TIM CRESSWELL

Tim Cresswell is Ogilvie Professor of Geography at the University of Edinburgh and the first Visiting Professor to the Centre for Place Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University. He is a cultural geographer by training, and the author or editor of a dozen books and over a 100 articles on the role of space, place and mobility in social and cultural life. He has PhDs in Geography (Wisconsin) and Creative Writing (Royal Holloway, University of London). Cresswell is also a widely published poet with three collections – most recently Plastiglomerate (Penned in the Margins, 2020). His most recent academic book, Maxwell Street: Writing and Thinking Place was published in 2019 by University of Chicago Press. For PLACE 2020 Tim has written about being a newcomer in Morningside, Edinburgh during COVID-19. He has reflected on the dominant stories surrounding the place juxtaposed with elements of its past (including as a site of quarantine during the plague years) and elements of its present. It is also a playful engagement with the idea of metafiction and autobiographical storytelling.