Photo of professor Gretchen Minton.

Gretchen Minton

Gretchen Minton, professor of English in the College of Letters and Science, is the recipient of this year’s Charles and Nora L. Wiley Award for Meritorious Research in the humanities, arts and social sciences. The award, which recognizes significant achievements and activity in research, is sponsored by the Wiley family and Office of Research and Economic Development and comes with a $2,000 honorarium.

Minton is a highly accomplished scholar and editor who writes ecological, place-based adaptations of William Shakespeare’s plays. While retaining the originals’ dramatic power and thematic complexity, Minton’s adaptations translate the narratives into critical conversations about the environmental present and future.

Minton’s work has demonstrated the transformative power of humanities scholarship to bridge disciplines and address urgent global challenges. Her works include “Timon of Anaconda,” an adaptation of “Timon of Athens,” about Montana’s mining history and environmental legacy; “Salt Waves Fresh,” an adaptation of “Twelfth Night,” which she developed during her 2023 Fulbright Fellowship in Australia to address marine ecosystem degradation and climate impacts on coastal communities; and “No Winter’s Tale,” an adaptation of “The Winter’s Tale,” centered in a climate-changed Intermountain West. For each adaptation, Minton engaged in sustained, reciprocal collaboration with scientific and local communities.

“Her work represents genuine intellectual risk-taking, moving beyond traditional modes of literary scholarship to create new forms of humanities research and public engagement,” wrote Alex Harmon, MSU assistant professor of English and American Studies, in a letter nominating Minton for the award. “Professor Minton is recognized nationally and internationally as a leader in ecological Shakespeare adaptation and environmental humanities, creating models that other scholars and institutions can follow.”