Jean Weisgerber, the internationally-acclaimed Belgian comparatist who worked in close collaboration with the ICLA for many years, passed away on December 8, 2013. Born in Brussels in 1924, he completed a doctoral thesis on W.H. Auden in 1951 at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, where he became Professor of Dutch and Comparative literature in 1957. His remarkable teaching talents inspired generations of students, including this writer. Jean Weisgerber then rapidly established himself as an authority on Flemish literature, in particular on the work of Hugo Claus. In 1967, he became a member of the Royal Academy of Dutch Language and Literature (Koninglijke Academie voor Nederlandse Taal- en Letterkunde). In 1994, the Flemish Catholic University of Louvain (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) awarded him an honorary doctorate. Early on in his career, in the 1960s, he served as Secretary General of the ICLA. He presided the Association’s Coordinating Committee on the Comparative History of Literatures in European Languages in the late 1980s. He also chaired ICLA’s nominating committee in the early 1990s. In the field of comparative literature, his work focused primarily on magical realism, as reflected in his seminal edited collection Le Réalisme magique: roman, peinture et cinema (1987). He was also widely regarded as an expert on avant-garde literary movements. He edited two volumes on this topic in the ICLA series on the Comparative History of Literatures in European Languages, entitled Les avant-gardes littéraires au XXème siècle (1984). He also felt deeply interested in intertextual studies, which he reconceptualized in his Faulkner and Dostoevsky: Influence and Confluence (1974; first published in French). Later in his career, he undertook research on the rococo style in  literature and the arts. His book, Le Rococo: beaux-arts et littérature is a major contribution to this field of study (2001). Even as he advanced in age, Jean Weisgerber never ceased to broaden the scope of his research. After turning 80, he wrote a series of monographs on thoroughly new topics, which I was privileged to publish in my “New Comparative Poetics” series. The fourth of these monographs, L’Épée, la pomme et le mouchoir. Essai sur les objets dans la tragédie européenne du XVIIème siècle (2009) turned out to be his last book. A few days before his death, a new French version of his earlier book on Faulkner and Dostovesky was republished in Brussels. I cannot imagine a more fitting homage for such an admirable and versatile comparatist as Jean Weisgerber.

Marc Maufort

Université Libre de Bruxelles

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