Editor for SHAKSPER Book Reviews, Michelle Assay:
Michelle Assay is Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, University of Huddersfield. She is working on the project ‘Shakespeare and Censorship in Soviet/Post-Soviet Music, Film and Theatre’. She was born in Tehran and trained in piano performance at the Tchaikovsky Academy in Kiev. She obtained her PhD from the Universities of Sorbonne and Sheffield. She is currently preparing her monograph, ‘Hamlet in the Stalin era’, for publication by Routledge. She is founder and chair of international research groups on ‘Shakespeare and Music’ and ‘Shakespeare in Central and Eastern Europe’. She hosts the podcast series, ‘Sounds and Sweet Airs’ on Shakespeare and music. Alongside publications in this area (including prize-winning articles), she is the co-author of a major life-and-work study of Mieczyslaw Weinberg. She is on the editorial board of Carl Nielsen Studies. She continues to appear in concert as a solo and chamber pianist and is a reviewer for Gramophone.