Collection context
Summary
- Title:
- J. Martin Evans papers
- Dates:
- 1943-2011
- Creators:
- Evans, J. Martin (John Martin)
- Extent:
- 15 Linear Feet and 216 megabytes
- Language:
- Undetermined .
- Preferred citation:
-
[identification of item], J. Martin Evans Papers (SC1163). Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, Calif.
Background
- Biographical / historical:
-
John Martin Evans was born in Cardiff, Wales, on Feb. 2, 1935. After a two-year stint working in military intelligence for the Royal Air Force from 1953 to 1955, Evans attended Oxford, where he received his BA in 1958 from Jesus College, and his MA and DPhil from Merton College in 1963. At Oxford, his thesis advisor was Dame Helen Gardner, the doyenne of 17th-century studies. Under her guidance, he began a lifelong career in Milton studies. Gardner was influential in other ways: She convinced Evans to apply to Stanford when the academic job market in Britain was so poor that 250 scholars with doctorates in English were competing for two university positions.
Evans was offered the job, and immediately flew to Switzerland and proposed to Mariella Lafranchi, whom he had met at Oxford. He didn't know half her family had emigrated to California decades before; Evans moved into a large extended family in the United States and never looked back.
In 2004, the Milton Society of America named him as a prestigious "honored scholar" for lifetime achievement.
He hosted a 400th birthday party for John Milton in 2008, with a marathon reading of Paradise Lost – some called it a "Martinfest." The event reunited many of his former students from across the United States and Canada.
At his death, he was in his 50th year of teaching at Stanford. He held many awards for his teaching and service, including the Bing Award for teaching (1992), the Richard W. Lyman Award (1990) and the Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching (1984). The 1987 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching cited "the magnificence of his teaching at all levels of the department curriculum" and "the passion about literature that infuses all his teaching and writing."
Evans was associate dean of the School of Humanities and Sciences (1977-81), director of undergraduate studies (1983-86) and chair of the English Department (1988-91). He was named the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor in 2002.
He was a champion of the humanities, and passionate in their defense: "The humanist's material is not a mysterious concatenation of natural phenomena or a mass of raw statistical data waiting to be given significance by the ordering mind of the analyst," he wrote in a 2009 article in Stanford magazine.
Evans was survived by his wife of almost 50 years, Mariella Evans of Stanford; his daughter Jessica Evans, his son-in-law Yung Duong and grandson, Owen Evans-Duong, all of Oakland; and his daughter Joanna Evans and son-in-law David Harris of Ojai, Calif.
Cynthia Haven http://news.stanford.edu/news/2013/february/martin-evans-obit-021513.html
- Physical location:
- Special Collections and University Archives materials are stored offsite and must be paged 48 hours in advance. For more information on paging collections, see the department's website: http://library.stanford.edu/spc.
- Rules or conventions:
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Indexed terms
About this collection guide
- Date Encoded:
- This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on 2024-10-28 12:44:58 -0700 .
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
Box 1 and 4 of ARCH-2022-009 are restricted.
Files in Series 6. Computer Files are open for research but are only available through the media cart (dedicated offline computers) in the Special Collections and University Archives reading room. In order to access this content, please contact specialcollections@stanford.edu.
The materials are otherwise open for research use. Audio-visual materials are not available in original format, and must be reformatted to a digital use copy.
- Terms of access:
-
All requests to reproduce, publish, quote from, or otherwise use collection materials must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, California 94305-6064. Consent is given on behalf of Special Collections as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission from the copyright owner. Such permission must be obtained from the copyright owner, heir(s) or assigns. See: http://library.stanford.edu/depts/spc/pubserv/permissions.html.
Restrictions also apply to digital representations of the original materials. Use of digital files is restricted to research and educational purposes.
- Preferred citation:
-
[identification of item], J. Martin Evans Papers (SC1163). Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, Calif.
- Location of this collection:
-
Stanford University Archives, Green Library557 Escondido MallStanford, CA 94305-6064, US
- Contact:
- (650) 725-1022