New Library Guide for Iberian Literatures

Iberian Literatures

Today, we are launching a new library research guide for Iberian Literatures & Criticism. The new guide will improve navigation and discovery in UC Berkeley’s vast literature collection in Romance languages, mostly found in a classification commonly known as the PQs. Over the course of the past year, we have critically reviewed the former guides, weeded outdated resources, and replaced them with more current content with links to digital resources when available.

This literary research guide, like the others for Italian and French & Francophone literatures launched last year, is now benefiting from the LibGuides platform, which makes it much easier to revise than the former PDFs. The guide is structured by sections for article databases, general guides and literary histories, reference tools, poetry, theater & performance, and literary periods. In addition to literature in Spanish and Portuguese, it also includes less commonly taught literatures and languages such as Catalan, Galician, Basque, Arabic, Ladino, and more. There is also a new section for Luso-African and Hispano-African literature.

The online guide also interfaces seamlessly with related guides published by the UC Berkeley Library. For example, on the home page, there is a prominent link to the online list of recently acquired publications on the general Spanish & Portuguese guide, making it even easier to stay current on new books in all of the call number ranges.

Because the guides are much easier to update, they encourage user interaction and invite community suggestions for inclusion (or deletion).

When you have time, please take a look at this new resource and let us know what you think.

Claude Potts, Romance Languages Librarian
Cameron Flynn, RLL Doctoral Candidate


PhiloBiblon 2025 n. 1 (enero): Final de una época

La semana pasada colgué las versiones últimas y finales de BETABITECA BITAGAP en la web de PhiloBiblon de la Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Desde este momento no habrá más cambios en los datos presentados allí. Dentro de unos meses, un PhiloBiblon nuevo y renovado aparecerá en FactGrid:PhiloBiblon en la universidad alemana de Jena, donde compartirá espacio virtual con otros cuarenta proyectos históricos, desde los estudios cuneiformes hasta la época nazi en Alemania.

Es el final de un largo periplo que empezó en 1975 con el proyecto Dictionary of the Old Spanish Language de la University of Wisconsin, encabezado por Lloyd Kasten, con quien había estudiado yo ecdótica unos diez años antes. Fue el primer proyecto de humanidades digitales en el ámbito hispanico. Kasten fue secundado por su joven colega John Nitti, el arquitecto del entorno informático del proyecto. Para garantizar la autenticidad del corpus de español antiguo, se necesitaba un repertorio de manuscritos españoles escritos antes de 1501. Tal repertorio no existió y pusieron a ayudantes de investigación a vaciar dos obras, el Catálogo de los manuscritos castellanos de la Real Biblioteca de El Escorial, del benemérito, y martirizado, padre Julián Zarco Cuevas; y la Bibliografía de la literatura hispánica del igualmente benemérito José Simón Díaz. Identificaron 966 obras y Kasten y Nitti imprimieron el resultado como Bibliography of Old Spanish Texts en 1975. Siguió una segunda edición en 1977, con 1869 fichas. Al año siguiente yo me encontraba en la Hispanic Society, redactando su catálogo de manuscritos medievales y enviando adiciones y correcciones a BOOST. En 1981 Kasten y Nitti me ofrecieron la dirección de BOOST como proyecto autónomo, y lo demás, como dicen, es historia.

Pronto tuve un colaborador, un jovencísimo Ángel Gómez Moreno (UCM), que acababa de pasar un año de estudios de posgrado en Wisconsin. Al volver a España se lanzó con entusiasmo a la tarea de repasar los ficheros y catálogos (en papel, por supuesto), de la BNE, la Biblioteca de Palacio, la RAE y la RAH, siempre en busca de nuevos manuscritos para BOOST. En los años 80 estudiantes de carrera y posgrado sirvieron como ayudantes de investigación, primero María Morrás (UPF), y en los 90 Ángela Moll Dexeus y Antonio Cortijo (UC Santa Barbara), durante su paso por las aulas de Berkeley.  Ya desde 1993 BOOST era BETA, la Bibliografía Española de Textos Antiguos en CD-ROM y en la red en 1997. En 2000 Ángel me mandó como becario por dos años a Óscar Perea Rodríguez; y desde entonces Óscar ha sido mi mano derecha en el proyecto, organizando los seminarios de PhiloBiblon, primero en San Millán de la Cogolla y luego en Madrid. Más recientemente ha trabajado como ayudante en Berkeley Heather Bamford (George Washington University), mientras que, en España, en la UCM, Álvaro Bustos ha participado en varias campañas de investigación conmigo y ha reclutado nuevos miembros del equipo de BETA.

Kasten y Nitti fueron responsables también de la Bibliography of Old Catalan Texts (BOOCT, 1985), base de datos gemela a BOOST, compilada por Beatrice Concheff (†), antigua alumna de la University of Wisconsin y que, en aquel tiempo, ejercía como profesora de inglés en una escuela de lenguas de Barcelona. Era una aficionada a la literatura catalana, pero no era experta en ella en términos académicos; por ello, la inmensa mayoría de sus citas a obras y manuscritos medievales provenía de fuentes secundarias. Y además, en el año de 1989, por desgracia, Concheff se encontraba con una salud muy delicada y era consciente de que no podría dedicarse a la compilación de una segunda edición de BOOCT.

En una de las sesiones de trabajo del congreso de la Asociación Internacional de Hispanistas de Barcelona de 1989, mi amigo Francisco Marcos Marín me presentó a Vicenç Beltrán. Expuesto el caso a Vicenç, vio inmediatamente la importancia de seguir adelante con BOOCT. En seguida Vicenç embarcó en el proyecto a su jovencísima alumna, doctoranda en aquel entonces, Gemma Avenoza i Vera (†). Fue Gemma la que enseguida quedó al cargo del mismo. Era ya una codicóloga consumada, como se puede comprobar en su tesis doctoral, Repertori dels manuscrits en llengües romàniques conservats a biblioteques barcelonines. Además, Gemma era de los escasos expertos en filología de la época que sabía manejar un ordenador, habilidad absolutamente necesaria para trabajar con PhiloBiblon. Ambos, Gemma y Vicenç, romanistas al estilo antiguo y expertos no sólo en las literaturas medievales ibéricas, sino también en las de Francia e Italia, comprobaron la utilidad del (entonces recién bautizado) PhiloBiblon,  pues podría facilitar la tarea de catalogación y descripción de los textos y testimonios del corpus de literatura medieval ibérica en lenguas castellana, catalana, portuguesa y gallego-portuguesa.

A los pocos meses de ese primer encuentro en Barcelona, en el otoño de 1989 Gemma ya pudo visitarme en Berkeley para adentrarse en el arcano mundo de PhiloBiblon y encargarse, junto con Vicenç, de BOOCT, que pronto cambiaría su nombre en BITECA (Bibliografia de Textos Catalans Antics), de forma paralela a BETA. Desde entonces hasta su demasiado temprana muerte en 2021, Gemma fue la mano directriz de BITECA, pronto secundada por Lourdes Soriano, alumna tanto de Gemma como de Vicenç. Durante casi 20 años, pues, Gemma, Lourdes y yo estuvimos en contacto constante. Las dos supieron atraer a más de medio centenar de colaboradores y ayudantes de investigacíon. Los miembros actuales del equipo de BITECA son Joan Mahiques Climent (Universitat Jaume I),  Joan M. Perujo  (Universitat d’Alacant), Helena Rovira Cerdà (Universidad de Murcia), Glòria Sabaté (Universitat de Barcelona) y Ferran Triadó Sales, (Universitat de Barcelona), todos ellos alumnos o antiguos alumnos de Gemma y Lourdes.

Ya por la misma época, en 1988, entablé discusiones con mi querido colega y vis-à-vis (literalmente) en el departamento de español y portugués de Berkeley, Arthur Askins, sobre la posibilidad de crear una base de datos paralalela a BOOST y BOOCT. Se llamaría Bibliography of Old Portuguese Texts (BOOPT) y formaría un nuevo tomo en la “Bibliographic Series” de la Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies. Pero ya la época de publicación en papel había pasado. Con una subvención de la Sociedad Estatal del Quinto Centenario, BETA, BITECA y el recien bautizado BITAP (Bibliografia de Textos Antigos Portugueses) saldría en disco CD-ROM en 1993. Más tarde, el nombre BITAP se cambiaría en BITAGAP (Bibliografia de Textos Antigos Galegos e Portugueses).

Arthur había sido testigo ocular de mis investigaciones con BOOST desde 1981 y se había dado cuenta de la utilidad de las bases de datos en sus propias investigaciones sobre la biblioteca de Fernando Colón. Estaba intrigado, pero se dio cuenta desde el principio que esto tendría que ser un proyecto de equipo. Reclutó a sus amigos y antiguos compañeros de estudios de Berkeley, Harvey Sharrer (†), profesor en la University of California, Santa Bárbara,  y Martha E. Schaffer, en aquel entonces profesora la University of Chicago y actualmente en la University of San Francisco.

Iniciados sus viajes de investigación anuales en Portugal, muy pronto los tres persuadieron a Aida Fernanda Dias (†), profesora de la Universidade de Coimbra, que se uniera al equipo. Luego, comenzando en 2008, se incorporaron Pedro Pinto (Universidade Nova de Lisboa), con su olfato extraordinario para encontrar manuscritos de interés, Cristina Sobral (Universidade de Lisboa), Filipe Alves Moreira (Universidade do Porto, actualmente Universidade Aberta), Maria de Lurdes Rosa (Universidade Nova de Lisboa),  Ricardo Pichel Gotérrez (Universidade de Santiago y actualmente Universidad de Educación a Distancia), Mariña  Arbor (Universidade de Santiago y Diana Fontão (Universidade de Porto / Universidad de Salamanca).

Como en los casos de BETA y BITECA, el equipo de BITAGAP ha contado con al menos una centena de buenos colaboradores, entre estudiantes y colegas del mundo entero.

PhiloBiblon no sólo ha sido creación de las personas mencionadas aquí, sino de todos aquellos colegas que nos han escrito pidiendo u ofreciendo información sobre tal o cual texto, manuscrito o persona. Por y para ellos hemos dedicado tanto esfuerzo durante más de cuarenta años, el mismo esfuerzo precisamente que todos los miembros del equipo vamos a continuar haciendo en esta nueva etapa que se abre ante nosotros.

Charles B. Faulhaber
University of California, Berkeley

Referencias:

Faulhaber, Charles B., PhiloBiblon, pasado, presente, futuro: Historia de un proyecto de investigación, San Millán de la Cogolla: Congreso Internacional. Códices literarios españoles (Edad media) 2007-11-29

_____, PhiloBiblon: Pasado y futuro, (Incipit 29 2009: pp. 191-200)

_____, PhiloBiblon, Information Technology, and Medieval Spanish Literature: A Balance Sheet, Bern: Humanitats a la Xarxa: Món Medieval – Humanities on the Web: The Medieval World 2014: pp. 15-43

_____, PhiloBiblon and the Semantic Web. Notes for a Future History, València: La Literatura Medieval Hispánica en la Imprenta (1475-1600) 2016: pp. 75-93

____. Harvey L. Sharrer (1940-2024). PhiloBiblon blog 2024-10-10

Dias, Aida Fernanda, Arthur Lee-Francis Askins, Harvey L. Sharrer, A ‘Bibliografia de Textos Antigos Galegos e Portugueses’ na Internet, Lisboa: Revista Portuguesa de História do Livro 1 n. 2 1998: pp. 173-80)

Martín Molares, Mónica PhiloBiblon 2020 n. 1 (febrero): Crónica del V Seminario Internacional PhiloBiblon-BNE-UCM (Madrid, junio de 2019), (PhiloBiblon Blog 2020-02-28)

Perea Rodríguez, Óscar, y Charles B. Faulhaber, Esbozos sobre la evolución y el futuro de un pionero de las humanidades digitales hispánicas: el proyecto de PhiloBiblon, Revista Digital Universitaria 18 n. 1 2017

Schaffer, Martha E. Homenagem a Aida Fernanda Dias oferecida pelos seus colegas de Philobiblon, eHumanista 31 2015: pp. i-v, 1-275) 

Sharrer, Harvey L., BITAGAP (Bibliografia de Textos Antigos Galegos e Portugueses): um armazém da memória histórica, Madrid: (Tenh’eu que mi fez el i mui gran ben. Estudos sobre cultura escrita medieval dedicados a Harvey L. Sharrer 2022: pp. 39-67)

_____, A BITAGAP no seu 30o aniversário: a expansão de dados e expectativas para o futuro, Berlin: O Medievalismo no século XXI 2020: pp. 157-68) 

_____, The BITAGAP project since 1988 – Expansion of the corpus of texts and important discoveries, Bern: Humanitats a la Xarxa: Món Medieval – Humanities on the Web: The Medieval World 2014: pp. 169-83


Library event: Que vlo-ve? and Le Mot

Que vlo-ve ?
Various issues of the third series of Que vlo-ve ?

In these austere times where both financial resources and shelving space are limited, it has become a rare occasion when we are able to pursue full-runs of older periodicals. However, the recent acquisition of these two—one from France and the other from Belgium—in more or less the same time period has sparked the idea of hosting a hands-on journal presentation for those interested in interacting with the journals before the issues are processed, cataloged, bound, and stored in their distinct library locations.

Que vlo-ve?: bulletin de l’Association internationale des amis de Guillaume Apollinaire was published from January 1973 to 2004. Centered on the work of the celebrated 20th century French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist and art critic of Polish descent, its intention was not to duplicate articles published in the annual Guillaume Apollinaire series by Lettres Modernes. Instead, it was meant to welcome articles that could not easily find a place, news of the association and of the museum as well as news that members of the scholarly society wished to disseminate internationally.

Le Mot
Issue number 20 (July 1, 1915) of Le Mot

Le Mot (1914-1915)

Sardonic and visually rich, this wartime French literary and artistic journal published by Jean Cocteau and Paul Iribe, was characterized by a restrained modernism and a fiercely nationalistic, anti-German perspective. Le Mot (The Word) was a wartime sequel to François Bernouard’s Schéhérazade: Album Mensuel d’Oeuvres Inédites d’Art et de Littérature (1909-11). Its primary purpose was to establish an entirely French artistic style and taste—anti-bourgeois and uninfluenced by German modernism.

Reports of the brutal treatment of noncombatants (such as mass executions that included women, small children, and the elderly) and damage to towns and cultural centers shocked the public, leading to a characterization, particularly within France, of the German soldiers as destructive and uncivilized “huns” particularly within wartime propaganda. The bi-monthly periodical included cover designs by not only Iribe and Cocteau but also Sem, Raoul Dufy, Léon Bakst, André Lhote, Albert Gleizes, and Pierre-Emile Legrain. Cocteau signed his drawings as Jim, the name of his dog. In August 1914, when war was declared with Germany, he was twenty-five years old. Like many patriotic young Frenchmen, Cocteau tried to enlist but was turned down because of his health. Looking for other ways to serve his country and the war effort, he collaborated with Iribe to launch Le Mot. As a teenager, Iribe drew illustrations for the popular caricature journal L’Assiette au Beurre (The Butter Plate), which ran from 1902 to 1912. He also freelanced for Le Témoin, Rire, Sourire and other periodicals and was enthusiastic about starting a satirical journal of his own.

Please join us for an interactive show and tell with special guest Willard Bohn, alumnus of the Department of French and Professor Emeritus of French and Comparative Literature at Illinois State University.

Thursday, February 6
4-5:30 pm
223 Doe Library (accessible through south end of the Heyns Reading Room)

No rsvp required.

—-
Claude H. Potts (he/him)
Librarian for Romance Language Collections


New book by Jeroen Dewulf

Nova Historia

Nova História do Cristianismo Negro na África Ocidental e nas Américas makes a historiographical intervention aimed at the history of black Catholicism and black religion in the Americas in a broader way. Dewulf’s central and well-documented assertion is that black Christianity, both Catholic and Protestant, has roots in pre-Tridentine Portuguese Catholicism. Even before the advent of the slave trade, Catholicism had become an indigenous African religion, at times assuming pre-Tridentine and syncretic forms that have become irreconcilable for the Europeans of the post-Tridentine period. This argument has significant historiographical consequences; the long-standing confusion about the religiosity of the enslaved people is, at least in part, the result of assumptions that Africans knew little about Christianity before their enslavement. On the contrary, Dewulf traces these religious forms to the slave ships that transported human “cargo” to the Americas. This book is a timely salute to the Catholic and Christian studies that has for a long time portrayed Christians of African descent as marginalized and atypical people, rather than important global actors. (Citation of the Committee of the Prize John Gilmary Shea of ​​the year 2023)

[from publisher’s site]

Jeroen Dewulf is Queen Beatrix Professor in Dutch Studies at the UC Berkeley Department of German and a Professor at Berkeley’s Folklore Program and an affiliated member of the Center for African Studies and the Center for Latin American Studies. He recently completed his long-term role as director of UC Berkeley’s Institute of European Studies where he is chair of the Center for Portuguese Studies. His main area of research is Dutch and Portuguese colonial history, with a focus on the transatlantic slave trade and the culture and religion of African-descended people in the American diaspora. He also publishes in the field of Folklore Studies and about other aspects of Dutch, German, and Portuguese literature, culture, and history.

Nova História do Cristianismo Negro na África Ocidental e nas Américas. Porto Alegre: EDIPUCRS, 2024.


PhiloBiblon 2024 n. 6 (diciembre): Noticias

Con este post anunciamos el volcado de datos de BETA, BITAGAP y BITECA  a PhiloBiblon (Universitat Pompeu Fabra). Este volcado de BETA y BITECA es el último. Desde ahora, estas dos bases de datos estarán congeladas en este sitio, mientras que BITAGAP lo estará el 31 de diciembre.

Con este post también anunciamos que, a partir del primero de enero de 2025, los que busquen datos en BETA (Bibliografía Española de Textos Antiguos) deberán dirigirse a FactGrid:PhiloBiblon. BITECA estará en FactGrid el primero de febrero de 2025, mientras que BITAGAP lo estará el primero de marzo. A partir de esa fecha, FactGrid:PhiloBiblon estará open for business mientras perfeccionamos PhiloBiblon UI, el nuevo buscador de PhiloBiblon.

Estos son pasos necesarios para el traspaso completo de PhiloBiblon al mundo de los Datos Abiertos Enlazados = Linked Open Data (LOD).

Este  póster dinámico de Patricia García Sánchez-Migallon explica de manera sucinta y amena la historia técnica de PhiloBiblon, la configuración de LOD y el proceso que estamos siguiendo en el proyecto actual, “PhiloBiblon: From Siloed Databases to Linked Open Data via Wikibase”, con una ayuda de dos años (2023-2025) de la National Endowment for the Humanities:

Ésta es la versión en PDF del mismo póster: PhiloBiblon Project: Biobibliographic database of medieval and Renaissance romance texts.

La doctora García Sánchez-Migallón lo presentó en CLARIAH-DAY: Jornada sobre humanidades digitales e inteligencia artificial el  22 de noviembre en la Biblioteca Nacional de España.

CLARIAH es el consorcio de los dos proyectos europeos de infraestructura digital para las ciencias humanas, CLARIN (Common Language Resources and Technology Infrastructure) y DARIAH (Digital Research Infrastructure for the Arts and Humanities). Actualmente, la doctora García Sánchez-Migallón trabaja en la oficina de CLARIAH-CM de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid.

Charles B. Faulhaber
University of California, Berkeley

 

 

 


Intelligenza Artificiale in Italia

artificial intelligence in Italy

Judging by the explosion of new books on artificial intelligence, or AI, being published in Italy,  you might think this Mediterranean country is the the editorial epicenter for one of the hottest interdisciplinary topics. Whether you are in the humanities, social sciences, human sciences,  computer science, or STEM fields, “intelligenza artificiale” as it’s called in Italian will eventually find its way into your coursework or research. Here are just a few of the books on AI to recently reach bookstores in Italy and that have not automatically been sent to the UC Berkeley Library. However, if you are inclined just let your friendly Romance languages librarian know and he’ll be happy to push the first button to initiate this demand-driven order.*

 

*Demand-driven acquisition (DDA), is a model of library collection development in which a library only purchases materials when it is clear that a patron has demonstrated the need for a resource. If implemented correctly, DDA can make it possible to purchase only what is needed, allowing libraries to spend the same amount of money as they previously spent on monographs, but with a higher rate of use.

 

 


Bibliopolítica: A Digital History of the Chicano Studies Library

Bibliopolítica: A Digital History of the Chicano Studies Library

At the intersection of Chicana/o/x Studies, Digital Humanities and Library History, Bibliopolítica: A Digital History of the Chicano Studies Library chronicles the history of one of the first Chicana/o/x collections, the Chicano Studies Library at the University of California, Berkeley.

Bibliopolítica shares the stories of trailblazing library workers, students and community members who worked to preserve and make Chicana/o/x resources available. Featuring photographs, ephemera, archival documents, and oral histories, Bibliopolítica offers an original digital collection of primary sources and is the first audiovisual history of this special place that helped redefine what libraries could be.

Bibliopolítica takes its name from a book of the same title that Richard Chabrán and librarian colleague Francisco García-Ayvens published in 1984, BiblioPolítica: Chicano Perspectives on Library Service in the United States. In 2024, it remains one of the few titles dedicated to the discussion of Chicana/o/x librarianship. Bibliopolítica: a Digital History of the Chicano Studies Library adds to this important conversation, but it is only the beginning of a much needed longer and more detailed history of the Chicano Studies Library and the contributions of Chicana/o/x library workers.

You can explore the digital exhibit, listen to recorded oral histories, browse digitized archival items, or explore on your own path.

Co-curated by Amanda Belantara – Assistant Curator at New York University Libraries, Lillian Castillo-Speed – former Chicano Studies Library Coordinator, now Head Librarian of the Ethnic Studies Library at UC Berkeley, and Richard Chabrán – former Chicano Studies Library Coordinator, Team Leader Latino Digital Archive Group.

Digitization of archival items by Chrissy Huhn and UC Berkeley Library IT and Oral history recordings at Berkeley by Pablo Gonzalez and Angelica Garcia. See additional credits.

 


Harvey L. Sharrer (1940 – 2024)

It is with deep sadness that we share the news that Harvey Sharrer, our dear friend and colleague and co-director of the Bibliografia de Textos Antigos Galegos e Portugueses (BITAGAP) for more than thirty-five years, died unexpectedly last month.

Harvey, Professor Emeritus at the University of California Santa Barbara, passed away at his home in Santa Barbara on September 12, 2024. His life was dedicated to teaching, academic research, and world exploration.

Born in Oakland, California in 1940 to Ruth Morehouse and Harvey Sharrer, he spent his formative years in Oakland and Danville, California, graduating from San Ramon Valley High School in 1958. His passion for foreign languages was ignited by his high school Spanish teacher, who inspired him to pursue language studies in college.  After graduating from high school, Harvey took a summer course at the Monterey Institute of Foreign Studies and spent Fall quarter at the University of San Francisco. He then took a gap year to work with his father’s remodeling business, saving money for a transformative month’s-long European trip with a high school friend—an experience that kindled his lifelong love for world travel.

Returning to the U.S., Harvey earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Spanish from UC Berkeley in 1963 and 1965, respectively, followed by a doctorate in Hispanic and Luso-Brazilian Literature from UCLA in 1970, with a dissertation on “The Legendary History of Britain from its Founding by Brutus to the Death of King Arthur in Lope García de Salazar’s Libro de las bienandanzas e fortunas.”  Even before finishing his dissertation he had published a Critical Bibliography of Hispanic Arthurian Material, I: Texts: The Prose Romance Cycles (London: Grant & Cutler, 1977) in Alan Deyermond’s fundamental series of Research Bibliographies & Checklists. He spent his entire academic career at UC Santa Barbara, starting in 1968 as an Acting Assistant Professor and progressing steadily through the canonical ranks to full professor in 1981. He served as chair of the UCSB Department of Spanish & Portuguese in 1978-1981 and then again 2002-2003.

Dr. Sharrer was universally admired for his scholarship and the impressive breadth of his knowledge of medieval literature and culture, encompassing Arthurian literature, the medieval Romance lyric, and, increasingly, the digital humanities—a field in which he was a pioneer. He made significant scholarly contributions to our knowledge of medieval and early modern Portuguese, Galician, Spanish, and Catalan literatures. His expertise in Catalan was honed by the two years (1984-1986) he spent as the director of the Barcelona Study Center (U. of California and U. of Illinois), where he enjoyed the friendship of Vicenç Beltran and Gemma Avenoza, who would become colleagues in PhiloBiblon as the directors of the Bibliografia de Textos Antics Catalans (BITECA).

He collaborated on BITAGAP with his friends Arthur Askins and Martha Schaffer from its beginning in 1989 as one of PhiloBiblon‘s three constituent bibliographies, all three dedicated to uncovering and documenting the primary sources of the medieval Romance literatures of the Iberian Peninsula:

Martha Schaffer and Arthur Askins with Harvey Sharrer in Coimbra in 1999, on the occasion of the investiture of Askins as Doctor <em>honoris causa</em> of the Universidade de Coimbra.
Martha Schaffer and Arthur Askins with Harvey Sharrer in Coimbra in 1999, on the occasion of the investiture of Askins as Doctor honoris causa of the Universidade de Coimbra.
 

The three colleagues were indefatigable ratones de bibliotecas, systematically quartering Portugal, from Bragança in the north to Lagos in the south, in search of new manuscripts of medieval Portuguese and Galician texts. They found the richest collections, however, in Lisbon: the Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, the Ajuda library, and Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo.  They and their Portuguese collaborators, especially Pedro Pinto and Filipe Alves Moreira, combed through those collections assiduously. Harvey’s most spectacular discovery, in 1990, was the eponymous  Pergaminho Sharrer, a parchment fragment with seven lyric poems in Galician-Portuguese, with music, by King Dinis of Portugal (1278-1325) . It had been used as the cover of a bundle of 16th-c. documents in the Torre do Tombo, a not  uncommon practice during the period.

Harvey described his discovery in “Fragmentos de Sete Cantigas d’Amor de D. Dinis, musicadas –uma descoberta” (Actas do IV Congresso da Associação Hispânica de Literatura Medieval, Lisboa: Edições Cosmos, 1991: I:13-29).

Pergaminho Sharrer, with seven poems by King Dinis of Portugal, with music
Pergaminho Sharrer, with seven poems by King Dinis of Portugal, with music

Retirement came in 2011, but it did little to slow Harvey down. He continued to participate in conferences worldwide and, at UCSB, generously proofread articles for his former department. He remained a respected and admired scholar, mentor, and colleague throughout his life.

Harvey at the XXXX Congress
Harvey at the microphone

Harvey’s career was commemorated by a splendid volume of homage studies edited by Ricardo Pichel, “Tenh’eu que mi fez el i mui gran ben”. Estudos sobre cultura escrita medieval dedicados a Harvey L. Sharrer (Madrid: Silex, 2022): 

Homage presentation
Presentation of the homage volume in Santiago de Compostela: (from left): Xavier Varela Barreiro, Ricardo Pichel, Harvey Sharrer, Miguel García-Fernández

Harvey Sharrer will be deeply missed for his extraordinary scholarship, his remarkable mentorship of and generosity toward students and young scholars, and his courteous and congenial personality, um cavaleiro da escola antiga. His work will continue to influence future generations of students and scholars.  In recognition of his scholarly career and lasting impact on the Santa Barbara campus, the campus flag was lowered to half-staff on Wednesday, October 2.

Harvey, who never married and considered his scholarly career to be his life’s work, is survived by a sister, Elizabeth Porter, in Upland, California, a brother, William Sharrer, in Louisville, Kentucky, and several cousins, nieces, and nephews who will miss him dearly.

Harvey did not wish to have a formal memorial service, but rather planned to create an endowment in his name at UC Santa Barbara, to be called the “Harvey L. Sharrer Dissertation Travel Grants.”  Plans for this endowment are going forward actively, and we will announce them opportunely. It will support future scholars in their research endeavors, particularly in the field of Ibero-Romance languages, reflecting Harvey’s lifelong passion and areas of expertise. 

William L. Sharrer
Elide V. Oliver
Charles B. Faulhaber


Fum d’Estampa Press

 Fum d'Estampa Press

“Our objective is to bring what we think are great stories and literature to the English-speaking world and let the readers decide for themselves.” – Douglas Suttle

Fum d’Estampa Press was founded in 2020 by translator Douglas Suttle to bring exciting, different Catalan language literature to an English speaking audience. Though small, the press quickly established itself as an ambitious publisher of high quality titles. Since then, they have been long- and short-listed for some of the most important literary prizes in the UK and abroad, and have recently started to publish fantastic literature in translation from languages other than Catalan.

Catalan authors include Montserrat Roig, Joan Fuster, Guillem Viladot, Jordi Cussà, Bel Olid, Joaquim Ruyra, Jacint Verdaguer, Laura Alcoba, Maica Rafecas, Jordi Larios, Almudena Sánchez, Adrià Pujol, Oriol Ponsatí-Murlà, Raül Garrigasait, Oriol Quintana, Joan Maragall, Jordi Llavina, Marina Porras, Jordi Graupera, Llorenç Villalonga, Jaume Subirana, Ferran Soldevila, Narcís Oller, and Rosa Maria Arquimbau.

Among the translators are Alan Yates, Ronald Puppo, Louise Johnson and Peter Bush, Tiago Miller, and Mara Faye Lethem.

While its editorial offices are based in Vilafranca del Penedès, south of Barcelona, it prints its books in the south of England, and stores its physical books in Scotland. Ebooks are also available.

Here are a few of their books held by the UC Berkeley Library:

Visit the publisher’s site to view all available titles.

Correspondance complète de Rousseau ONLINE

 

 Jean-Jacques Rousseau
 Image: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1712-1778.               Austrian National Library

In partnership with the Voltaire Foundation, the Correspondance complète de Rousseau ONLINE makes Ralph Leigh’s critical edition in 52 volumes in the original French-language available as an ebook collection for the first time.  The digital corpus gathers together all 8,000 letters written to and by one of the most important figures of eighteenth-century intellectual history, as well as the correspondence between third parties relating to the writer and his time. Drafts and copies have been collated against the original manuscripts and all variants reproduced. The extensive annotations identify individuals, events and places, explain the linguistic usages of the eighteenth century, give bibliographical information and clarify obscure allusions.

This library purchase was made possible with the generous support from the Archie & Harriett Maclean Endowed Fund for French Culture.