Born 13 December 1937 in Cardiff, Great Britain. I was educated at St. Marylebone Grammar School, London, and Trinity College, Cambridge, where I took a double first in English and won both the Charles Oldham Shakespeare Scholarship and the Harness Prize. I was a Fellow and Director of Studies at Downing College and a University Lecturer in English. In 1972 I was appointed Professor (Ordinarius) at the University of Zürich, and in 1975 I moved to the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, where I also directed the Centre for Renaissance Studies. Subsequent to my retirement in 2003 I became a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the School of Advanced Study, University of London. I am a Fellow of the British Academy, an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, an Honorary Fellow of Downing College, Cambridge, and an Honorary Visiting Professor at University College, London. In 2008 I was knighted for services to literary scholarship. I was awarded the Ph. D. and D. Litt. by Cambridge, an Honorary D. Lit. by London University, and an Honorary Ph. D. by the University of Fribourg, Switzerland.
I am a member of both the UK and the USA Societies for Renaissance Studies; the International Society for the History of Rhetoric (ISHR), and the Institute of English Studies (IES).
Education
| 1948-57 | St. Marylebone Grammar School |
| 1957-59 | National Service, Royal Artillery |
| 1959-64 | Trinity College, Cambridge |
Academic Record
| 1961 | English Tripos, Part I: First Class Honours |
| 1962 | English Tripos, Part II: First Class Honours |
| 1962 | Senior Scholarship, Trinity College, Cambridge |
| 1967 | Ph.D., Cambridge English Faculty |
| 1996 | Litt.D., Cambridge University |
Appointments
| 1964 | Research Fellow, Churchill College, Cambridge |
| 1964 | University Assistant Lecturer in English |
| 1965 | Fellow and Director of Studies in English, Downing College, Cambridge |
| 1968 | University Lecturer in English |
| (re-appointed to retiring age: May 21, 1971) | |
| 1972-75 | Professor (Ordinarius) of English Literature, University of Zürich |
| 1975-2003 | Professor (Ordinarius) of English and Renaissance Literature, ETH Zürich |
| 1978 | Appointed Professor of English, Harvard University |
| (unable to take up appointment for family reasons) | |
| 1980-81 | Visiting Fellow, All Souls College, Oxford |
| 1986-87 | Fellow of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (Institute for Advanced Study) |
| 2003 | Distinguished Senior Fellow, School of Advanced Studies, University of London, and Senior Research fellow, Institute of English Studies |
Administrative posts
| 1965-68 | Cambridge University: English Faculty Librarian |
| 1967-69 | Downing College, Cambridge: Dean |
| 1976-2003 | ETH Zürich: Director, Centre for Renaissance Studies |
| 1996-97 | ETH Zürich: Chairman, Humanities Department |
Distinctions
| 1961 | Cambridge University Charles Oldham Shakespeare Scholarship |
| 1965 | Cambridge University Harness Shakespeare Prize |
| 1974 | Annual Shakespeare Lecture, Deutsche Shakespeare-Gesellschaft (West) |
| 1976-89 | Member of the Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis für Renaissanceforschung |
| 1977-79 | President of the International Society for the History of Rhetoric |
| 1989 | Awarded the Morris D. Forkosch Prize by the Journal of the History of Ideas for “the best book in intellectual history published in 1988: In Defence of Rhetoric” |
| 1992 | Annual Shakespeare Lecture, British Academy |
| 1996 | Litt. D. Cambridge University |
| 1998 | Elected Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy |
| 2003 | Honorary Doctorate, Université de Fribourg (Suisse) |
| 2004 | Elected Chairman of the Society for Renaissance Studies |
| 2007 | Elected an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences |
| 2008 | Appointed Knight Bachelor for services to literary history |
| 2008 | Elected Honorary Fellow of Downing College, Cambridge |
| 2009 | Honorary Doctor of Letters, University of London |
| 2014 | Awarded the Beverly Rogers Literary Award by The Ben Jonson Journal |
| 2015 | Sam Wanamaker Fellow, Shakespeare’s Globe, London |
The Complete Works of John Ford, Volume II and III (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 29 September, 2016), pp. 992. ISBN 9780198748878.
The One King Lear (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016), pp. 410. ISBN 9780674504844.
The Collected Works of John Ford, Volume I, edited by Gilles Monsarrat, Brian Vickers, and R. J. C.Watt (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), pp. xiv, 720. ISBN: 978-0-19-959290-6
Mächtige Worte. Antike Rhetorik und europäische Literatur, by Brian Vickers and Sabine Köllmann (Berlin: LIT-Verlag, 2008), partial translation of B23, with new material.
Shakespeare, ‘A Lover’s Complaint’, and John Davies of Hereford (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. xii, 329.
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. The Merchant of Venice, ed. by William Baker and Brian Vickers (London and New York; Continuum, 2004), pp. xli, 437. General Editor’s Preface, pp. ix–xli.
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. Coriolanus, 1687–1940, ed. by David George (London and New York; Continuum, 2004), pp. xxvi, 448. General Editor’s Preface, pp. viii–xxiii.
Shakespeare, Co-author. A Historical Study of Five Collaborative Plays (Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. xxix, 561. ISBN: 978-0-19-925653-2.
‘Counterfeiting’ Shakespeare. Evidence, Authorship, and John Ford’s Funerall Elegye (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. xxvii, 568.
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. Measure for Measure, 1783–1920, ed. by George Geckle (London and NJ: Athlone Press, 2001), pp. xxxvi, 382. General Editor’s Preface, pp. x–xxxiv.
English Renaissance Literary Criticism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), Pp. xv, 675. ISBN: 978-0-19-818679-3
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 1775–1920, ed. by Judith M. Kennedy and Richard F. Kennedy (London and NJ: Athlone Press, 1999), pp. xxi, 461. General Editor’s Preface, pp. x–xix.
Francis Bacon, The Essays and Counsels, Civil and Moral (The Folio Society, 2002).
Francis Bacon, The Essays and Counsels, Civil and Moral (Oxford World’s Classics, 1999): pp. xliii, 216.
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. Richard II, 1780–1920, ed. by Charles Forker (London and NJ: Athlone Press), pp. xviii, 593. General Editor’s Preface, pp. x–xv.
Francis Bacon, History of the Reign of King Henry VII (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. x, 281. (“Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought”).
Shakespeare. The Critical Tradition. King John, ed. by Joseph Candido (London and NJ: Athlone Press, 1996), pp. xvi, 415. General Editor’s Preface, pp. vi–ix.
Francis Bacon (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. li, 813. (“Oxford World’s Classics”).
Francis Bacon (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. li, 813. (“The Oxford Authors”).
Francis Bacon (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. li, 813. (“The Oxford Authors”).
Francis Bacon (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. li, 813.
Ripensare Shakespeare. Questioni di critica contemporanea (Milan, 2001). Italian translation of B27 by Mario Baccianini, Marina Merella, and Alessandra Di Luzio.
Appropriating Shakespeare: Contemporary Critical Quarrels (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1993), pp. xvi, 501. Paperback ed. 1994; repr. 1996.
Returning to Shakespeare (London: Routledge, 1989), pp. viii, 257.
Classical Rhetoric in English Poetry; second ed., with new Preface and additional bibliography (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989), pp. vii, 186.
Classical Rhetoric in English Poetry; second ed., with new Preface and additional bibliography (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989), pp. vii, 186.
Francis Bacon, German translation of B15 and A30 by Reinhard Kaiser (Berlin: Wagenbach, 1988), pp. 78.
Storia della retorica (Bologna: il Mulino, 1994), pp. 649. Italian translation of B23 by Rocco Coronato; introduction by Andrea Battistini.
In Defence of Rhetoric (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. xi, 508.
(Editor) English Science, Bacon to Newton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), pp. xi, 244.
(Editor) English Science, Bacon to Newton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), pp. xi, 244.
(Editor) Public and Private Life in the Seventeenth Century: The Mackenzie-Evelyn Debate (Delmar, NY: Scholars’ Facsimiles and Reprints, 1986), pp. xlii, 277. – Introduction, pp. ix–xlii.
(Editor) Arbeit, Musse, Meditation. Betrachtungen zur Vita activa und Vita contemplativa (Zurich: Verlag der Fachvereine, 1985), pp. 307. – Introduction, pp. 1–19.
(Editor) Mentalidades ocultas y científicas en el Renacimento (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1990), pp. 318. Abridged Spanish translation of B19 by Jorge Vigil Rubio.
(Editor) Occult and Scientific Mentalities in the Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. xiv., 408. – Introduction, pp. 1–55.
(Editor) Rhetoric Revalued. Papers from the International Society for the History of Rhetoric (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1981), pp. 281. – Introduction, pp. 13–39.
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 6. 1774–1801 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1981), pp. 650.
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 5. 1765–1774 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979), pp. xvi, 569.
Francis Bacon (London: Longman, 1978), pp. 46; repr. in British Writers ed. I. Scott-Kilvert, Vol. 1 (New York: Scribner’s, 1979), pp. 257–74.
Shakespeare’s Coriolanus (London: Edward Arnold, 1976), pp. 68. (“Studies in English Literature” series).
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 4. 1753–1765 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976), pp. xiv, 583.
(Editor) Hooker: The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity. An Abridged Edition. Co-editor: A.S. McGrade (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1976), pp. 413. Introduction 2: “Hooker’s Prose Style”, pp. 41–59.
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 3. 1733–1752 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1975), pp. xii, 487.
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 2. 1693–1733 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974), pp. xi, 549.
(Editor) Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage. Volume 1. 1623–1692 (London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974), pp. xi, 448.
Towards Greek Tragedy (London: Longman, 1973), pp. xvi, 658; repr. 1979.
Classical Rhetoric in English Poetry (London: Macmillan, 1970), pp. 180.
(Editor) Seventeenth Century Prose: An Anthology (London: Longman, 1969), pp. 266.
(Editor) The World of Jonathan Swift (Oxford: Blackwell; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1968), pp. ix, 273. – Introduction, pp. 1–24.
(Editor) Essential Articles for the Study of Francis Bacon (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1972), pp. xxiii, 323. – Introduction, pp. xi–xxiii.
(Editor) Essential Articles for the Study of Francis Bacon (Hamden, CT: Archon Press, 1968), pp. xxiii, 323. English publication by Sidgwick & Jackson (London, 1972). – Introduction, pp. xi–xxiii.
The Artistry of Shakespeare’s Prose, Third Edition (London: Routledge, 2005), pp. vii, 452.
The Artistry of Shakespeare’s Prose, Revised Edition (London: Methuen, 1979), pp. x, 452.
The Artistry of Shakespeare’s Prose (London: Methuen, 1968), pp. ix, 452.
Francis Bacon and Renaissance Prose (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. xi, 316.
