Erik Eklund (1991–) is a Research Scholar with the Northwestern University (Evanston, IL) Research Initiative in Russian Philosophy, Literature, and Religious Thought, and Adjunct Professor at Northwest University (Kirkland, WA), where he teaches in the Department of English and the College of Ministry. His primary areas of research and inquiry include literature and religion, literary reflexivity, and Nabokov studies, with a particular interest in authorial identity, unreliability, and indeterminacy. He combines structuralist and post-structuralist approaches to literary theory with close reading to investigate the conceptual possibilities and limitations of the "and" that makes the study of literature and religion possible. This includes all concepts of religion, spirituality, the relationship between the secular and the sacred, and all aspects of religious culture. This work has resulted in several peer-reviewed articles and other essays on religious subtexts and mystical resonances in Nabokov's work, including an alternative theory of Pale Fire, as well as articles and book chapters in philosophical theology and Inklings studies. He is the recipient of the 2023 Gennady Barabtarlo Best Essay Prize and the inaugural Dieter E. Zimmer Prize for Best Postgraduate Work (2019). His Ph.D. dissertation, titled "A Triptych of Bottomless Light: Repetition, Originality and Transcendence in Vladimir Nabokov's Pale Fire," was completed under the supervision of Professor Siggy Frank and Rev'd Canon Professor Alison Milbank at the University of Nottingham in 2023.
Journal Issues Edited:
Guest Editor. Nabokov Studies 19 (2023–24), special issue in honor of Zoran Kuzmanovich.
Refereed Publications on Nabokov:
"Rereading the World: A Theological Appraisal of Vladimir Nabokov’s Metaliterary Eschatology." Religion & Literature 57.1 (2025). Forthcoming.
"The Mirror and the Icon: An Alternative Reading of Nabokov’s Pale Fire." Partial Answers 22.1 (Jan. 2024): 117–40.
"Haloed Hallucinations: Vladimir Nabokov’s Bend Sinister and the Cult of St. Antony from Athanasius to Gustave Flaubert." Religion and the Arts 27.4 (Oct. 2023): 454–82.
"'The Name of God has priority': 'God' and the Apophatic Element in Vladimir Nabokov’s Pale Fire." Literature and Theology 36.3 (Sept. 2022): 298–315.
"Do Not Be Angry at the Moon: Pale Fire and The Old English Boethius." The Nabokovian 83 (Fall 2022): 1–13.
"The Gist of Masks: Notes on Kinbote’s Christianity and Nabokov’s Authorial Kenosis." Nabokov Online Journal 15 (2021): 1–29.
"'A green lane in Paradise': Eschatology and Theurgy in Lolita." Nabokov Studies 17 (2020–21): 35–60.
Forums & Round-tables
Organizer and participant. "Nabokov and Religion: Part Two." Forum with Christopher Link, Mary Ross, Matthew Roth, and Michael Wood. Moderated by Yuri Leving. Nabokov Online Journal 17 (2023): 1–24.
Organizer and participant. "Nabokov and Religion: Part One." Forum with Christopher Link, Mary Ross, Matthew Roth, and Michael Wood. Moderated by Yuri Leving. Nabokov Online Journal 16 (2022): 1–20.
Book Chapters related to Nabokov:
"God He Sees in Mirrors: Nabokov's Trinity, Revisited." In New Trinitarian Ontologies: Conference Proceedings of the New Trinitarian Ontologies Conference and Symposium, edited by John Milbank, Ryan Haecker, and Jonathan Lyonhart. (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2024). Forthcoming.
Book Reviews:
Vladimir Nabokov and the Art of Moral Acts by Dana Dragunoiu (Northwestern University Press, 2021). Nabokov Studies 18 (2022–2023): 149–54.
Nabokov and the Real World: Between Appreciation and Defense by Robert Alter (Princeton University Press, 2021). Nabokov Online Journal 15 (2021): 1–4.