Derek Brewer
Welsh scholar
title: "Derek Brewer" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1923-births", "2008-deaths", "alumni-of-magdalen-college,-oxford", "academics-of-the-university-of-birmingham", "masters-of-emmanuel-college,-cambridge", "royal-fusiliers-officers", "british-medievalists", "chaucer-scholars", "british-army-personnel-of-world-war-ii", "worcestershire-regiment-officers", "corresponding-fellows-of-the-medieval-academy-of-america"] description: "Welsh scholar" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Brewer" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Welsh scholar ::
::data[format=table title="infobox person"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Derek Brewer |
| birth_name | Derek Stanley Brewer |
| birth_place | Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom |
| birth_date | |
| death_place | Cambridge, England, United Kingdom |
| death_date | |
| education | Magdalen College, Oxford |
| occupation | |
| :: |
| name = Derek Brewer | birth_name = Derek Stanley Brewer | birth_place = Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom | birth_date = | death_place = Cambridge, England, United Kingdom | death_date = | education = Magdalen College, Oxford | occupation = Derek Stanley Brewer (13 July 1923 – 23 October 2008) was a Welsh medieval scholar, author and publisher.
Life
Born in Cardiff, Wales, the son of a clerk with General Electric, Brewer read English at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was taught, among others, by C. S. Lewis. He served as infantry officer with the Worcestershire Regiment and with the Royal Fusiliers during World War II, from 1942 to 1945, then returned to Oxford. He took a Second. He was appointed lecturer at the University of Birmingham, where he remained until 1964, when he moved to Cambridge to take up the position of lecturer in English and then become fellow of Emmanuel College.{{cite web |title=National Review Online – The Corner |website=National Review Online |publisher=National Review |url=http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/174172/thanksgiving/james-bowman |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120709131824/http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZjRlNzViNjVkNmJmN2Q0ZWUwNjA0YmE4ZTk4NGI1YWU= |archive-date=9 July 2012 |url-status=dead |access-date=2 December 2025
In 1990-1991 he held the Sandars Readership in Bibliography at Cambridge University on the topic "The fabulous history of Venus: Studies in the history of mythography from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century."
Brewer was one of the most recognized Chaucer scholars of modern times—his Chaucer and His World (1978, reissued 2000) "could be said to have started a whole new genre in historical literary biography."{{cite news |title=Professor Derek Brewer Obituary |work=The Daily Telegraph |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/3368297/Professor-Derek-Brewer.html |url-access=subscription |access-date=2 December 2025 |publisher=Telegraph Media Group
He died in Cambridge, England, a month after the death of his wife Elisabeth. Obituaries in all the main British newspapers and blogs in the US speak highly of his love of literature and the profession,{{cite web |title=Derek Brewer Obituary |website=Unlocked Wordhoard |url=https://unlocked-wordhoard.blogspot.com/2008/10/rip-derek-brewer.html |date=10 October 2008 |access-date=2 December 2025 |publisher=Blogger |title=Professor Derek Brewer: Scholar of medieval literature who led the field of Chaucer studies after the Second World War |work=The Independent |url=http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-derek-brewer-scholar-of-medieval-literature-who-led-the-field-of-chaucer-studies-after-the-second-world-war-989663.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081209054304/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-derek-brewer-scholar-of-medieval-literature-who-led-the-field-of-chaucer-studies-after-the-second-world-war-989663.html |archive-date=9 December 2008 |date=7 November 2008 |access-date=2 December 2025 |publisher=Independent News & Media |title=Derek Brewer Obituary |work=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2008/nov/17/derek-brewer-obituary-scholar |date=17 November 2008 |access-date=2 December 2025 |publisher=Guardian News & Media
Select bibliography
Books authored and edited
- Geoffrey Chaucer, The Parlement of Foulys. Ed. Derek Brewer. London: Nelson, 1960.
- Chaucer in His Time. London: Nelson, 1963.
- Chaucer, the Critical Heritage. Ed. Derek Brewer. London, Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978. .
- Chaucer and His World. London: Eyre Methuen, 1978. ; 3rd ed. The World of Chaucer. Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2000. .
- Symbolic Stories: Traditional Narratives of the Family Drama in English Literature. Cambridge: Brewer; Totowa: Rowman & Littlefield, 1980. .
- Traditional Stories and Their Meanings. London: English Association, 1983. .
- An Introduction to Chaucer. London, New York: Longman, 1984. ; 2nd ed. A New Introduction to Chaucer. London: Longman, 1998. .
- Studies in Medieval English Romances: Some New Approaches. Ed. Derek Brewer. Cambridge: Brewer, 1988.
- A Companion to the Gawain-Poet. Ed. Derek Brewer and Jonathan Gibson. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1997. .
Articles
- “The Tutor: A Portrait,” in C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table, James T. Como, editor, 1979, 41-67.
- "Chaucer and the Bible." In Kinshiro Oshitari et al., eds., Philologia Anglica: Essays Presented to Professor Yoshio Terasawa on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday. Tokyo: Kenkyusha, 1988. 270-84.
- "Chaucer's Poetic Style." In Piero Boitani and Jill Mann, eds., The Cambridge Chaucer Companion. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1986. 227-42.
- "Orality and Literacy in Chaucer." In Willi Ertzgräber and Sabine Volk, eds., Mundlichkeit und Schriftlichkeit im englischen Mittelalter. Script Oralia 5. Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag, 1988. 85-119.
- "Contributions to a Chaucer Word-Book from Troilus Book IV." In Michio Kawai, ed., Language and Style in English Literature: Essays in Honor of Michio Masui. English Research Association of Hiroshima. Tokyo: Eihosha, 1991. 27-52.
- "Arithmetic and the Mentality of Chaucer." In Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds., Literature in Fourteenth-Century England: The J. A. W. Bennett Memorial Lectures, Perugia, 1981-1982. Tübingen: Narr; Cambridge: Brewer, 1983. 155-64.
- "Chaucer's Venuses." In Juliette Dor, ed., A Wyf Ther Was: Essays in Honour of Paule Mertens Fonck. Liège: Université de Liège, 1992. 30-40.
References
before=Gordon Sutherland |title= Master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge | years=1977–1990 | after=Charles Peter Wroth
References
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