English scholar Dr. Peter J. Smith of Nottingham Trent University will present a lecture, “Something Rich and Strange: The Tempest and the Magic of Authority,” at 2 p.m. Wednesday, April 20, in the Arkla Room in Ross Hall. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Smith studied at Lancaster University and University of Leicester and has lectured in Italy, France, Holland, Australia, and Poland. He has been visiting professor at Tours, Lincoln-Nebraska, and University of Massachusetts.

He is the author of “Social Shakespeare” (Macmillan, 1995), co-editor of “Hamlet: Theory in Practice” (Open University Press, 1998) and, most recently, co-editor of a special volume of the journal Shakespeare (Routledge, 2010) on the theory of theatre reviewing.

His essays and reviews have appeared in Shakespeare, Shakespeare Survey, Shakespeare Bulletin, Review of English Studies, Critical Quarterly, and The Upstart Crow. He is on the editorial boards of Shakespeare and Cahiers Elisabethains and regularly reviews books and theatre productions for Times Higher Education. He is a trustee of the British Shakespeare Association.

Currently, he is finishing a book on scatology and writing a stage history of “Twelfth Night.”

For more information, contact the Department of English at 501-569-3161 or visit  ualr.edu/english.