Mary Floyd-Wilson (FFP ’04, ALP ’10), professor of English and a nationally recognized scholar of early modern English literature, has been named the 2024-2025 recipient of the George H. Johnson Prize for Distinguished Achievement by an IAH Fellow.  

The award, given biennially by the Institute for the Arts and Humanities, recognizes Floyd-Wilson’s distinguished scholarship, her deep commitment to the humanities, and her significant impact on both the academic community and the broader public.

As part of the Johnson Prize event, Floyd-Wilson will accept the award and deliver a public lecture. Her talk, titled "‘Tis an Unweeded Garden:” Hamlet’s Demonic Environment, will be followed by a short audience Q&A. Critics have overlooked how Shakespeare’s Hamlet invites its spectators to perceive unseen but influential demonological forces at work on the characters’ minds and bodies. The belief in an invisible, intrusive spirit world shaped how early modern people understood the various and constant transactions between self and place. The post-Reformation confusion of not knowing what to believe about the afterlife, as represented in the tragedy, heightened people’s perceived apprehension of the Devil’s presence in the world. Shakespeare’s audience, Floyd-Wilson argues, may have discerned the Devil’s footprints in Hamlet’s blighted environment.

This is a CLE event. Students can register on HeelLife and must scan the QR code after the event to receive credit.

The Institute for the Arts and Humanities' Johnson Prize recognizes the exemplary contributions by faculty in the arts, humanities, and humanistic social sciences.