# Tara K. Menon Assistant Professor of English Assistant Director of Undergraduate Studies ![Tara K. Menon](/sites/g/files/omnuum1611/files/styles/hwp_4_5__480x600/public/english/files/tarakmenon.jpeg?itok=cq5uYoDX) location\_on She/her/hersOffice: Barker 147 email laptop\_windows [tarakmenon.com](http://www.tarakmenon.com) By appt on my [calendly link](). Education: B.A., Columbia University (2011) M.A., New York University (2014) Ph.D., New York University (2019) I**Interests:** the novel; realism; narrative theory; nineteenth-century British literature; contemporary fiction, climate fiction **Selected Works:** “Forms of Discourse: The Significance of Direct Speech,” Studies in the Novel, vol 56, no. 2,mWinter 2024 “Constructing Attachment: Persistent and Elided Speech in Jane Austen’s Novels,”NOVEL: A Forum in Fiction, 57.3 “Keeping Count: Direct Speech in Nineteenth-Century British Novels,” Narrative, vol. 27, no. 2 (May), 2019. (Winner of James Phelan Prize for Best Article in Narrative.) Tara K. Menon is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Harvard University. From 2019 to 2023 she was a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows. She is currently writing a book called Speaking Parts: Character, Conversation, and Social Worlds in Nineteenth-Century British Novels, which is under contract with Princeton University Press. Her academic work has appeared or is forthcoming in Narrative, NOVEL: A Forum on Fiction, and Studies in the Novel. Her debut novel, Under Water, is forthcoming with Summit in the UK and Riverhead in the US. Rights have also been sold in 27 other territories. Her essays and reviews have appeared in publications including The New York Times Book Review, The Nation, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Sewanee Review, The Point, Bookforum, The Paris Review, and Public Books, where she co-edits the Literary Fiction section. \* I welcome conversations with all undergraduate and graduate students. As a former international student, I am particularly happy to speak to those navigating life in America for the first time. [C.V.](https://english.fas.harvard.edu/sites/g/files/omnuum1611/files/2025-02/Menon%2C%20Tara%20K._CV_%20January%202025.pdf) - ## Person Categories [Administration](/person-categories/administration) - ## Role [Administration](/role/staff) [Undergraduate Administration](/role/undergraduate-administration)