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Professor Anne Hudson (English Language & Literature, 1957), Honorary Fellow and St Hugh’s alumna, has died

It is with the deepest sorrow that the College has learnt of the death of Honorary Fellow Professor Anne Hudson (1938–2021), who studied English at St Hugh’s, and went on to become an internationally renowned scholar of medieval literature and religious culture.

Professor Hudson was a fellow at Lady Margaret Hall for many years, becoming a Fellow of the British Academy in 1988 in recognition of her ground breaking publications. Her work focused on fourteenth-century theologian and scholar John Wyclif (one of the most radical and consequential thinkers to be associated with Oxford) and his followers, known as Wycliffites or Lollards, whose thinking in many ways anticipated the Reformation, and whose teachings were suppressed by the established Church hierarchy.

Anne Hudson helped to bring Wycliffite texts and ideas into prominence through the complex work of editing and contextualizing them. Her books include The Premature Reformation; Doctors in English: A Study of the Wycliffite Gospel Commentaries; and Lollards and their Books. She had outstanding skills as a scholar, editor and teacher, and well after her retirement in 2003 was still leading major research projects in this field, especially engaged in editing the Wycliffite translation of the Bible. In addition, she was the Director of the Early English Text Society for a number of years, helping to make more medieval texts available in scholarly editions. Her work will continue to be used and admired for many decades, and both the College and wider academic community mourn her loss.

Anne wrote about her experiences as a student at St Hugh’s and her subsequent career which can be viewed by clicking here.