Education
B.A., Baylor University
M.A. and Ph.D., University of Virginia
Biography
Prof. Finley was educated at Baylor University (B.A.), where he graduated magna cum laude, Honors Program with Distinction, and at the University of Virginia (M.A. and Ph.D.). He has been a member of the Department of English at Haverford since 1982. His scholarly research has been supported by both NEH and ACLS Fellowships. In 1985-86 he was a Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities of the University of Edinburgh, and in 1990-91 he was a Fellow of Pusey House, Oxford University. His primary field of scholarship is British Romantic and Victorian literature, although in the last several years he has expanded his area of specialization to include the years between the opening of this century and the end of the Great War. His current research concerns autobiography, traumatic memory, and the cultural topography of ruin. Throughout his career, he has been concerned with the social and aesthetic construction of Romantic nature and landscape, and this interest manifests itself concretely in his enduring passion for gardens and gardening.