Learning from Langland: theo-poetic resources for the post-Hind ...

Acknowledgements
My fascination with Piers Plowman dates back to university days, and thanks must go
firstly to Professor John Stevens who supervised my BA dissertation and first planted the
seed of a longer thesis. It was during Mike Higton’s taught MA module at Exeter that I re-
visited Langland, and when I approached Mike some years later with the PhD idea, his
enthusiasm helped me to believe that it could be done. My thanks are due to Mike for his
non-anxious supervision style and willingness to work with me long-distance. To the
Theology Department at the University of Exeter, with its welcoming postgraduate culture,
many thanks, especially to Esther Reed and David Horrell. Conversations with Chris
Southgate, Cherryl Hunt and David Hoyle have also helped to shape my thinking. Dr Susan
Ang has been a constant dialogue partner and friend since undergraduate days, and I am
grateful to her for her insightful engagement with my material as it unfolded, and her
generous hospitality in Cambridge.
I am grateful to my staff colleagues at the West of England Ministerial Training Course for
their encouragement to complete what I had begun, and to the student community there
who have been interested in my learning as I in theirs. Three years of funding from the St
Luke’s College Foundation made the project viable, and annual grants from the Women’s
Continuing Ministerial Education Trust also played a vital part – thanks are due to both sets
of trustees for their generosity.
Thanks are always rightly offered to longsuffering family members. To Anna and Catherine,
without whom I would have finished far more quickly but in whose absence life would
have been greatly diminished, my thanks for constant reinforcement of the central idea of
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