Gerald Gillespie, devoted professor of German and comparative literature, dies at 92

Gerald Gillespie, professor of German studies and of comparative literature, emeritus, in the Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences and a renowned scholar who published extensively about Germanic influences on great writers, died July 20, 2025. He was 92.

The embodiment of a humanities scholar, Gillespie wrote with an inexhaustible zeal for the West’s most formidable writers, including James Joyce, Thomas Mann, and Marcel Proust. (In fact, he wrote a book on those three men’s work in the modernist context.) His subjects ranged from how writers approached Biblical teachings to classical tragic theater to, of course, great German works, including Faust.

His efforts earned him some of the top fellowships in the world, including those from Fulbright, Guggenheim, Mellon, and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). He also served as president of the International Comparative Literature Association (ICLA) from 1994 to 1997 and as honorary president after that.

“Our association and the discipline have sustained an irreparable loss,” said Ipshita Chanda, current ICLA president, in a statement. “We owe much to his commitment, intellectual catholicity, collegiality, and understanding. Personally, I remember friendly debates on ‘Indic’ literature (which I strongly disagreed with), grounded in his enthusiastic curiosity and vast knowledge of world literatures and cultures. His crucial contribution to comparative literature, to which he dedicated his life, will remain etched in its history.”

A prolific writer and translator

Gillespie joined Stanford in 1974 and remained there until his retirement a quarter-century later. Although based at Stanford, his studies carried him around the world, including at a time when the Cold War prevented students of German culture from freely exchanging knowledge with those behind the Iron Curtain. 

His publications varied widely and recently included translations such as The Nightwatches of Bonaventura (University of Chicago Press, 2014), an anonymous dark comic German novel from 1804. He also published or edited more than 20 books, including Proust, Mann, Joyce in the Modernist Context (Catholic University of America Press, 2003), Ludwig Tieck’s Puss-in-Boots and Theater of the Absurd (Peter Lang, 2013), and Living Streams: Continuity and Change from Rabelais to Joyce (Peter Lang, 2019). He also served on the editorial boards of journals including Comparative Literature and German Life and Letters.

“Gerald had an encyclopedic familiarity with many literatures, which made him a true comparatist,” said Russell A. Berman, the Walter A. Haas Professor of the Humanities and professor of comparative literature and of German studies in H&S. “He was always eager to share anecdotes and insights generously. He radiated optimism and good will toward colleagues and students alike.”

He was also a passionate advocate for the humanities. In 1976, he and a group of colleagues co-authored a series of position papers in the Stanford Daily demanding better funding and support for the humanities at Stanford. His battle continued into the ’90s, when he took part in a “memorial” on campus for the arts and humanities at U.S. universities.

In 1991, he sought to fight “political correctness” by becoming a charter member of a Stanford campus group affiliated with the National Association of Scholars, a conservative organization established to reform higher education and defend academic freedom.

A decorated student and global scholar

Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1933, Gillespie attended undergrad at Harvard, spent a year at the University of Tübingen in Germany, received his master’s degree and doctorate from Ohio State in 1961, and then continued his postdoctoral studies at the University of Munich in the late ’60s. It was during this time that he received his Fulbright fellowship.

He began his career with stints at the University of Southern California and the State University of New York at Binghamton before making his way to Stanford in the ’70s. By that time, he had also received honors from the foundations of Andrew Mellon and John S. Guggenheim, along with his NEH fellowship. Gillespie retired from Stanford in 1999. 

He is survived by his wife, Adrienne Gillespie, and his younger brother, James Gillespie. He was preceded in death by his brother, Frank Gillespie, and his sisters, Kathleen Colacarro and Nora Oriti.