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Volume 16, Issue 1 May 1994
FIVE ITEMS -- S U M M A R Y --
(1) ROBERT MINHINNICK
Welsh Life Today:
Language, Politics, Environmentalism
5:00 p.m.
Thursday, May 5th
344 Campbell Hall
[Wheelchair Accessible]
(2) BRANWEN PLAY READING
Maude Fife Room
315 Wheeler Hall
May 11, 1993
5:30 p.m.
[Wheelchair Accessible]
(3) Andrew O'Hehir's
Cousin Martin
at Fort Mason Center
Building B
San Francisco
through Sunday, May 8
(4) Celtic Studies T-Shirts
Now on Sale!
(5) Faculty Profile:
Professor Daniel Melia
ROBERT MINHINNICK
Welsh Poet, Writer, and Environmentalist
Winner of 1993 Welsh Book Award for
*Watching the Fire Eater*
will speak on
Welsh Life Today:
Language, Politics, Environmentalism
5:00 p.m.
Thursday, May 5th
344 Campbell Hall
[Wheelchair Accessible]
===========================================
BRANWEN PLAY READING
Maude Fife Room
315 Wheeler Hall
May 11, 1993
5:30 p.m.
In Fall semester 1992, some of Professor Kathryn Klar's Welsh students began reading Branwen, a one-act play by Saunders Lewis. It is based on the story from the Mabinogi, but it fills in the gaps left by the passage of centuries, gaps of motivation and meaning. In the original story, we do not know why Efnisien reacts so violently to Branwen's marriage, nor do we know how Branwen herself feels about the whole thing. There are all the familiar characters as well as new ones invented by Lewis, such as Trostan, the pompous voice of comic relief.
Saunders Lewis firmly yanked the story out of myth and planted it in the modern world ... and some of his characters' motives may have been too modern. This play has never before (to our knowledge) been translated, perhaps because of Lewis's frank usage of a taboo subject from the very first lines. Or it could be that the play is just too difficult--it is full of non-sequiturs and parallel monologues within conversations. We frequently consulted Tad (that is, Father) Dorian, a native speaker studying at the Graduate Theological Union, and he confirmed that yes, it really is that convoluted or no, there really is no way to tell what she's referring to in that line. And so, after two years of working and reworking the text, we have turned it into good colloquial American English. Alas, we were unable to find any way to satisfactorily translate the persistent puns on march/meirch, merch/moch/ traed, moch/moch M n: horse/horses/ girl/pigs/utter confusion/people (or pigs) of Anglesey.
The translation was made by Heather Jones, David Librik, Antone Minard, Rebecca Patrascu, Anne Many, and Burke Edwards, with guidance from Professor Klar and Tad Dorian.
~ Antone Minard
Reception to Follow in the English Lounge
CELTIC STUDIES T-SHIRTS
NOW ON SALE!
Styles: Black with White Lettering
White with Black Lettering
Sizes: M, L, XL
Price: $13.00
To order, send a check to:
Celtic Colloquium
301 Campbell Hall
U.C. Berkeley
Berkeley, California 94720
FACULTY PROFILE:
PROFESSOR DANIEL MELIA
Here at Celtic Studies we consider ourselves a pretty fantastic department. Where else could you possibly learn so much arcane knowledge? One thing that makes our department so dynamic and innovative is our wonderful faculty. So, in tribute, and to clear up any departmental rumors, we at the Celtic Colloquium we would like to honor our faculty by initiating a series called "Faculty Profiles." We plan to interview the teachers responsible for furthering our knowledge in the field. I began by entering the bowels of the Dwinelle labyrinth to talk to the man some have called "Mr. Celtic Studies," Prof. Daniel F. Melia.
Prof. Melia spent his undergraduate career at Harvard, where he majored in English. His interest in Celtic Studies started, innocently enough, in his senior year when he was looking for a class to fulfill a Literature-Before-1600 requirement. As fate would have it, someone told him about a "gut" class on Native Irish Literature. Prof. Melia chuckled as he remembered that he walked into the class, saw "a bunch of beefy necks" and knew he was in the right place. The subject interested him more than he expected, and he decided to investigate the Celtic Studies graduate program at Harvard. He spent most of his graduate years there, learning "lots of dead languages," including Old Irish and Old Norse. For one year he went abroad to Ireland, and learned modern Irish. What he seems to remember most vividly, though, is "living very well for a grad. student" on a traveling fellowship.
In 1972, Prof. Melia was hired by the Rhetoric Department as an expert in oral literature. Some people, he says, thought oral literature had to do with reading texts out loud, and were "shocked and horrified" when they found out what it really is. In addition to chairing the Celtic Studies Program, Prof. Melia is continuing the traditional cooperation between these fields by chairing the Scandinavian Department as well. Thus history always repeats itself, for during his time at Harvard the Celtic and Scandinavian scholars traditionally hobnobbed together. Many who have taken Celtic 70 ("World of the Celts") will be startled to discover that Prof. Melia is not also affiliated with the Linguistics Department. He just can't stop himself from discussing minimal pairs and cognates in teaching the history of the Celts.
Among Prof. Melia's first students of Welsh at Berkeley were Kathryn Klar and Annalee Rejhon, who now comprise the Welsh side of the Celtic Studies faculty.
He has seen many changes since his first years here; for instance, "they mow the lawns more regularly now," and the general quality of student preparation has improved. One thing that has not changed, however, is the Administration's consistent support of his desire to teach Celtic subjects, a freedom that might not have been allowed at some other colleges. "No one's going to object if you want to work too hard here," he chortled.
~ Diane Moffit
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