Selected Publications and Talks
Agatha Christie Under the Magnifying Glass, with Nicholas Birns, McFarland Publisher, August 2025
"Anthony Powell's Secret Harmonies, Music in a Jungian Key, " re-published in Secret Harmonies, Journal of the Anthony Powell society, May 2018
“Fragments of Possible Stories,” Ottendorfer Library, NYC, May 2018.
“Detective Fiction and the Prose of Everyday Life: Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh, and Gladys Mitchell in the 1950s”, Nicholas Birns and Margaret Boe Birns, in The 1950s: A Decade of Modern British Fiction (The Decades Series), Bloomsbury Press, 2018.
Harmonie Club, 2019: Book Club Moderator, Jame Joyce's The Dead
Harmonie Club, 2018: Book Club Moderator, Steven Zweig’s The Post-Office Girl
One Book, One New York program
#OneBookMcGhee: “Americanah” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie; discussion with Margaret Boe Birns, 2017
“Reading The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead” with Margaret Boe Birns, NYUSPS Great Lecture Series, 2017
"Etgar Keret: The Seven Good Years," Brotherhood Synagogue guest lecture and discussion, 2015
"666 Twinned and Told Twice: Roberto's Bolaño 's Double Time Frame in 2666" in Roberto Bolaño: A Less-Distant Star, edited by Ignazio López-Calvo, Palgrave-Macmillan, 2015; republished by Academia.edu 2022
EnrichMint post-performance discussion :”John Van Druten: Life and Work, ” Mint Theater, New York City, 2014
Member of Panel on Tolstoy and Pedagogy, Tolstoy in the 21st Century, The New School, 2010
The Novel Now, ING Corporation Learning at Lunch Lectures, 2004; “Literary Laurels,” ING Corporation Learning at Lunch Lecture, 2005
Magill's Literary Annual—2005-2013
Articles on: Tea Obreht, "The Tiger's Wife"; Bharati Mukherjee, "Miss New India"; Chris Adrian, "The Great Night"; Tom Perrotta, "The Leftovers"; Justin Cartwright, 'The Pursuit of Happiness"; Phillip Henscher, " Northern Clemency'"; Nancy Huston, "Fault Lines"; Kazuo Ishiguro, "When We Were Orphans"; Jane Gardam, "Old Filth"; Allegra Goodman, "Intuition"; Ian McEwan, "On Chesil Beach''; Richard Price, "Lush Life"; Gary Schteyngart, "Super Sad True Love Story"; Chang-Rae Lee, "The Surrendered"; Miguel Syjuco, "Illustrado"; Dan Chaon, "Await Your Reply"; Dai Sijie, "Once on a Moonless Night"; Marilynne Robinson, "Home "; Rawi Hage, "DeNiro's Game"; Zoe Heller, "The Believers"; Hitomi Kanehara,"Snakes and Earrings"
Great Lives from History Series: "Khaled Hosseini"; “Ray Barretto”; "Teresa Urrea"; "Susan Sontag”; "Carly Simon”; "Mark Helprin"
A Critical Companion to Henry James, edited by Kendall Johnson, Swarthmore College, Facts on File, 2010. Articles on William James; Robert Louis Stevenson; Henrik Andersen
Compendium of Twentieth Century Novelists and Novels, edited by Michael Sollars, 2007: “A.B. Yehoshua”; “Mr. Mani”; “Erich Maria Remarque”; “All Quiet on the Western Front”; “Jose Saramago”; “Blindness” “Gao Xingjian”; “Soul Mountain”
Studies in American Naturalism, 2006. Review of A New Book of The Grotesques: Contemporary Approaches to Sherwood Anderson’s Early Fiction, by Robert Dunne
Birns Nicholas, and Margaret Boe Birns “Agatha Christie: Modern and Modernist” The Cunning Craft: Original Essays on Detective Fiction and Contemporary Literary Theory , Walker and Frazer, editors, 1990
Ebsco Literary Resources Center, 2005-2006 50 biographical essays on European, American, English and Canadian authors
Journal of Canadian and Ethnic Studies, 2005 Review of A Complicated Kindness, by Miriam Toews
Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, edited by Gabrille Cody, Columbia University Press, 2004: “John Van Druten”
The Dreiser Encyclopedia, edited by Keith Newlin, Garland Pub., 2004: “Burton Rascoe,” and “Sinclair Lewis”
The Continuum Encyclopedia of British Literature, edited by Steven. R. Serafin and Valerie Grosvenor Myer, Continuum, 2003: "Anita Brookner"; "Iris Murdoch"; "Agatha Christie"
"Cherry Ames, Chief Nurse, Feminism and National Sentiment in a Wartime Book for Girls," Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on World War II, Siena College, 1994.
Guest lectures: "Recent English Fiction," " The English Experience, " New York University, 1993 and 1994; "The English Novel," The Shakespeare Club, 1992; "The New York Novel," "Edith Wharton's Old New York," New York University's "Sundays in New York" series, 1995-97
Women's Studies, edited by Virginia Hlavsa, Fall 1993: "Demeter as the letter D: Naming Women in The Sound and The Fury and As I Lay Dying."
Massachusetts Review, Winter, 1985 "Solving the Mad Hatter's Riddle "
The Literary Review, Autumn, 1981: “Anthony Powell's Secret Harmonies"
POETRY: "Heaven," Journal of Popular Film and Television; "Incredible Justice," "Visitation," "Lady Going Crazy," in Rolling Stone "Primavera," Art Times; "The Typewriter," Women Poems #3 (special issue featuring Adrienne Rich and Marge Piercy) "Dinner at Eight," "The Apple Tree," New York Culture Review "Things in Dreams," International Dream Quarterly
AREAS OF TEACHING EXPERTISE
English, and American European and Literature of the 20th Century; The Mystery Novel; Contemporary English and American Literature; Contemporary World Literature; The Short Story; The Nineteenth Century Novel (English, American, European)
AWARDS Excellence in Teaching, SCPS, New York University ,1985
Finalist for Distinguished University Teaching Award, The New School, 2011