Michel Zink
Michel Zink (born May 5, 1945 in Issy-les-Moulineaux , Département Hauts-de-Seine ) is a French writer , philologist , Medievalist , Romance scholar and university professor , who was an external member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1997 and a member of the 2000 Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres and has been permanent secretary of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres since 2011 . In 2017 he also became a member of the Académie française.
Life
Studies, university lecturers and honors
Michel Zink is the son of the Germanist and poet Émile Georges Zink , who was awarded the Upper Rhine Culture Prize in 1977 , as well as his wife Marthe Cohn, and a brother of the historian and university professor Anne Zink . After attending the Lycée du Parc in Lyon and attending the preparatory class ( Classe préparatoire ), he himself began studying at the École normal supérieure (ENS Paris ) in 1964 , where he was the best in his class in 1967, where he obtained a license to teach Classical Philology ( Agrégation de lettres classiques ) . He then began his professional activity between 1968 and 1970 as a research assistant at the Sorbonne , the University of Paris , and in 1970 he received his doctorate (Doctorat de spécialité (3e cycle)) at the chair of Pierre Le Gentil with a thesis on the medieval lyrical genre the pastourelle . He then worked as a research assistant at the Faculty of Literature at the University of Tunis as part of the military cooperation with Tunisia . After his return, he was Maître-assistant at the University of Paris-Sorbonne (Paris IV) between 1972 and 1976 , during which time he completed his doctorate (Doctorat d'État) in 1975 with a thesis on the beginnings of the Roman vernacular .
In 1976, Zink took over a professorship at the Université Toulouse II - Le Mirail and taught there until 1987. In 1987 he received the prize of the International Association for French Studies (Association internationale des études françaises) . He was then professor at the University of Paris-Sorbonne (Paris IV) between 1987 and 1994, before he was professor and holder of the chair for French literature of the Middle Ages at the Collège de France from 1994 to 2016 . In addition, he held lectures as visiting professor at numerous foreign universities such as Yale University , University of California, Berkeley , University of Pennsylvania , Johns Hopkins University , Columbia University , Stanford University , Wesleyan University , University of Chicago , La Sapienza University , University of Naples Federico II , University of Konstanz , University of Santiago de Compostela , University of Geneva and the University of Zurich . In 1997 he received the gold medal of the Société Arts-Sciences-Lettres .
Michel Zink became a foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1997 and, in 2000, as successor to Félix Lecoy, a member of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres . In 2001 the Académie des jeux floraux in Toulouse awarded him the Liseron d'or . He also received honorary doctorates from the University of Sheffield in 2004 and from the University of Bucharest in 2011 . In 2007 he was honored with the Balzan Prize for his services to European literature in the Middle Ages . He has also been permanent secretary of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres since 2011, succeeding Jean Leclant .
Zink, who is in command of the Legion of Honor , the Ordre des Palmes Académiques and the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic , was elected a member of the Académie française on December 14, 2017 , where he succeeded René Girard in chair 37 (37e fauteuil) . On December 18, 2018, he gave the obligatory eulogy for his deceased predecessor René Girard.
Act as a writer and editor
In addition to his teaching activities, Michel Zink is the author and editor of numerous books. The vast majority of his books and most of the works that he wrote or edited in collaboration deal with the literature of the Middle Ages, especially poetry and religious literature, or more precisely with the religious ideas in literature and its consequences for literary Thinking and Aesthetics. In his works he dealt in particular with personalities such as Jordi de Sant Jordi , Jean Renart , Jules Cornu , Carlo Salvioni , Daniel Poirion and Guy Raynaud de Lage , but also with subjects such as Canso d'Antiocha , Historia Caroli Magni , Chanson de toile as well as Bilingual Alba of Fleury-sur-Loire .
Some of the symposia he organizes and the related volumes relate to general topics from literary criticism and literary theory. In the paperback series Le Livre de Poche published by the publisher Hachette Livre , he has been publishing Lettres gothiques since 1988 , in which works from the Middle Ages in the original French, Occitan or Latin text are juxtaposed with the translation in today's language. He also wrote short chronicles, which he presented under the title Bienvenue au Moyen Âge (“Welcome to the Middle Ages”) in the France Inter program of the public broadcaster Radio France , and which appeared in 2015 in an anthology. For the oratorio La Passion selon Marc - Une Passion après Auschwitz, performed in 2017, he transcribed the unabridged text of Chapters 14 and 15 of the Gospel of Mark in Old French from a Bible manuscript from the 13th century.
Publications
His works include:
- Les Dessins géométriques , Édition de la Grisière, 1971
- La Pastourelle. Poésie et folklore au Moyen Âge , dissertation, Éditions Bordas, 1972
- La Prédication en langue romane avant 1300 , Habilitation, Éditions Honoré Champion, 1976
- Belle. Essai sur les chansons de toile , Éditions Honoré Champion, 1978
- Roman rose et rose rouge. Le Roman de la Rose ou de Guillaume de Dole de Jean Renart , Les Belles Lettres, 1979
- Le Roman d'Apollonius de Tyr , Le Livre de Poche, 1982
- La Subjectivité littéraire , co-author, Presses Universitaires de France (PUF), 1985
- Rutebeuf. Œuvres complètes , Volume I, Éditions Classiques Garnier, 1989
- Rutebeuf. Œuvres complètes , Volume II, Éditions Classiques Garnier, 1990
- Le Moyen Âge. Littérature française , co-editor, PUF, 1990
- Littérature française du Moyen Âge , PUF, 1992
- Histoire européenne du roman médiéval. Esquisse et perspectives , co-author, PUF, 1992
- Dictionnaire des lettres françaises - Le Moyen Âge , editor, 1992
- Les Voix de la conscience. Parole du poète et parole de Dieu dans la littérature médiévale , Editions Paradigme, 1992
- Le Moyen Âge et ses chansons ou Un passé en trompe-l'œil , Éditions de Fallois, 1996
- Le Tiers d'amour. Un roman des troubadours , Éditions de Fallois, 1998
- Froissart et le temps , PUF, 1998
- Le Juggler de Notre-Dame. Contes chrétiens du Moyen Âge , Le Seuil / Plon, 1999
- Pages manuscrites de la littérature médiévale , co-author, Le Livre de poche, 1999
- Déodat ou la transparence. Un roman du Graal , Le Seuil / Plon, 2002
- Dictionnaire du Moyen Âge , editor, 2002
- L'Œuvre et son ombre. Que peut la litterature secondaire? , Editor, 2002
- Poésie et conversion au Moyen Age , PUF, 2003
- Le Moyen à la lettre. Un abécédaire médiéval , Éditions Tallandier, 2004
- Arsène Lupine et le mystère d'Arsonval , Éditions de Fallois, 2004
- Nature et poésie au Moyen Âge , Librairie Arthème Fayard, 2006
- Un portefeuille toulousain , Editions de Fallois, 2007
- Seuls les enfants savent lire , Éditions Tallandier, 2009
- Livres anciens, lectures vivantes. Ce qui passe et ce qui demeure , editor, 2009
- Les Troubadours. Une histoire poétique , Éditions Perrin, 2013
- D'autres langues que la mienne , editor, 2014
- Bienvenue au Moyen Âge , Éditions des Équateurs, 2015
- L'Humiliation, le Moyen Âge et nous , Éditions Albin Michel, 2017
- Bérets noirs, bérets rouges , Éditions de Fallois, 2018
- Seuls les enfants savent lire - Nouvelle édition , Les Belles Lettres, 2019
Background literature
- Jean-Maurice de Montremy : Michel Zink, le conteur du Moyen Age , In: L'Histoire , September 1999
Web links
- Entry on the homepage of the Académie française
- Literature by and about Michel Zink in the catalog of the German National Library
- Entry in Prabook
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Zink, Michel |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French writer, philologist, Medievalist, Romance scholar and university lecturer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 5, 1945 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Issy-les-Moulineaux , Hauts-de-Seine department |