Alex Niven (born 18 February 1984, Hexham, Northumberland) is an English writer, poet, editor, and former musician.[1]

He is also currently a Lecturer in English Literature at Newcastle University[2] and an editor at Repeater Books.[3]

Early life and education

Alex Niven was born in Hexham, Northumberland.

Career

In 2006, Niven was a founding member of the indie band Everything Everything, with friends from Queen Elizabeth High School and played guitar with the band between 2007 and 2009.[4] In 2009, he left the band to study for a doctorate[5] at St John's College, Oxford and to pursue a writing career.

Formerly assistant editor at New Left Review[6] and editor-in-chief at The Oxonian Review, Niven wrote for The Guardian, The Independent, openDemocracy, Agenda, The Cambridge Quarterly, English Literary History, Oxford Poetry, Notes and Queries, The Quietus, a number of collective blogs, in addition to his own blog The Fantastic Hope (2007-2017).

Work

In 2011, Niven's first work of criticism, Folk Opposition, was published by Zero Books. The book attempted to reclaim a variety of folk culture motifs for the political left, and excoriated the "Green Tory" zeitgeist that had accompanied the ascendancy of David Cameron's Conservative Party in Britain in 2009-10. Writing in the journal of the Institute for Public Policy Research, Niki Seth-Smith described it as a "rebuttal to ... knee jerk reactions [about folk culture] by way of careful historicisation and incisive cultural analysis",[7] while Joe Kennedy of The Quietus described it as "one of 2011's most incisive polemics".[8]

In 2014, his second book, a study of the Oasis album Definitely Maybe, was published in Bloomsbury's 33⅓ series.[9] The Times Literary Supplement praised its "convincing modulation between a discussion of the post-Thatcher north-west England that informed Oasis's early lyrics, and the finer points of pentatonic and mixolydian melody governing Noel Gallagher's early songwriting".[10] LA Review of Books reviewer Rhian E. Jones judged the book a success, concluding that "Niven displays a thorough appreciation of what made Oasis good while remaining aware of their shortcomings".[11]

In 2014, his first collection of poetry, The Last Tape, was published, and his poem "The Beehive" provided the epigraph to Owen Hatherley's 2012 architecture survey A New Kind of Bleak.[12]

In 2019, his third book was published: New Model Island: How to Build a Radical Culture beyond the idea of England.[13]

Contributing articles
  • 'Covid-19 is helping the Tories redraw the political map of England', The Guardian, 21 September 2020[14]

References

  1. ↑ Farrell, William. "Folk Opposition (interview and profile/caricature of Alex Niven)". Archived from the original on 19 October 2012. Retrieved 30 October 2012.
  2. ↑ "Staff Profile - English Literature, Language and Linguistics - Newcastle University". www.ncl.ac.uk. Retrieved 2017-08-18.
  3. ↑ "Team". Repeater Books. 2014-11-25. Archived from the original on 2017-10-03. Retrieved 2017-10-03.
  4. ↑ "Everything Everything's sounding great for Tynedale band". The Journal (Newcastle). 19 May 2009. Archived from the original on April 20, 2013. Retrieved 25 October 2012.
  5. ↑ Cutterham, Tom. "Politics beyond Dalston: An Interview with Alex Niven". Review 31. Retrieved 13 April 2013.
  6. ↑ "About". newleftreview.org. New Left Review. Retrieved 17 December 2014.
  7. ↑ Seth-Smith, Niki (16 May 2012). "Review of Alex Niven's Folk Opposition". PPR (Public Policy Research). 19 (1): 78.
  8. ↑ Kennedy, Joe. "Big Society, Little Hope: False Folk Culture in 2011". The Quietus. Retrieved 25 October 2012.
  9. ↑ "Aphex Twin, Oasis, Bjork, J Dilla headline new series of 33 1/3 books". FACT Magazine. Retrieved 26 October 2012.
  10. ↑ Charlton, Joe (July 18, 2014). "Oasis' Definitely Maybe". Times Literary Supplement: 27.
  11. ↑ Jones, Rhian E. "Living Fast: Revisiting Oasis' Definitely Maybe". lareviewofbooks.org. Retrieved 17 December 2014.
  12. ↑ Hatherley, Owen (2012). A New Kind of Bleak. London: Verso. pp. (epigraph page). ISBN 9781844678570.
  13. ↑ Michael J. Brooks (2019-12-19). "Not Looking For A New England: Alex Niven's New Model Island". The Quietus. Retrieved 2020-05-23.
  14. ↑ "Covid-19 is helping the Tories redraw the political map of England | Alex Niven". The Guardian. 21 September 2020. Retrieved 28 September 2020.
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