Sigmund Eisner (1920–2012) was an American scholar of

medieval literature Medieval literature is a broad subject, encompassing essentially all written works available in Europe and beyond during the Middle Ages (that is, the one thousand years from the fall of the Western Roman Empire ca. AD 500 to the beginning of t ...

. A professor emeritus at the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory. ...

, he was a noted expert on Geoffrey Chaucer and was frequently consulted on matters of astronomy in Chaucer.

Biography

Eisner was born in Red Bank,

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York (state), New York; on the ea ...

, on December 9, 1920, but was raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. He enrolled at the

in 1939, but joined the army after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. He graduated from the

University of California at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant uni ...

in 1947 and received his

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

degree from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...

in 1955, then was a

Fulbright Scholar The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people o ...

in Ireland. Eisner taught at

Oregon State University Oregon State University (OSU) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant, research university in Corvallis, Oregon. OSU offers more than 200 undergraduate-degree programs along with a variety of graduate and doctoral degree ...

and Dominican College before returning to the University of Arizona, where he taught for over forty years. He died on December 18, 2012.

Select bibliography

*''A Tale of Wonder. A Source Study of The Wife of Bath's Tale'' (Wexford: John English, 1957) *''The Tristan Legend: A Study in Sources'' (Evanston: Northwestern UP, 1969) *'' Geoffrey Chaucer, A Treatise on the Astrolabe''. Variorum Edition of the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer 6 (Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 2006; ed. with Marijane Osborn)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eisner, Sigmund 1920 births 2012 deaths Academics from New Jersey American academics of English literature American people of Bohemian descent Columbia University alumni Oregon State University faculty People from Red Bank, New Jersey University of Arizona faculty University of California, Berkeley alumni Writers from the San Francisco Bay Area United States Army personnel of World War II