Leave it to the Internet to leak a secret. Though it was supposed to be a surprise, Dr. Pedro Campa, UTC Professor of Romance Languages, found out about the book of articles to be published in his honor after doing a simple Google search.
“One day I was searching Google and clicked on a link where I read that one of my colleagues was writing an article for a book to be published in my honor. I was very surprised,” Campa said.
The book, titled In Nocte Consilium: Studies in Emblematics in Honor of Pedro F. Campa, is a festschrift honoring Campa’s contributions to the field of emblem literature. A festschrift is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic scholar, and presented during his or her lifetime. The German term can be translated as celebration of a publication or celebratory (piece of) writing. The 516-page book featuring Campa was published earlier this year.
The book, edited by John T. Cull and Peter M. Daly, features essays and articles from Campa’s friends and colleagues. Arranged in three parts, “Hispanic Emblems and Literature,” “Bibliography and Emblem Theory,” and “Emblems, Emblematic Images, and Numismatics,” the festschrift contains more than a dozen articles and 77 illustrations. For more information on the book, click here.
Daly first met Campa in May 1980 at a meeting of the Medieval Congress at the University of Western Michigan in Kalamazoo. Afterward, Campa and Daly began organizing regular meetings called “Emblem Sessions” at the Kalamazoo venue. For more than twenty years, scholars from all over the world have presented papers at the session
Though many call Campa the world’s most known scholar of Hispanic emblems, he remains humble about his accomplishments.
“As they say, pride comes before the fall, but I am very honored,” he said.
