Elizabeth Dearnley is a folklorist, writer, artist and Lecturer in Creative Writing at Edinburgh Napier University whose work explores fairy tales, horror, eerie landscapes and collaborative storytelling.

Following a PhD in comparative medieval literature and a practice-based Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship tracing fairy tales set in forests across languages, cultures and media, she now works across academia, the arts and public engagement to stage imaginative participatory events, interventions and installations, whether making statues talk or turning Anna Freud's bedroom into an uncanny immersive space filled with magic mirrors.

Organisations she has worked with include the Freud Museum London, Fáilte Ireland, the Wellcome Collection, Being Human, the Bloomsbury Festival, Upstart Theatre, Treadwell's Books, Leeds Libraries, and the National Archives.

Her work spans research, public engagement and artistic practice, with each element informing the others (read about her immersive installations here, her books here, and her other research and engagement projects here).

Alongside her work at Edinburgh Napier, Elizabeth regularly gives talks and leads creative writing workshops around the UK and beyond, and also teaches courses on folklore, film and psychoanalysis at the Freud Museum London (see what's coming up next here). Her writing has appeared in publications including The White Review, Hellebore, the Guardian and the Times Literary Supplement, she is an editor for the British Library's Tales of the Weird and Gilded Nightmares series (her most recent being Deadly Dolls), and is writing a book about fairy tales, horror and 80s fantasy films.