Dear colleagues and fellow medievalists,

I am sorry to announce the death of Professor Alan Deyermond of Queen Mary, University of London. He passed away last Saturday, 19 September.

Alan's death is a great loss to the field of hispanomedievalism, where he was active for more than half a century, and his intellectual accomplishments scarcely need noting. His work touched practically all areas of medieval Spanish literature and he was as successful in reporting his research to specialised audiences as he was in presenting it in a form accessible to students in his lectures and textbooks.

His entire career was spent at the department of Hispanic Studies in Westfield College which was later to merge with Queen Mary College to form Queen Mary, University of London. Alan's service to the department and the College -from his arrival in 1955- was long and distinguished. He founded the Medieval Hispanic Research Seminar in 1967 and was his director until his retirement in 1997. The Seminar started as an series of meetings where  postgraduates could present and discuss their work but it soon changed. The audience  is made of medievalists from other colleges of the University London and the UK, as well as scholars  from overseas that may be passing through London, while papers are given by researchers at all stages in their careers. Now in its 42nd year, the Seminar has become the leading forum for Hispanic Medieval research in the United Kingdom and Alan's leadership helped forge its strong links with scholars abroad, in particular, Spain. He was also founding General Editor of the Papers of the Medieval Hispanic Research Seminar, a book series launched in 1995 that has published already some sixty volumes that include monographs, edited texts and collections of articles.

Alan's greatest contribution to the life of the department was his collegiality and support of colleagues. He will be greatly missed by all of us.

Yours,

Rosa Vidal


Dr Rosa Vidal Doval
Lecturer in Hispanic Studies
School of Languages, Linguistics and Film
Queen Mary, University of London