Yakov Malkiel papers, 1882-1998,, bulk , bulk 1942-1992

Summary

Creators:

Malkiel, Yakov, 1914- Lida de Malkiel, María Rosa

Abstract:

The papers of Yakov Malkiel provide an overview of his career as a professor, author, editor and researcher. The collection, spanning the years from 1882 to 1998, with the bulk from 1942 to 1992, contains correspondence, teaching files, interviews, lectures, manuscript drafts, reprints of journal articles, research materials and notes, profession affiliation files, awards, family papers and photographs. The collection also includes the papers of María Rosa Lida de Malkiel, consisting of correspondence, manuscript drafts, offprints of postumously published works, teaching materials, diaries, course notebooks, research notes, and personal miscellany. Although the majority of the collection is in English, portions of correspondence and writings are in Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Russian with a small number in other languages. Malkiel's personal annotations are included throughout the collection.

Extent:

Number of containers: 34 cartons, 61 boxes, 1 oversize box, 1 oversize folder Linear feet: 67.4

Language:

Collection materials are in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Russian.

Background

Scope and content:

The papers of Yakov Malkiel provide an overview of his career as a professor, author, editor and researcher. The collection, spanning the years from 1882 to 1998, with the bulk from 1942 to 1992, contains correspondence, teaching files, interviews, lectures, manuscript drafts, reprints of journal articles, research materials and notes, professional affiliation files, awards, family papers and photographs. The collection also includes the papers of María Rosa Lida de Malkiel, consisting of correspondence, manuscript drafts, offprints of postumously published works, teaching materials, diaries, course notebooks, research notes, and personal miscellany. Although the majority of the collection is in English, portions of correspondence and writings are in Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Russian with a small number in other languages. Malkiel's personal annotations are included throughout the collection.

Malkiel's extensive correspondence files along with his teaching files reflect his broad circle of academic colleagues and friends both nationally and internationally. His career at the University of California, Berkeley, where he served as a faculty member from 1942 until his retirement, forms the bulk of his teaching files in the Departments of Spanish and Portuguese, Linguistics, Group in Romance Philology, and the Graduate Division. Also included are materials relating to Romance Philology, a leading scholarly journal, which Malkiel founded in 1946 and served as editor-in-chief for many years.

Malkiel's prodigious quantity of writings, primarily represented by manuscript drafts and reprints, exemplify his scholarly endeavors. Early in his career, Malkiel focused on historical lexicology of Hispano-Romance with emphasis on etymology, word history, word-formation and derivational problems. In later years, Malkiel explored related domains in other Romance languages, diachronic phonology and morphology as well as the historiography of Romance and general linguistics. The collection contains Malkiels published and unpublished works including several books, hundreds of scholarly articles, reviews, articles relating to María Rosa Lida de Malkiel's writings, necrologies, and miscellaneous short pieces. Among his best-known books are Etymological Dictionaries: A Tentative Typology (1976) and From Particular to General Linguistics: Selected Essays, 1965-1978 (1983).

Professional activities are represented in the collection with his consultation correspondence, information relating to his participation in professional organizations, and the honorary degrees, fellowships, and citations he received during his distinguished career.

Malkiel's personal and family papers provide some insight into the critical period in history when his Jewish family fled civil war in Russia and the onset of World War II in Germany. The majority of early correspondence is in the Russian language to his mother, Claire, from relatives and friends. Malkiel's early correspondence is with his mother while he was attending the University, his teachers, relatives, and friends. The later correspondence includes letters with María Rosa Lida during their courtship and after their marriage when either Malkiel or she was away from their home in Berkeley. He also communicated regularly with María Rosa's brothers, Raimundo and Emilio. Malkiel is sometimes referred to as Jacques, Yasha, Yakob, or Jacob. There are biographical materials and photographs as well as school certificates, degrees, and class notes from the gymnasium in Berlin from his earlier years.

Malkiel devoted several years after the untimely death of his wife, María Rosa Lida de Malkiel, to postumously complete, edit and publish many of her writings. She was a fellow scholar from Argentina focusing her research and teaching on Spanish literature as well as Greek language and literature. Her papers primarily consist of correspondence with colleagues, manuscript drafts, reprints, research notes and materials related to her writings, and specifically her major works; Two Spanish Masterpieces: "The Book of Good Love" and "The Celestina" (1961) and La originalidad artística de "La Celestina" (1962). The collection also includes María Rosa Lida de Malkiel's personal papers which consist of biographical materials; letters of condolences; documents; diaries; correspondence with her family, particularly with her brothers, Emilio and Raimundo; school documents and course materials, and photographs.

Biographical / historical:

Yakov Malkiel was born into an intellectual Jewish family in Kiev in 1914, but civil war in Russia forced the family to move to Berlin. By the time he was of college age, Germany was becoming an increasingly difficult place for Jews. He had to overcome serious difficulties before he was admitted into Berlin's Friedrich-Wilhelms Universität, where in 1938 he received his Ph.D. magna cum laude, specializing in romance linguistics. The worsening situation for Jews in Germ,any made his safety tenuous, and he left soon after receiving his degree. After emigrating with his parents to the United States in 1940, he worked briefly in Wyoming and then joined the University of California, Berkeley faculty in 1942, first as lecturer, then as an Assistant Professor of Spanish and Portuguese, and eventually as Professor of Romance Philology. He participated in the 1952 founding of the Department of Linguistics, and in 1965 he became a member of the department, where he taught until his retirement.

In 1948, Malkiel married María Rosa Lida, a brilliant fellow scholar from Argentina, who from then on published under her married name, María Rosa Lida de Malkiel. After her untimely death in 1962, he spent several years devoting hiimself to the completion of her unpublished works, and for the rest of his life he kept her memory alive in numerous publications of his own.

Malkiel is the author of more than a dozen books and literally hundreds of articles, and is the editor or co-editor of half a dozen other books. His list of publications is itself of monograph length: in 1987, his colleagues and students prepared with him and for him his Autobibliography, a book listing 822 of his works with annotations; it was published by the University of California Press as a special issue of Romance Philology. His pubications include works on historical linguistics, the history of linguistics, etymology, linguistic typology, and Romance linguistics. Among his best-known books are Etymology Dictionaries: A Tentative Typology (1976) and From Particular to General Linguistics: Selected Essays, 1965-1978 (1983). An astounding polyglot, he pubished in English, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, and Spanish, and lectured as well in Russian. In 1946 he founded Romance Philology, a highly respected and thriving journal of international stature, which he served as editor-in-chief for many years. He continued to publish until failing eyesight brought his research to a halt.

Malkiel received many awards and honors in his distinguised career, including three Guggenheim Awards. He was awarded honorary degrees by seven universities: Chicago (1966), Illinois (1969), Paris (1983), the Free University of Berlin (1983), Georgetown (1987), Oxford (1989), and Salamanca (1994), where he was the first Jew to be so honored since the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492.

In 1998, Malkiel died of a heart attack at the age of 83.

(from memorial in collection: "Yakov Malkiel, Professor Emeritus of Linguistics, 1914-1998")

Acquisition information:

The Yakov Malkiel Papers were given to The Bancroft Library by Professor Malkiel on August 31, 1990. Additions were made on May 26, 1995.

Physical location:

Many of the Bancroft Library collections are stored offsite and advance notice may be required for use. For current information on the location of these materials, please consult the library's online catalog.

Location of this collection:

UC Berkeley, Bancroft Library

University of California, Berkeley, The Bancroft Library

Berkeley, CA 94720-6000, US

Contact:

510-642-6481

bancref-library@berkeley.edu

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