Last modified on Tue 26 Jan 2021 14.19 EST
My friend and colleague Roy Wisbey, one of the leading figures in British German studies, has died aged 91.
Roy revolutionised the study of modern languages by pioneering the field of digital humanities, which is now fundamental to research in the area. He founded the Literary and Linguistic Computing Centre at Cambridge University in 1964, and collaborated in the creation in 1973 of the Association for Literary and Linguistic Computing (now the European Association for Digital Humanities), of which he was the first chair and president (1980-83).
In the early days, computing was extremely laborious, being based on mainframe computers, punched cards and magnetic tape. It is all the more remarkable that Roy recognised the medium’s potential and made Cambridge a world leader in digital humanities. Equally important was his transformation of the Modern Humanities Research Association (MHRA) into a financially well-endowed and high-powered f