In Memoriam: Richard C. Tobias
Rent from DeepDyveOctober 12, 1925- September 12, 2006
Victorian Poetry has lost a long-time friend and associate. "Tob" was a charter member in 1963 of the Editorial Board of the Journal. In 1967 he became, along with Gordon Pitts and Fred A. Dudley, a member of a special group of advisors to the editor called Editorial Associates. He remained, the sole survivor of that group, until the very end. "Tob" wrote for the first volume of Victorian Poetry "The Year's Work in Victorian Poetry: 1962." He wrote that article for the next ten years. It is now produced by a cadre of specialists in the various poets. It was Tobias who guided that annual review article, which has become a valuable annual feature of the Journal.
Tobias was not merely a valuable associate, he was a personal friend of the previous editors of the Journal: John Stasny and Hayden Ward; we enjoyed—or endured—many a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball game together. My wife and I enjoyed the companionship with "Tob" and his wife, Barbara, who, alas, died too early and whom "Tob" missed so tenderly. I, myself, have a myriad of fond memories of my friend of a half century.
"Tob" was a preeminently knowledgeable Victorian scholar, but he was much more than that. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette headlined his obituary "Legendary Pitt English Professor." He was an enthusiastic teacher, who taught last summer a course in Augsburg, Germany and who was going to teach, at age 81, a course this fall at the University of Pittsburgh. Victorian Poetry was honored in its association with Richard Tobias. One is tempted to quote Browning's "A Grammarian's Funeral":
This is our master, famous calm and dead,
Borne on our shoulders.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
He, whom we convey to his grave aloft,
Singing together,
He was a man born with thy face and throat,
Lyric Apollo!
