Dennis Howard Green
Dennis Howard Green | |
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Born | Bournemouth, England | 26 June 1922
Died | 5 December 2008 Cambridge, England | (aged 86)
Spouses | Dorothy Warren
(m. 1947; div. 1972)Margaret Parry
(m. 1972; died 1997)Sarah Redpath (m. 2001) |
Children | 1 |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | |
Thesis | Konrads Trojanerkrieg und Gottfrieds Tristan. Vorstudien zum Gotischen Stil in der Dichtung |
Doctoral advisor | Friedrich Ranke |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Germanic philology |
Sub-discipline |
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Institutions |
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Notable students | |
Main interests |
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Notable works |
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Dennis Howard Green
Early life and education
Dennis Howard Green was born in Bournemouth, England, on 26 June 1922, the son of Herbert Maurice Green and Agnes Edith Flemming.[1][2] Just before World War II, at the age of eighteen, Green enrolled at Trinity College, Cambridge to study German.[3]
During the war, Green temporarily abandoned his studies to serve in the Royal Tank Regiment, where he rose to the rank of major and participated in the Normandy landings. During this time it is probable that he was a member of British intelligence. During the war, Green was once arrested for having spoken Dutch with a German accent, and in May 1945, he organised a military transport to Halle to enable him to acquire a complete set of Niemeyer medieval texts in exchange for rations. The discipline and order which Green became accustomed to in the military would become key characteristics of his future career.[4]
Returning to his studies at Cambridge after the war, Green gained his
Early career
Green was Lecturer in German at the University of St Andrews from 1949 to 1950. He was elected to a Research Fellowship at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1949, which he continued to hold for the rest of his life.[8] Green gained an M.A. at Cambridge in 1950, and was University Lecturer in German at Cambridge from 1950 to 1966.[1][6]
A
Green's The Carolingian Lord (1965) was a
Schröder Professor of German
In 1979 Green was elected Schröder Professor of German at Cambridge, succeeding Leonard Wilson Forster. He ran his Department of German with a firm hand, but was known as a brilliant teacher for those who were able to keep up with his pace.[10] Among his more notable students was David Yeandle.[5]
Combined with his duties at Cambridge, Green was a productive writer. In 1975, he published all of the twenty book reviews for the Modern Language Review, which subsequently gave rise to Lex Green, whereby the editors of this journal were limited to permitting the publication of three reviews per person a year.[11]
In his Approaches to Wolfram von Eschenbach (1978), which he wrote with his colleague
Green was one of few medieval Germanists who were thoroughly acquainted with both Medieval German and
Retirement from Cambridge
Green retired from Cambridge in 1989, and was elected a
In 1998, Green returned to his scholarly roots by publishing
Green was a member of several learned societies, including Modern Humanities Research Association and the International Association for Germanic Studies (IVG), of which he at one point served as Vice-President.[10] He was a founding member of an interdisciplinary group of scholars which met annually in San Marino to discuss the Germanic peoples and languages, and he edited a collection of essays by this group published in 2003.[5]
Green continued writing books and book reviews well into his 80s. His monographs from this time, such as The Beginnings of Medieval Romance: fact and fiction 1150–1220 (2002) and Women Readers in the Middle Ages (2007), covered topics recently made relevant by critical theory, such as reading, listening, orality, literacy and the role of women.[10][15]
Death and legacy
Green died on 5 December 2008. His final monograph, Women and marriage in German medieval romance (2009), which he had completed a few weeks before his death, was published posthumously by Cambridge University Press. At the time of his death, Green was working on a draft for a book on authorship in medieval literature.[10]
For more than half a century, Green was one of the most distinguished scholars of Cambridge, and he has been described as one of the last representatives of the so-called Cambridge tradition, dating back to the nineteenth century, in which the study of literature proceeded from philology and scholars of literature were thoroughly trained in
After his death the D. H. Green Fund was established at the University of Cambridge "for the encouragement of medieval German studies".[17]
Personal life
Green married Dorothy Warren in 1947. They had one daughter, and divorced in 1972. On 17 November 1972 he married Margaret Parry, who died in 1997. In 2001 Green married Sarah Redpath.[8] A man of great wanderlust, Green made many exotic journeys during his life, including travelling the Silk Road and Machu Picchu.[6]
See also
- Brian O. Murdoch
- Winfred P. Lehmann
- Hermann Reichert
- Otto Höfler
- Georg Baesecke
- Jan de Vries (philologist)
Selected works
- Green, D.H. (1965). The Carolingian lord : semantic studies on four Old High German words: balder, frô, truhtin, hêrro. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- ———— (1966). The Millstätter Exodus : a crusading epic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Green, D.H.; Johnson, L.P (1978). Approaches to Wolfram von Eschenbach : five essays. Bern: Peter Lang. ISBN 3261029080.
- Green, D.H. (1979). Irony in the medieval romance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521224586.
- ———— (1982). The art of recognition in Wolfram's Parzival. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521245001.
- ———— (1994). Medieval listening and reading : the primary reception of German literature 800-1300. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521444934.
- ———— (1998). ISBN 0521471346.
- ———— (2002). The beginnings of medieval romance : fact and fiction, 1150-1220. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521813999.
- ———— (2007). Women readers in the Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521879422.
- ———— (2009). Women and marriage in German medieval romance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521513357.
References
- ^ a b c d Contemporary Authors. 22 May 2001.
- ^ Who's Who.
- ^ Palmer 2009, p. 119.
- ^ Paulin 2009, pp. 117–118.
- ^ a b c Palmer 2009, p. 120.
- ^ a b c d Paulin 2009, p. 118.
- ^ a b Palmer 2009, pp. 120–121.
- ^ a b c Paulin 2008.
- ^ a b Paulin 2009, p. 117.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Paulin 2009, pp. 118–119.
- ^ a b Palmer 2009, p. 122.
- ^ a b Palmer 2009, p. 124.
- ^ a b c Palmer 2009, p. 123.
- ^ a b Palmer 2009, p. 125.
- ^ Palmer 2009, pp. 123–124.
- ^ Palmer 2009, p. 121.
- ^ University of Cambridge 2021.
Sources
- "Dennis Howard Green". Contemporary Authors. Gale. 22 May 2001. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
- Palmer, Nigel (9 May 2009). "Memorial for Dennis Howard Green". Trinity College Cambridge Annual Record. Trinity College, Cambridge: 119–125. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
- Paulin, Roger (18 December 2008). "Professor Dennis Green". The Independent.
- Paulin, Roger (2009). "Professor Dennis Howard Green". Trinity College Cambridge Annual Record. Trinity College, Cambridge: 117–119. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
- University of Cambridge (2021). "Statutes and Ordinances. Chapter XII Trusts" (PDF). p. 871. Retrieved 21 August 2022.
- "Green, Prof. Dennis Howard". ISBN 978-0-19-954089-1. Retrieved 4 October 2020.