Cleo Hanaway-Oakley
LightNews LightNews
banner
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Cleo Hanaway-Oakley
@cleohanaway.bsky.social
1.7K followers 430 following 48 posts
Senior Lecturer, writer, thinker.
Collector of autoimmune diseases.
I share a birthday with James Joyce (and I quite like his books, too). Mostly a modernist. Also sensory studies, disability, and medhums.
Posts Replies Media Videos
cleohanaway.bsky.social
I’m rarely on here, these days, but I just wanted to say…

Happy Bloomsday from me and my Gorgonzola sandwich! 🥪 📖

#Bloomsday #JamesJoyce #Ulysses
A smiling middle aged white woman with wavy brown hair and glasses holding up a plate with a sandwich on it. Her t-shirt says Happy Bloomsday!
June 16, 2025 at 11:44 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
It had begun to snow again.
Cleo dressed in a shocking pink puffer coat, hood pulled up over a matching pick fleecy hat. She’s smiling and standing in front of some snow covered tree branches.
November 19, 2024 at 2:09 PM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Today, I received the best Valentine’s message 💌

It turns out that Edinburgh University Press really fancy my book. They love it so much they want to publish it!

(Now I just need to write the bloody thing. I am very much open to offers of research leave funding!)
A section from my publishing contract from EUP, for my new monograph entitled James Joyce and Non-normative Vision. I have added emoji love hearts in the margins!
February 14, 2024 at 4:48 PM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Happy 142nd birthday to James Joyce and happy 40th birthday to me! 🎈
Photo of Cleo - a 40 year old woman with curly light brown hair wearing funky black and pink glasses and a black t-shirt with ‘1984’ written on it in gold. She is holding up a birthday card with a picture of James Joyce on it.
February 2, 2024 at 9:23 PM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
It is somewhat chilly.

#WritingShed life.

(Or, more accurately for today, #MarkingShed life)
A glass door covered in an icy geometric, accidentally very beautiful, design. In the background you can just about make out the shape of an office chair and a pile of books.
January 19, 2024 at 9:54 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Lads, something rather exciting has occurred!

So, you may recall that I published a piece about Ulysses & blue: theconversation.com/ulysses-at-1...

Well, an artist called Alastair Noble got in touch, saying that my article had inspired him…

…And this wondrous object is the result!
The front cover of Alastair Noble’s artist’s book, ‘Ulixes’. It has a deep blue (with a slight purple tone) background, with white fabric crossing over it, so that it resembles (or possibly is) the Greek flag. On top of the white fabric cross is brighter white lettering which reads: ‘ULIXES’ in capital letters, echoing the font used on the cover of the 1922 edition of Joyce’s Ulysses. The final pages of Alastair Noble’s artist’s book, ‘Ulixes’. The left hand page is a deep bluey-green with a large white ‘U’ on it. The right hand side gives the title of the artwork and explains how it relates to Ulysses - that it excerpts references to blue and places them on blank pages or on top of illustrations of the sea. A page of Alastair Noble’s artist’s book, ‘Ulixes’. The page features a grey-blue photograph of of a ship on a sea, with the words ‘All his works down to Ulysses were born in Trieste - Svevo’ (in white lettering). An open double page of Alastair Noble’s artist’s book, ‘Ulixes’. The left hand page in white and features a large ‘S’ in black with a small ‘IRENS’ next to it. The right hand page is white with small black lettering which reads: ‘Blew. Blue Bloom is on the Gold pinnacled hair.’
January 10, 2024 at 4:30 PM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Excited to be teaching Joyce + film today, as part of my ‘Modernism & the Movies’ unit. I’ve assigned 2 accessible pieces, by 2 fab Joyceans, as prep. reading: Casey Lawrence’s Strick review (tinyurl.com/4ynkdd7t) and Katherine Mullin’s Ulysses intro. (tinyurl.com/5n8dkvjr).
Film poster for Joseph Strick’s ‘James Joyce’s Ulysses (1967)’. Bloom is holding Molly in his arms and the pull quote reads: ‘Brilliant, forceful and respectful cinema art’. The top section of the poster is in black and white and the bottom section is in blue with ‘Ulysses’ written in white.
October 17, 2023 at 8:46 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Today marks the start of #BabyLossAwarenessWeek. Last year, I had a poem commended in a poetry competition. In the poem, I tried to convey a side of #BabyLoss I don’t often see represented - the dull, mundane, monotony of missed and recurrent miscarriage:

www.tomneill.ltd/portfolio/th...
Patient, by Cleo Hanaway-Oakley The maternity centre nurse was not amused When I tried to make light of The heavy ache I bore. ‘I’m becoming a regular’, I quipped, To still my quivering lips, To stop myself from over- Flowing with Loss. ‘Would you mind taking a seat’, she said, Next to the open window that Overlooks the playground Laden with Laughing Kids? Homes Under the Hammer hums Above the corkboard that Displays frayed bumps And fading foetuses In shadowy, Worn Wombs. ‘Yes’, I said, ‘I’ll wait’.
October 9, 2023 at 8:11 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
To the lighthouse
Photo of me, in a black swimsuit, attempting to walk across a rocky beach. The sea is in the background. The sea is in the background. In the middle ground there’s a red and white lighthouse. Grass and the backs of two people walking is in the foreground. A red and white lighthouse with grass in the foreground.
October 3, 2023 at 9:04 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
#WeddingAnniversary #10Years

Same moon. More chaos.
Two photos, side by side. The first features a couple kissing, sat on a large crescent moon. The second photo features the same moon, with a family of four dancing in front of it.
September 28, 2023 at 7:10 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
Autumn leaves and summer sandals, just before sunrise.
A photo of my sandals clad feet resting on brown and orange crunchy leaves.
September 9, 2023 at 5:06 AM
cleohanaway.bsky.social
I just want know whether blind nuns were a common kink in Victorian erotica. For research purposes, honestly. But I’d rather not google it too much, for obvious reasons. So, if anyone has any leads on this, please get in touch!
Black and white photo of a nun holding a long piece of wood in her hand.
September 7, 2023 at 5:39 PM