About Me
I’m Dany Szelsky, a teacher and lifelong learner of art, literature and history, currently rediscovering my passions. I use a penname since my students tend to google me and I would like to keep my teaching and artistic lives separate.
In 2017, I graduated with honors in Modern English Language and Literature at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. In 2021, I graduated with honors in a joint Master's degree in English and American Studies between the Università Ca' Foscari di Venezia and the University of Graz, earning 110 cum laude.
My academic work has centered on Gothic literature, translation, and the uncanny; I have presented research at the International Gothic Association, the International Colloquium of Gothic Literature, and academic conferences on Bram Stoker, and has translated and annotated the work of John Banville for the European Federation of Associations and Centers of Irish Studies.
I speak four languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian.
For the past five years, I have worked as an elementary school teacher. These past two years have been of extreme changes that have taken me through a journey of self-discovery and re-defining who I am. Thus, it is my desire and intention to return to the things that first drew me to my studies and to living in Venice: art history, painting, videomaking, commonplace booking, reading, and travel. This online space is where that second life will hopefully flourish and take me to places I’ve never thought possible before. It’s a raw experience of growth and one that makes me feel vulnerable but one can only grow by putting oneself out there.
MA Thesis and BA Thesis
“Journeys End In Lovers Meeting”: The Spectral Uncanny in Carmilla and The Haunting Of Hill House. 15 july 2021. Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and University of Graz. MA Thesis.
“Through the broken battlements and casements : los espacios heterotópicos en Drácula de Bram Stoker”. 2017. National Autonomous University of Mexico. BA Thesis.
Publications and Presentations
2017 — Fragments of Eclipse and Fragments of Dr. Copernicus (John Banville), translation and commentary, European Federation of Associations and Centers of Irish Studies
2017 — "'For the Blood is the Life': The Heterotopia of the Lunatic Asylum in Dracula," 13th Biennial Conference of the International Gothic Association, UDLAP, Mexico
2017 — "'A Stranger in a Strange Land': The Representation of Transylvania as a Heterotopic Space in Dracula," University of the Cloister of Sor Juana, Mexico City
2018 — "The Uncanny Landscape in The Woman in Black and Its Adaptation by James Watkins," International Colloquium of Gothic Literature, UNAM, Mexico City
