Landscapes of the Mabinogi
Old College
15 May 2008
Landscapes of the Mabinogi
Dr John Bollard, Executive Editor of the African American National Biography at Harvard University, and Editorial Director of the Native American Biography Project, will be at Aberystwyth University on Friday 23 May to deliver an illustrated lecture on the ‘Landscapes of the Mabinogi'.
The lecture, which is being organised by the Department of Welsh, takes place in the Seddon Room, Old College at 5.00pm and will be followed by a reception.
Dr Bollard's articles on the structure of The Mabinogi are recognized as seminal studies that broke new ground in our understanding of this Welsh classic. Two volumes of translations, with stunning landscape photographs by Anthony Griffiths of Aberystwyth, have been published recently to wide acclaim by Gomer Press: The Mabinogi: Legend and Landscape of Wales (2006) and Companion Tales to the Mabinogi (2007).
Dr Bollard received a BA from the University of Rochester in New York, after which an interest in medieval literature, especially early Arthurian tradition, brought him to the Department of Welsh, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, where he took an MA in Medieval Welsh Language and Literature. His doctorate from the University of Leeds was awarded for a comparative study of Middle English and Welsh Arthurian narrative.
As well as pursuing a career as a lexicographer and editor in western Massachusetts, Dr. Bollard has taught courses in Medieval Welsh literature at the University of Massachusetts, the University of Connecticut, and Yale University, as well as courses in English at Smith College and Mount Holyoke College, and he has lectured widely on Medieval Welsh literature and history. He has also published translations of early Welsh Arthurian poetry, the romance of Peredur, the prophetic poetry of Myrddin (Merlin), and Chaucer's Wife of Bath’s Tale.
Dr Bollard's wife, the poet Margaret Lloyd, is also visiting Wales this spring: her latest volume is A Moment in the Field: Voices from Arthurian Legend.
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