Malcolm Bowie

Who was Malcolm Bowie?

Malcolm McNaughtan Bowie FBA was a British academic, and Master of Christ's College, Cambridge from 2002 to 2006. An acclaimed scholar of French literature, Bowie wrote several books on Marcel Proust.

Born in Aldeburgh, Suffolk, Bowie attended Woodbridge School, and then studied at the University of Edinburgh where he gained an MA in 1965. He was awarded a DPhil at the University of Sussex in 1970. His research fields were French literature, psychoanalysis and the relationship between literature and the arts. He taught at the University of East Anglia, Clare College, Cambridge and Queen Mary College, London.

Bowie was elected to the Christ's Mastership in 2002, after spending ten years as Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature and Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford. Before going on to the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, University of Oxford, he held the Professorship of French Language and Literature at Queen Mary College. While in London he was the Founding Director of the Institute of Romance Studies, the School of Advanced Study, University of London. In December 2006, he vacated the Mastership because of ill health, and was made an Emeritus Fellow of Christ's.