E. V. Gordon

Eric Valentine Gordon (1896–1938) was a philologist, known as an editor of medieval Germanic texts and a teacher of medieval Germanic languages at the University of Leeds and the University of Manchester.^[1]

Early life

Gordon was born on Valentine's Day, 1896, in Salmon Arm, British Columbia; his mother was a Presbyterian Scot and a teacher.^[2]

He was educated at Victoria College, British Columbia and McGill University. In 1915 he was one of the eight Canadian Rhodes Scholars, in his case studying at University College, Oxford. He joined the Canadian Field Artillery in 1916 but was discharged for medical reasons. He worked for the rest of the First World War for the Ministries of National Service and of Food.

Returning to Oxford in 1919, Gordon took a second-class BA in 1920, partly under the tutelage of J. R. R. Tolkien. He began a B Litt degree at Oxford, but abandoned it upon his appointment to the English Department at the University of Leeds in 1922.

University of Leeds

Gordon worked at Leeds from 1922 to 1931, introducing first Old Norse and later modern Icelandic to the curriculum. While at Leeds, he wrote his An Introduction to Old Norse (first published 1927) and collaborated with Tolkien, who worked at Leeds from 1920 to 1925, particularly on their edition of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (first published 1925). After Gordon arrived at Leeds, Tolkien wrote in his diary "Eric Valentine Gordon has come and got firmly established and is my devoted friend and pal."^[3]

Gordon was promoted to a Professorship of English Language in 1926 following Tolkien's departure and oversaw the University Library's acquisition of the library of Bogi Thorarensen Melsteð, establishing the library as one of the world's best Icelandic collections. Accordingly, for his services to Icelandic culture, Gordon was made a Knight of the Royal Icelandic Order of the Falcon in 1930.^[4]

With Tolkien, Gordon also began the Viking Club. In this club they would read Old Icelandic sagas (and drink beer) with students and faculty, and invent original Anglo-Saxon songs. A collection of these was privately published as the book Songs for the Philologists. Most of the printed editions were destroyed in a fire and only 14 or so books are said to exist.^[5] In 2014, the estate of Gordon's eldest daughter Bridget sold a collection of letters written variously to E. V. Gordon and his wife Ida by J. R. R. Tolkien to the Brotherton Library of the University of Leeds.^[6]

Gordon was active in the Yorkshire Dialect Society. On Gordon's departure from Leeds, he was succeeded by Bruce Dickins. Among Gordon's best Leeds students were the scholars Albert Hugh Smith, J.A. Thompson, the translator of Halldór Laxness's classic novel Independent People,^[7] and Ida Lilian Pickles,^[8] whom he married in 1930. Together they had four children (the eldest of whom, Bridget Mackenzie, went on to lecture in Old Norse at Glasgow University).

University of Manchester, and death

In 1931, Gordon was made Smith Professor of English Language and Germanic Philology at the University of Manchester where his research focused on Old and Middle English. Among his students was A. R. Taylor, who later succeeded Gordon at Leeds.^[9] He died unexpectedly in 1938 of complications following an operation to remove gallstones. After his death, Gordon's widow Ida took on a number of his teaching duties at Manchester, finishing and posthumously publishing a number of his works, before retiring in 1968.

Select bibliography and archives

• 1925 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, co-edited with J. R. R. Tolkien, Oxford University Press, 211 pp.; Revised edition 1967, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 232 pp.
• 1927 An Introduction to Old Norse, Revised edition 1956, revised by A. R. Taylor; Reprinted 1981, Oxford University Press, USA; 2nd edition
• 1936 Songs for the Philologists, with J. R. R. Tolkien et al.
• 1937 The Battle of Maldon
• 1953 Pearl
• 2014 Tolkien-Gordon Collection, Leeds University MS 1952

See also

• Songs for the Philologists
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
• Philology
• J. R. R. Tolkien
• An Introduction to Old Norse
• Archival material at Leeds University Library

References