Elizabeth Patton

Elizabeth Patton is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Comparative Thought and Literature at Johns Hopkins University, part of the Krieger School of Arts & Sciences. She specializes in 16th- and 17th-century English and continental literature, with a focus on early modern women writers, post-Reformation English Catholicism, and the evolution of the Petrarchan sonnet. Her research examines marginalized voices, particularly women’s networks and religious resistance during the Reformation era.

Patton holds a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University (directed by Anne Prescott and Edward W. Tayler) and an M.A. in Medieval literature under Walter Ong, SJ, focusing on oral formulaic elements in late Medieval works. Her current projects include a collaborative scholarly edition of the Arundel biographies (forthcoming 2020) and a reconstruction of Dorothy Arundell’s lost biography of Father John Cornelius, highlighting women’s roles in Counter-Reformation literary production.

Her teaching includes directing the consortium course 'Great Books at Hopkins' and courses on early modern literature. Her publications explore transnational Catholic networks, underground book circulation, and women’s spiritual writings. She has contributed to volumes on Counter-Reformation book culture and post-Reformation English Catholic identity, emphasizing material culture and textual transmission.

Patton’s work bridges literary analysis with religious history, recovering overlooked narratives of women’s intellectual contributions to early modern Europe. Her research often involves reconstructing lost texts through cross-lingual translations and marginalia studies, illuminating the intersections of faith, gender, and power in early modern Britain and Europe.