Glynis Ridley holds an MA (Hons) English Language and Literature from the University of Edinburgh and a D.Phil. from the University of Oxford, at both of which she specialized in study of the literature of the eighteenth century. After twelve years working in universities in Britain and Northern Ireland, she moved to the U.S. and joined the University of Louisville in 2004, chairing the Department of English from 2013-2023. Her first book, Clara’s Grand Tour. Travels with a Rhinoceros in Eighteenth-Century Europe (2004) won The Institute of Historical Research Prize. Her second book, The Discovery of Jeanne Baret. A story of science, the high seas, and the first woman to circumnavigate the globe (2010) led to the 2012 naming of a new species, Solanum baretiae, in honor of its subject: the first species named for the botanist Baret in over two hundred years. Part of Baret’s story was dramatized by screenwriter/director Philipp Grieß for Atlantis Film’s 2019 docudrama Mythos Tahiti (ZDF)/Bougainville. Le Voyage à Tahiti (ARTE), a link to which can be found under the "professional experience" tab on this profile. Dr. Ridley recently completed a book on eighteenth-century poet Alexander Pope, to be published in 2026 in Wiley/Blackwell’s The Life of the Author series. Between these larger projects, she has published articles and chapters on a variety of eighteenth-century topics, for both academic and general readerships. Dr. Ridley has served as an assessor for the National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholars Program and is a reader and referee of submissions to a number of scholarly presses and academic journals in the field of eighteenth-century studies. Since December 2024, she has been Director of the University's General Studies Program.