Marielle O'Neill

Marielle O’Neill is a PhD candidate at Leeds Trinity University. Her research investigates the political activism of Leonard and Virginia Woolf, situating their work within the co-operative, anti-imperialist, and anti-fascist movements of the period, while also exploring their wider socio-political milieu and relationships with key political figures. She received a scholarship from Leeds Trinity to support this work.

From 2021 to 2024, she served on the Executive Council of the Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain (VWSGB), where she co-organised online events and expanded the Society’s digital presence. Marielle is particularly interested in how cultural memory shapes understandings of historical figures, especially in challenging patriarchal narratives and recovering overlooked voices. She combines this interest with activism, turning ideas into public campaigns and community projects. She led the successful Leonard Woolf bus campaign, securing political and organisational support to name a Brighton and Hove bus after Leonard Woolf. She also supported the campaign for a plaque commemorating Margaret Llewelyn Davies, pioneer of the Women’s Co-operative Guild. With VWSGB, she was part of the advisory group for Camden Council’s ‘Re-Presenting Virginia Woolf’ project to decolonise Woolf’s legacy.

Marielle co-produced the 2022 Outside/rs conference at the University of Brighton, which explored ‘outsider’ experiences in relation to gender, sex, and sexuality, and co-edited the Excursions x Outside/rs special issue published by the University of Sussex in 2023. Her work has appeared in specialist Virginia Woolf journals (The Virginia Woolf Bulletin and The Virginia Woolf Miscellany), and she has lectured internationally on the Woolfs. She was also a guest on The Virginia Woolf Podcast hosted by Karina Jakubowicz, contributing to the episode on Leonard Woolf’s legacies.

Before entering academia, Marielle worked in local government in Kirklees and Brighton and Hove. She has also been politically active on both sides of the Atlantic, working on Capitol Hill and in the Houses of Parliament. In 2016, she was selected as one of ten Young Fabians to research and observe the US presidential election, during which she campaigned for Hillary Clinton; in 2012, she worked on Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.

Beyond the Woolfs, her research interests span Labour history and progressive social movements, the music of Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, and the cinema of Hollywood’s Golden Age and film noir.