University of Virginia Library

This letter has three purposes. It will serve
as a brief interim report of activities during
my Sesquicentennial Associateship, fall 1972;
as a means of expressing my gratitude to the
University; and as a letter of resignation from
the faculty of the University of Virginia.

On 26 September I arrived in Edinburgh.
My first task was to make some stylistic
revisions in an article accepted for
publication.

Classes began on 9 October, when
Professor Jackson kindly informed me of my
appointment as Postdoctoral Fellow in the
Celtic Department. After several conferences
with him, I decided that the book which I
would write should be a monograph on the
great Irish epic, The Cattle Raid of Cooley,
with a focus on the hero, Cu Chulainn.

In the course of my researches, I have
decided also to revise an article based on my
1967 Harvard dissertation. This I hope to
expand later into another book, on Chretien
de Troyes' Yvain.

It is, however, rather unfortunate that my
original idea–to return to the University of
Virginia and teach some Celtic language and
literature, thus bringing to my students fruits
of all this labor–will not be realized.

After five years of commitment to the
ideals of quality at the University of Virginia,
I find it necessary to resign.

I want you to know, sir, that in no way do
I feel bitter towards the University of Virginia
or towards its administration, or even towards
Charlottesville. All in all, I was well treated by
them. And, by means of the Faculty Research
Committee and for other reasons, I was able,
since 1967 (when I arrived), to complete three
and one-third books, 14 articles and
over a dozen book reviews.

While I was charged with serious
shortcomings by your department, whose
decision of December 1971 it was not to
propose my candidacy to the faculty for
promotion, I was heartened to learn, on the
one hand, that in their view, I had
contributed somehow in the area of service to
the University, even though in their view I
had failed as a scholar and as a teacher. The
effect of that decision, traumatic for me at
first, was countered by the good news from
Provost Shannon about the Sesquicentennial
Associateship.

In a way, I regret not having contested my
rejection by the French department for,
based on sample opinions outside the
department, my scholarship is satisfactory
and, based on student evaluations, my
teaching is adequate. But it is said that at
home no man is a prophet.

Of course I also regret having to leave my
many friends and students and begin all over
again.

In any case, I hereby tender my
resignation from the University of Virginia, to
take effect 1 February 1973.