[7] Building on her doctoral thesis, Kewes' early publications focused on the themes of plagiarism, appropriation, translation, adaptation and biography in the long eighteenth century.

[9] Kewes' chief research interests have since shifted to Elizabethan and early Stuart drama, particularly the genre's classical reception and historiography as well as the work of William Shakespeare.

[2] In 2020 she edited a special issue of Huntington Library Quarterly focused on the conceit of Ancient Rome in early modern English political culture.

Kewes' historiographical interests were reflected in the edition of[13] and handbook to[14] Holinshed's Chronicles she produced, in collaboration with Ian Archer and Felicity Heal, for Oxford University Press in 2013.

In August 2015 Kewes appeared as a guest on BBC Radio 4's Great Lives series discussing Elizabeth I alongside Matthew Parris and Michael Howard.