Bernard Cerquiglini

Bernard Cerquiglini

Bernard Cerquiglini (born April 8, 1947 in Lyon ) is a French linguist .

Bernard Cerquiglini is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Paris VII . He is director of the Institut national de la langue française . His publications and studies span a broad field of linguistic research, including critical studies of textual criticism .

In his polemical essay Éloge de la variant(1989) Cerquiglini argues that the formation of variants is a fundamental characteristic of the handwritten literature. Cerquiglini's main thesis is that variants and variance are central aspects of the medieval text and that for this reason editors of modern editions do not deal adequately with the texts if they see variance as something that needs to be eliminated. This book by Cerquiglini stimulated ›New Philology‹, whose work in turn led to a more differentiated view of variant versions of medieval texts and "to take greater account of the variant as an object of interpretation," said Christa Jansohn and Bodo Plachta in a foreword by 2005. In her review of the English edition of the work in 2001, Melinda Menzer was disappointed that Cerquiglini presented an exciting way in which medieval texts could be read, but that he did not show how variance actually produces meaning.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The English edition of Éloge de la variante was published in a translation by Betsy Wing as In praise of the variant: A critical history of philology by Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore 1999.
2. ↑ MJ Driscoll, " The words on the page: Thoughts on philology, old and new " (open access), in: Creating the medieval saga: Versions, variability, and editorial interpretations of Old Norse saga literature, edited by Judy Quinn & Emily Lethbridge. Syddansk Universitetsforlag, Odense 2010, pp. 85-102.
3. ↑ ^{a b} Melinda Menzer, In Praise of the Variant: A Critical History of Philology. ( Memento of the original from September 8, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (Review), Bryn Mawr Review of Comparative Literature , Volume 2, Number 2, Spring 2001 
4. ↑ Christa Jansohn and Bodo Plachta: "Foreword", in: Variants - Variants - Variantes . Edited by Christa Jansohn and Bodo Plachta. Editio / supplements; 22. Niemeyer, Tübingen 2005, ISBN 3-484-29522-8 , pp. 1-6.

Web links

Commons : Bernard Cerquiglini  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Bernard Cerquiglini (French)
• Melinda Menzer, In Praise of the Variant: A Critical History of Philology. (Review), Bryn Mawr Review of Comparative Literature , Volume 2, Number 2, Spring 2001, in English