The electronic William Blake Archive has won the Modern Language Association’s 2003 award for a Distinguished Scholarly Edition. The Archive is edited by three of the most important Blake scholars working today, Morris Eaves, Robert N. Essick, and Joseph Viscomi. I’ve been associated with the site since 1997, first as project manager during my time at Virginia, then as a technical editor, and now as a consultant. This is the first time this important award has been bestowed to an electronic edition, and it’s noteworthy not least because the Blake Archive challenges the very idea of an “edition.”
The award is also significant in a related but more subtle respect. One of the reasons “Web sites” (and the Blake Archive is a good deal more than a Web site—it’s really a structured electronic environment rendered in SGML and delivered via HTTP) suffer from academic illegitimacy is that they don’t have any entrée into the prevailing channels of scholarly communication. They’re not listed in library catalogs (though this changing), they’re not received for review by journals and serials, and they’re typically not on the radar screen for awards like this—not necessarily because of any overt prejudice against the medium, but simply because as a mode of scholarly production a Web site does not circulate in the same way as a monograph. So here’s hoping this is the start of a trend, kudos to the MLA for its progressive actions on behalf of electronic scholarship, and warm congratulations to the editors and current project team. The award will be officially conferred at the upcoming convention in San Diego.
Posted by mgk at December 1, 2003 09:15 PMWay to go! And congratulations to you, Matt. Persistence pays off! You are entitled to share in the award honors, given your past and current involvement with the William Blake Archive.
Revolutionary technologies need those pioneers like yourself, a person whose vision is both broad and deep. There are any number of people who effuse about the quantitative impact computers have upon human society: speeding up the generation, delivery, and retrieval of information; enhancing storage capacity; and lowering costs. You are fluent in this discourse, but you go beyond and share concise and profound insights about how the quality of human life and thought are also affected. In the process, you raise new possibilities for Being; you show us forms for human expression and creation never before seen.
Thank you for your courage, your tenaticty, for the gifts of your mind
JT
Posted by: John Torquato at December 22, 2003 01:28 PM | Link to Comment