Summary of the impact

Sara Haslam's research on Ford Madox Ford has contributed significantly in the last decade to the public re-discovery and resurgent interest in his life and work. She has been the chair of the Ford Society since 2008, and has published a monograph, an edited essay collection, and critical editions of two of Ford's novels. Haslam's research and cultural networking has informed the recent dissemination of his work to a broad popular audience through the acclaimed BBC/HBO adaptation of Parade's End (August-Sept, 2012) and the BBC Culture Show special, `Who on Earth was Ford Madox Ford?'

Underpinning research

The underpinning research is Haslam's body of work on Ford, which she conducted at the Open University as a lecturer in English from 2001 and as a senior lecturer in English from 2009 to the present. Her research is focused on Ford and his relationship to literary modernism in the early twentieth century. Her research has been particularly focused upon Ford's intellectual, cultural and publishing milieus, most notably his engagements with contemporary psychology, philosophy, visual aesthetics, and the transport revolution. Such attention to Ford in his context has enabled Haslam to demonstrate his importance as a cultural broker and defining influence on many canonical (as well as lesser-known) modernist writers. Complementing her studies of Ford's world, Haslam's critical analyses of his formal techniques and his literary evocations of the First World War have further contributed to re-positioning Ford as a major author of the pre-and post- First World War period.

The second major aspect of Haslam's work on Ford is her editing of a range of his writings, from the non-fiction trilogy England and the English, to what is still his best-known novel, The Good Soldier, to Volume 3 of Parade's End, A Man Could Stand Up. In all three cases, substantial introductions and extensive notes introduce Ford to contemporary readers. In addition, in Haslam's edition of A Man Could Stand Up, textual scholarship was a prominent part of the project, and all extant prior publication materials were consulted, described and/or recorded in the production of what has become the authoritative text. England and the English and Parade's End were published as part of the Millennium Ford project, a venture begun by Michael Schmidt at Carcanet Press, which aims to bring all of Ford's major work back into print. Haslam has been involved since the inception of the series in planning discussions with Schmidt.

Haslam was a founder member of the Ford Madox Ford Society in 1996, and has been its chair since 2008. In the same year, she became a member of the editorial Board of the series International Ford Madox Ford Studies, and contributed to its development by editing individual volumes, by facilitating the editing and publication of previously unpublished Ford essays in Ford Madox Ford and the City (2005), and by writing individual chapters for other volumes. As a direct consequence of her many publications on Ford (listed in 3), Haslam has been contracted as the lead editor of a 200,000-word Ashgate Research Companion to Ford Madox Ford to be completed by 2015.

Haslam's sustained academic work on Ford has led directly to her playing an influential role in communicating his hitherto under-appreciated literary achievements to wider audiences in a number of BBC television programmes (see 4).

References to the research

Details of the impact

Haslam's research into Ford has contributed to his transformation from esoteric modernist writer with a small but loyal academic following into widely acclaimed early twentieth-century novelist. That Haslam's monograph makes the case powerfully for Ford's significance as a major modernist figure is confirmed by Andrzej Gasiorek in his review in Literature and History, where he describes Haslam's research as `timely and trenchant', and concludes that her work `convincingly promotes Ford as a maverick advocate of modernist techniques'. Through new editions of Ford's writings, broadcast and print media, and public events, Haslam's research into Ford has reached increasing audiences. The discovery of Ford by a new generation of readers has enriched cultural life and resulted in economic benefits.

Haslam's research on Ford has had a direct economic impact via increased sales of new editions of Ford's novels. This is most clearly demonstrated in the sales figures for Haslam's Wordsworth Classics edition of The Good Soldier: On 29 June 2011, Haslam's edition of The Good Soldier had sold 4,200 copies; in November 2011 the total was 6,000; and on 8 October, 2012, the total was 12,001. It was listed at number 4 in the Wordsworth `Top 10 Bestsellers' list in October 2012, is the first title listed on the Amazon Ford page, and was ranked at number 1,566 in the Amazon Bestsellers list in October 2012. Such sales figures demonstrate that many of the purchasers enjoying cultural enrichment from Haslam's edition of Ford's best-known novel have been non-academic readers.

Complementing Haslam's Wordsworth edition aimed at popular audiences has been her contribution to cultural life in part-editing the new scholarly Carcanet editions of Ford's Parade's End. The cultural impact of this research is illustrated in the many positive reviews in the popular media, with several reviewers specifically mentioning these editions. For example, Mary Gordon in Style (2012) wrote, `The new Carcanet edition of Parade's End is, therefore, a literary event that is worthy of the very greatest rejoicing. It honors the original text in a way that no other edition has done. . . . [T]he editors have labored valiantly to give us a definitive, authoritative edition' [5.1]. In the same spirit, Boyd Tonkin in the Independent (18 August 2012) suggested, `Newcomers [to Ford Madox Ford's Parade's End tetralogy] will have one publisher above all to thank: Manchester-based Carcanet Press, which issues the sequence both in separate volumes and as an omnibus edition. Michael Schmidt's outfit, a notable poetry specialist but one with a keen eye for the lesser-spotted classic of fiction, publishes all of Ford's work.' [5.2]

Haslam has used her Ford expertise to contribute to media broadcasts and public events, thus further enriching cultural life and encouraging reading of Ford's works. Haslam has been utilised in recent BBC television programmes on Ford. She was the academic consultant and an interviewee for the BBC 2 television programme, `Who on Earth was Ford Madox Ford?' (Culture Show Special by Alan Yentob, broadcast 1 September, 2012) [5.5]. The viewing figures were 535,300, and the audience appreciation score was 84%. Rupert Edwards, producer/director of the BBC 2 Culture Show Special, has described Haslam's `detailed knowledge [of Ford studies] in the UK and internationally' as of `invaluable assistance' to the Culture Show. The production, he notes, `was able to take advantage of Haslam's detailed biographical knowledge of the Parade's End tetralogy'; the `newly edited Carcanet edition of the tetralogy and in particular, A Man Could Stand Up edited by Haslam, were invaluable resources, as was her critical study of Ford and the war, Fragmenting Modernism'.[5.9]

Haslam was an academic consultant to the BBC 2 television programme, `The World of Parade's End' (broadcast 24 August 2012) [5.6], and was academic consultant and interviewee for a film on Ford's life and work currently in production in the United States (Ford Madox Ford: A Man Mad About Writing, director Paul Lewis, Subterracon Films).

Haslam has contributed to public events on Ford. In addition to chairing a discussion with Susanna White, director of the BBC/HBO Parade's End, and Rupert Edwards, producer/director of the Culture Show, at a public event at the Ford Society's Parade's End conference in London in September 2012, she delivered three public lectures on Ford: one as part of the South Bank `The Rest is Noise' Festival on 3 February 2013 (audience 40+) [5.8]; the second at Stony Stratford library on 19 March 2013 (audience 70+) [5.7]; and the third to the 2013 public seminar series at the Imperial War Museum, `Reappraising the First World War', which drew an audience from well beyond Ford enthusiasts.

Sources to corroborate the impact

Reviews of Ford editions edited by Haslam:

1. Mary Gordon in Style (2012) 26.1
   (http://www.style.niu.edu/newstyle/archives/46.1/46.1_BR_Parades_End.pdf)
2. Boyd Tonkin in Independent (8 August 2012)
   (http://www.independent.co.uk/arts- entertainment/books/features/boyd-tonkin-the-sporting-novel-often-underperforms-but-it-still-has-a-team-of-champions-8053577.html)
3. Philip Hensher in The Telegraph (29 August 2012)
   (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/9506259/What-will-be-the-next-Parades-End.html)
4. Edmund White in New York Review of Books (24 March 2011)
   (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/mar/24/panorama-ford-madox-ford/?pagination=false); (12 May 2011)
   (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/may/12/finest-novel-about-world-war-i/?pagination=false)

Details of television programmes that consulted Haslam:

5. Who on Earth Was Ford Madox Ford?' (BBC 2, The Culture Show, 1 September 2012)
   http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01mlvkj
6. `The World of Parade's End' (BBC 2, 28 August 2012)
   http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01m81ht

Details of public events involving Haslam:

7. Lecture at Stony Stratford Library (19 March 2013)
   http://sstc.idlive.co.uk/Events/Events_Index/Friends_of_Stony_Stratford_Library:_Talk_about _the_Work_of_Ford_Madox_Ford
8. Lecture at `The Rest is Noise' Festival at the South Bank, London (3 February 2012)
   http://www.open.edu/openlearn/whats-on/events/the-rest-noise-the-rise-nationalism

Individuals who will corroborate the details of this case study:

9. The Director, The Culture Show, (BBC television).
10. Spectator contributor
11. Editor at Wordsworth Classics.