From left to right: John W. Wevers, Edward N. Burstynsky, Peter A. Reich, J. K. (Jack) Chambers, Neville E. Collinge, Ronald Wardhaugh.
Professor John W. Wevers, who died on Friday, July 23 at 91, was integrally involved in the founding of Linguistics at the University of Toronto. While his scholarly and administrative focus was on Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, in which he was long-time Chair and a renowned scholar, it is probably fair to say that without his influence Linguistics might not have been instituted here in the first place, and without his leadership in the early years it might not have survived.
In 1967, John was a member of the consortium of scholars that succeeded in gaining institutional recognition for the Centre for Linguistic Studies. They had lobbied for linguistics at the University of Toronto for at least four years. Martin Joos from the University of Wisconsin was brought in as Director. Graduate faculty were seconded from various departments to teach courses. In the next three years, new faculty were hired with cross-appointments to the Linguistic Centre.
In the consortium, John was probably the best integrated into the Canadian linguistics community. He was active in the Canadian Linguistics Association (which had been founded in 1954). He edited the Canadian Journal of Linguistics for seven years, starting in 1964.
John's greatest service to Linguistics or perhaps (as he might have put it) his greatest sacrifice for it came in 1970–71, when he served as Acting Director for the Centre for Linguistic Studies. It was not his choice. True to the temper of the times, a "generation gap" festered in the Centre. Some of the younger linguists were rankled by the autocratic manner of Professor Joos, and the formalities that Joos had imposed on the department made it easy to turn it into a crisis. In a long, loud department meeting in (I think) April 1970, someone moved lack of confidence, the motion passed, and Joos resigned.
In the aftermath, the Dean importuned John Wevers to serve as Acting Director for one year. He was reluctant, and I am certain he finally accepted because he knew that if the rancour persisted the Centre would be dissolved. John was not one for tolerating rancour. He imposed a one-hour limit on our monthly meetings, and made it clear that he meant to enforce it. Decisions were made by consensus (as they are to this day). There were still vituperative moments, with raised voices and posturing, but none of them took place within earshot of John Wevers.
Linguistics survived. John went back to Near Eastern Studies and thereafter linguistics occupied less of his time. For a few years, he regularly made an appearance at term-end parties in the department. In 2004, he made a rare appearance at the annual meetings of the Canadian Linguistics Association to participate in a panel discussion of former CJL editors. He was guest of honour at our 25th anniversary festivities in 1993. That's where the photograph of chairs (see below) was taken; John Wevers is on the left. RIP.
Jack Chambers
From left to right: John W. Wevers, Edward N. Burstynsky, Peter A. Reich, J. K. (Jack) Chambers, Neville E. Collinge, Ronald Wardhaugh.
Sadly, on July 23, Professor Emeritus John William Wevers, of the University of Toronto, passed away at the age of 91. Prof. Wevers was struck by a cerebral hemorrhage in the Toronto nursing home where he had lived since July 2008. A memorial service will be held in Toronto on Sept. 11.
During his long tenure at the University of Toronto, Prof. Wevers had brought the Department of Near Eastern Studies (now merged into the Dept. of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations) to unprecedented complement and quality; he himself became an undisputed master of Septuagint Studies during the last decades of the 20th century, having produced the critical edition of the whole Greek Pentateuch for the Göttingen Septuaginta Unternehmen, and added further text-critical studies, translations, and commentaries to each of the five main volumes of this edition. Prof. Wevers's knowledge and contribution extended to several other languages; he had, in particular, made significant contributions to Classical Hebrew scholarship, as well as vigorously promoting its study at the University of Toronto.
Sizable autobiographical sketches are expected to come out, and will be announced on the web site of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies when available.
Paul E. Dion
Professor Emeritus, University of Toronto
Link to the notice that appeared in the Globe and Mail, Saturday July 31, 2010.
"The eminent J. W. Wevers has given us the ripest fruit of his unequaled scholarship. The greater part of his career has been devoted to the Pentateuch in Greek; and from the time that his critical edition of Genesis launched the series Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum (Göttingen, 1974), he was recognized as the supreme authority. If ever anyone comes along to improve upon Wevers' work, it will only be done by digesting it fully."
From a review in the Journal of the American Oriental Society, October 2001, by Saul Levin of JOHN WILLIAM WEVERS. Notes on the Greek Text of Numbers (SBL Septuagint and Cognate Studies Series, vol. 46). Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998. Pp. xlviii + 643.
August 2, 2010