Profile
I first read Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment while in high school. While reading the murder scene—told from the perspective of the murderer—I remember thinking “So this is what it feels like to kill someone.” I’ve read the novel at least 30 times, but that first sensation has lasted a lifetime and prompted some of my most important career choices. I went out to earn a Ph.D. in English Literature and Humanities at Stanford, where I continued my studies of Dostoevsky. My dissertation focused on how modern English novelists responded to Dostoevsky's novels (which were all translated in the early 20th century), leading to a book published by Cambridge University Press. I've been an educational administrator, an editor, and teacher.