaue Reiter group around Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc in Munich in the years before the First World War.
At St Hilda’s, Dr Paul has taught German literature from the 18th to the 21st centuries, as well as German language and film, and within the Faculty she has lectured on post-1945 German writing. Over her career, she has supervised numerous DPhil and Master’s students on topics ranging from women writers of Expressionism to Ingeborg Bachmann, and from pop-feminism in German and Anglo contexts to 'multidirectional memory', translation studies, and theories of poetic tradition and influence.
A prize-winning translator of contemporary German poetry, she has also worked with institutions such as the Goethe-Institut and DAAD.
Beyond her tutorial duties, Dr Paul has undertaken significant College responsibilities. Most notably, she served as Acting Principal from April 2021 to January 2022, guiding St Hilda’s through the latter stages of the pandemic and preparing the way for Professor Dame Sarah Springman’s arrival.
Her service has extended beyond the College as well: since September 2022 she has held the role of Chair of the Sheldonian Curators, appointed by the Vice-Chancellor for a four-year term.
Dr Paul reflected:
It is an extraordinary watershed for me, to come to the end of my time as Fellow and Tutor in German at St Hilda’s. The last 19 years have been a significant period in the College’s history and I’ve been proud to have played my part in its transformation, in particular through the 125th anniversary building project. It has been a great privilege to serve as Tutor for Graduates, as Vice-Principal and, for ten months in 2021-22, as Acting Principal and to work alongside my fellow-Fellows, four Principals, and the amazing College staff to make this the best Oxford can offer. At heart, St Hilda’s is an educational institution and what makes me proudest of all are the inquisitive, knowledgeable, discerning, and confident critical thinkers who have gone forth from our tutorial care into the world to shape it and change it. Working with you all has been a true life-substance and I thank you for all I have learned from you.
Professor Dame Sarah Springman added:
It is rare for one individual to bridge so many roles: scholar, teacher, translator, mentor, institutional servant and leader, and to do so with such grace, insight, and dedication. At St Hilda’s, she has shaped countless student journeys, nurtured doctoral work, taken on many essential roles and enriched the intellectual life of the College. We wish her all the best for this new phase: may she enjoy time for new projects, and the satisfaction of knowing that her work has made a lasting mark here.