Acknowledgments
Many of the texts presented here have been fellow travelers of mine for well over half a century now. Our peregrinations started in the late 1960s and early 70s, when I took the advice of Professor Hans-Gert Roloff at the Free University of Berlin, first, to write a PhD dissertation on Eobanus’s Heroides and then, more momentously, to embark on a bilingual edition of the complete poetic works. Full of twists and turns, the journey has certainly turned into more of an adventure than ever I could have imagined. Originally the plan was to bring out four volumes of Dichtungen in Roloff’s series, “Ausgaben Deutscher Literatur des XV. bis XVIII. Jahrhunderts” (De Gruyter, Berlin). Owing to relentless headwinds, however, those vessels never did set sail. I had somewhat better luck with Roloff’s parallel series, “Mittlere Deutsche Literatur in Neu- und Nachdrucken” (Peter Lang, Bern). Indeed, after three years of further delay, a first volume came out in that series in the winter of 1990/91, under the title, Helius Eobanus Hessus, Dichtungen: Lateinisch und Deutsch. Dritter Band: Dichtungen der Jahre 1528–1537. So it happened that pretty much the same book that in manuscript form had helped me obtain promotion and tenure in 1976 would ultimately help me win promotion to full professor in 1992!
The luck did not last, however. A second volume of the Dichtungen, which I had submitted in 1992, languished at the publisher until June 1994, when I was brusquely informed that the “Mittlere Deutsche Literatur” series had collapsed. Twice jilted, I thought it best to reboot the Eobanus edition for an English-speaking audience and then look for a reliable publishing partner. After finishing some other projects, notably the Carmina for Erasmi opera omnia (Amsterdam, 1995) and several monographic articles on Sebastian Brant and Erasmus, I rejoiced to find that partner in the Renaissance Text Series, published jointly by the Renaissance Society of America (RSA) and Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies (MRTS). To this day, I gratefully recall the zeal with which John Monfasani, RSA’s then Executive Director, nurtured the undertaking until his retirement from that position in 2010.
When the Renaissance Text Series parted ways with MRTS in 2012, Volume 3 of The Poetic Works had the honor of inaugurating RSA’s new Texts and Studies Series, edited by the late Craig Kallendorf, who also oversaw the publication of Volume 4. Volume 5 was then ably steered into print by his successor, Ingrid De Smet. After twenty years of smooth sailing, therefore, it looked for all the world as if the Eobanus edition might yet make port without incident. But there is no accounting for sudden squalls. In June 2024, just as I was on the point of forwarding the current installments to Editor-in-Chief David Marsh, I was shocked to learn that the RSA Texts and Studies Series was being phased out and no new submissions would be accepted. In something of a panic, I immediately wrote the series editor. But here a miracle happened. For thanks to the forceful and more than gracious intervention of RSA’s Executive Director, Carla Zecher, and of Arjan van Dijk, Acquisitions Editor at Brill Publishers, the present volumes will not be set adrift. To both Carla and Arjan, accordingly, I extend my profoundest gratitude.
Special thanks, finally, go not only to the two anonymous readers, who most generously took time to assess my work and gave it their unqualified support, but also to Yael Isaacs, Associate Editor at Brill, and Sanne Hadfy-Kovács, production manager at TAT Zetwerk, for so amicably and efficiently guiding these volumes through the press.