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A personal superhero

By Paulette Jones Morant

Homenaje a David T. Gies

A leader, a seeker of justice, an intellectual and a true friend; these characteristics only begin to describe the distinguished gentleman, Mr. David T. Gies. As the twenty-eighth year of our association and friendship approaches, I am honored to reflect on his positive and inspirational effects. Whether friend, colleague, family member or student, David motivates achievement and excellence. This became clear to me from our first meeting in 1990, when I took part in the program that was the precursor for the 1992 National Endowment for the Humanities institute “Spain Today and Toward the Year 2000”. In the 1990 program, a small group of secondary level teachers of Spanish convened at The University of Virginia (my alma mater) for a two-week residential program of instruction on Spain’s current literary and political trends. Under David’s expert instruction and with the superb support of teaching assistant Mousumi B. Franks, our awareness, interest and expertise increased in multiple ways. David’s enthusiasm was contagious in the best sense: he didn’t wish to be the only knowledgeable person on any topic. His generosity of time, spirit and smiles made for a program that we would not forget. He erased the often-perceived barrier between university and secondary level teachers by reminding us that we are all in the match together to share the powerful tools of linguistic and cultural fluency. We promised to take his advice to read a few pages of native Spanish literature or journalism each day, no matter how overburdened our high school schedules. As he predicted, confidence, enjoyment and better preparation for class came as a result.

The 1992 NEH Spain Today program brought the opportunity for me to visit and study in Spain for the first time since 1972. I will long remember meeting authors Carmen Martin-Gaite and Rosa Montero as well as learning through film, journals, lectures and travels, all highlighted by David’s confidence in us as participants and the added bonus of instruction by Professor Fernando Operé and Dr. Jeff Bersett. Café Gijón will remain in memory as a favorite location for people watching as well as project discussions.

On a personal note, my husband and I are huge fans of the Dynamic Duo, David and Janna. We enjoy following their adventures, we admire their partnership, and we wish them as many celebrity encounters as they can manage. I smile at a 1996 memory of my husband saying “Guess who was on The Today Show—David and Janna”. Their VIP status is in the stratosphere, as is their care for their community, for women’s issues and for the common good.

David’s enduring leadership, example, talents and enthusiasm have provided me with great life lessons. How many of us are fortunate enough to have a personal superhero? All of us who have been friends, relatives, students or colleagues of our treasured David T. Gies.

Gracias, David y que te vaya fenomenal siempre.

Un abrazo fuertísimo,
Paulette Jones Morant

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Our David

By David Haberly

I find it very hard to write something coherent about David Gies.  I’ve known and admired David for almost forty years, and he has been so much a part of my life and career over the decades that it’s difficult to try and step back.  What I do know for sure is that—at least in my long experience—David is a truly unique one-off, as an academic and as a person.

First, David is the only successful academic I have ever encountered who is fully, openly and unabashedly extroverted.  He actually enjoys the company of other people, of all sorts of other people, from small children to insecure first-year advisees to the gilded nabobs aboard The World, and he never tires of finding out all about them and their interests. One of the great ironies of David’s life is that he retains a laudably childlike excitement about meeting famous people, when in fact at least some of those worthies turn out to be utterly unworthy of the admiration of someone as smart and distinguished and decent as David.

The pleasure that interacting with others gives David, I think, helps explain both why he has been such a gifted and successful administrator, and also why he has consistently agreed to take on all sorts of complex and demanding administrative jobs. Being a Chair or a Dean is one thing, but how many other academics would willingly agree to run a homowners’ association?  David is also, I believe, uniquely energetic, enthusiastic, and open to new ideas and experiences.  The first time I ever met David he was talking with intense excitement about his dream of learning to fly a plane; I don’t think he ever learned, though he eventually did—equally enthusiastically—jump out of a plane.  I do remember his mother telling me that toddler David’s constant energy, curiosity, and excitement meant that the only way she could survive and get an occasional break was to tie him to a tree in their back yard.

David is also unique in that he is simultaneously devoted to and comfortable with the two very different intellectual and literary movements in which he has specialized for most of his career.  He is simultaneously enlightened and romantic in all the best senses of the terms.  He is effortlessly able to think logically and rationally about all kinds of issues, but never in isolation from their human, emotional context.  I’ve run just about every important academic or personal decision I’ve made in the last few decades past David, and his logical, rational and always sensitive advice has never once let me down.  I would bet large sums of money that I am far from the only person whom David has helped in this way.  I’m tremendously grateful for David’s constant help and guidance.  I am also grateful to Janna:  for her kindness to and tolerance of all of us; for making David so happy and giving him the chance to be a grandfather; and for the personal ties to Charlottesville that, I believe, helped keep David here among us when it seemed that half the universities in the country were trying to steal him.

Above all, David is unique in that he is truly an exceptionally kind and decent person.  I have never once, in all these years, known David Gies to be cruel or petty or hurtful.  He has always done good deeds without thought of recompense, including taking homeless academics under his roof.  A number of years ago, to give but one example, David did me a small but tremendously meaningful favor.  He did not expect or ask for my gratitude, and in fact never told me what he had done; I found out some time later, almost by chance.

David’s kindness and goodness, in my view, are summed up in a small but significant moment from this past fall. It was a Monday, at the department’s weekly tertulia in the Garden Room.  Very few of us had shown up, as I recall:   David, me, Ricardo Padrón, and a young Hispanic woman, an academic who was going to give a talk that afternoon.  I never caught her name or where she was from (ah, the joys of senescence).  She seemed nervous and a bit unhappy, and it crossed my mind that she might not feel prepared for her lecture.  After a good deal of talk about maps and navigation and European expansion, David—with his natural interest in everyone he meets—began asking her about herself.  Suddenly almost tearful, she mentioned that she had quite recently been widowed.  Without prompting, David began to speak very gently to her, almost in a whisper, revealing that his first wife had died, talking about how painful the experience had been, how long it took to recover, and how happy he was to have eventually found love again. She was literally transformed by his kind words, and it was clear to me that this brief interaction was something she would remember for the rest of her life.  Not only did David instinctively know just what to say and how to say it, but he bothered to make this effort with someone he had never met before and whom he would almost certainly never see again. That’s our David, and God knows how much all of us will miss him!

 

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A National Treasure

By Randolph Pope

It would be easier for me to write about the seven seas, which David has sailed, or the heights of the Andes range, which he has explored, than to put into immensely insufficient words what David Gies has meant to me as a very great friend, an admired colleague, a dazzling speaker and an a profoundly enlightened person. I first met him at an MLA Convention, and he immediately stood out for his wit, enthusiasm, sincere cordiality and winning personality. He was a defining reason for why Mané and I came to UVA (a happy decision!).

There is something peculiar and unique about his presence. When he walks into a room he changes it, not by overpowering it with his height or own personality, but by amazingly illuminating everyone there and celebrating them. He makes you believe in your best self. No wonder that in the department that he and Javier Herrero created we have been unusually supportive of each other, because we see ourselves in David’s view. He reads all we write and never fails to send an encouraging note. This is no minor gesture; it is extremely unusual and for me most encouraging.

He is effortlessly generous. His work for 18th-Century studies has changed for the best the profession, not only with his classes and the editorship of Dieciocho, but also for bringing together for years a study group of faculty interested in this period. His students love and respect him, and he cares for them deeply. He set a high standard for the rest of us. I have seen evidence of this innumerable times. And where did he and Janna find the time to attend our daughter’s wedding in Charleston or meet with Mané and me in Portugal? How much that meant for us!

Part of his career and adventures can be found in his engaging autobiography, “Hispanista por casualidad: mi viaje por la literatura y la cultura españolas”, found in ¿Por qué España?  (2014), but he is a radiant life-giving energy that goes beyond all accomplishments and words. In Japan, he would have been named a National Treasure years ago…

 

Randolph Pope

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Feliz jubilación, David

By María-Inés Lagos

The words that come to mind when thinking of David may seem hyperbolic to those who don’t know him, but I am not exaggerating when I say he is incredibly enthusiastic, friendly, generous, caring, and engaged with people and the world around. He has the best tips for restaurants and paradores, anything that has to do with travel and enjoying the local scenes.

His interests are wide ranging. Often times the first morning e-mail comes from David, sharing the latest news pertinent to our professional endeavors. Keeping abreast of what his colleagues are writing is also one of his passions. When I leave him an off-print in his box, that same evening he would have read it and sent me a message with the most perceptive, knowledgeable, and generous comments! How does he do it I ask myself? So organized and attentive, a truly amazing colleague.

In addition to being a charismatic speaker and storyteller, David has the talent to engage others in conversation. One of his most awesome qualities is how he makes people talk, not only students and colleagues or friends, but our own children! He asks the questions we would love to ask but are afraid to utter, and thus through his savvy approach we, parents, find out what they do at work and what their plans are, without having to ask ourselves!

I just loved his joyful enthusiasm when he came up with an idea for one of Janna’s significant birthdays. He proudly gave me a preview of a power point “show” he had prepared for her. (Our offices were across the hall at the time). The gift included, of course, surprise travel with Mediterranean cruise, and more. During our sixteen years in Charlottesville, David and Janna have been superb hosts who have introduced us to many fun activities. At Charlottesville’s Garden Week we met John Grisham in his own garden, the periodic Cooking Club gatherings with interesting mystery guests and creative recipes were always intriguing, his annual Oscar night party (with baked Alaska) continues to be a departmental ritual, and so many other occasions.

Now that he is retiring from the University of Virginia I have no doubt he will continue making life enjoyable to those around him! Feliz jubilación, David, y gracias por la amistad y el contagioso entusiasmo.

Mané Lagos

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David’s Teaching Saves Lives

By Dan Ortiz

For over a decade, I have sat along with 12 graduate and law students at David’s feet. And what an experience it has been! Each year David and I have taught a five-session seminar in ethical values to a group coming from all parts of the University. Spanish and Law naturally, but also Art History, English, Architecture, German, Physics, History, and others. We’ve discussed film exclusively and each year we’ve focused on a particular theme (from food to the ethics of murder), director (from Almodovar to Hitchcock), or part of the world.

I’ve been mostly a free rider. How could I not? I’ve never owned a TV and see few current films. (People know better than to let me out.) But David happily took the lead. He would invariably become enthused about a topic, quickly view and narrow down a bunch of films, most of which I had never heard of, let alone seen, and throw together a syllabus—all before I had time to consult Wikipedia for ideas. All I had to do was cajole a few law students to join the fun, watch the films myself, and bring food and wine. To anyone who knows David, bringing the wine was the most important of my responsibilities. From the way it lubricated his thinking, I think I did well.

David opened our eyes to film and teaching. Where before we saw stories (or in graduate-speak “narratives”), we quickly came to detect irony, doubt, and complexity. In short, David slyly led us into the post-modern condition. And we had much fun getting there. We law geeks entered the class as logical, rigorously linear, left-side thinkers and left more generous, broad-minded, and forgiving people. The students adored him, of course, and—teaching being a two-way street—opened him up to new experiences, like lunch at Chipotle, where the much-celebrated Hispanist and gourmand had never eaten.

About that title? Yep, it’s true. David’s teaching really did save lives or at least one—my own. It’s not that he expanded my thinking so that I could value things and life in ways impossible before. He did that, of course. I’m talking about something much more concrete. In the last meeting of “The Ethics of Murder,” we were discussing Hitchcock’s “The Birds” over one of David’s wonderful paella dinners. We had not yet reached the pièce de résistance, his Baked Alaska, which every year reliably turned students’ heads. I asked the students whether the film could be read as the revenge of nature itself (climate change, anyone?) or of human nature and whether the birds ultimately won. While waiting for a response, I took a too-large bite of paella and found I couldn’t breathe. I tried to drink a little water. Still, no air.

The student who was answering the question finished and quizzically looked at me for a reaction. But I couldn’t speak. All I could do was turn to David and whisper “Heimlich!” He knew exactly what to do, ran behind me, planted his two hard fists right below my chest, and pumped alarmingly away. A few seconds later, a piece of food spectacularly flew out across the room, the class gasped in surprise and appreciation, and I started breathing again. Luckily, my dramatic distress and David’s quick reaction not only brought the class alive but was also a great “teaching moment.” It offered one answer to the very question we were discussing: did the birds win? I had choked, I pointed out, on a big hunk of chicken.

 

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Lessons from David Gies

By Alison Weber

I owe my career in large part to David. In 1983 my husband, who was a professor of Microbiology at the University of Illinois, was invited to spend a sabbatical year at UVA. He urged me to see if the Spanish Department needed a part-time teacher of Spanish. I said, “Don’t be ridiculous. They won’t hire a walk-on.” But to appease him, I asked for an appointment with a certain Professor Gies, and walked in to his office with my rusty PhD in Comparative Literature and rustier Spanish and offered to teach a course I had dreamed up called “Literary Analysis.” Much to my great surprise, he offered me not one course but three, for the grand salary of $11,000 a year. My career was launched! Over the next thirty-five years, David was one of my most important mentors and academic models. Here are some of the lessons I learned from him, lessons whose importance I often underestimated at the time and too often failed to put in to practice. 1) Expand your audience. If you are going to be an educator, look beyond your graduate seminar and reach out to learners of all ages and abilities 2) Step up to the plate. You are not too important to do the little jobs. 3) Learn people’s names. Ask them questions. 4) Celebrate the accomplishment of others. 5) Own up to your mistakes. 6) Don’t overthink problems. 7) Forgive and move on. 8) Be cheerful and have fun. 9) Be thankful. Teaching is a wonderful career. This is what I have perceived as David’s unspoken philosophy—a philosophy he lives every day and one that is worth imitating.

 

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David Gies star of short film “Be Deaf Be Dead”

By Karen Van Lengen

David Gies offered to act in a short film that 3rd grader Kiri Van Lengen-Welty made with her teacher John Hunter, Venable Elementary School, (from the World Peace Game fame) in 2003. The film was developed out of a year-long independent project that Kiri took on underJohn’s guidance and our assistance.

The film is based on a study of Hitchcock films that Kiri undertook, then wrote a script for a new short “hitchcockian” film.

The film Title: Be Deaf Be Dead

Plot: It is feared that Terrorists might blow up the Rotunda- so FBI Agent Prezik (David) is hot on the trail of several music students who he suspects are involved in the plot. The title BE DEAF BE DEAD comes from the actual musical notes that are played by a terrorist in her recital at old Cabell Hall in order to send a code to someone in the audience, who will find his instructions from a book of that title, housed in the Rotunda Library.  He does uncover the plot just in time to save the Rotunda and arrest the real terrorists.

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In Praise of David

By John Portmann

In my years at UVa, David has emerged as one of the most fun –if not the most—academics I have met. He’s not just all grace and charm: he is a person of moral courage as well.

I met David through Janna.

My friend Jeff Miller, a Ph.D. student in history, kept telling me that he enjoyed reviewing books for the Virginia Quarterly Review. One day I got around to accompanying him to the VQR office, where Janna was hard at work (and that’s another story!). I liked her immediately and starting stopping by the VQR regularly. I looked forward to chatting with Janna even more than looking through the pile of books available for review.

One day I informed Janna that I had received an offer to teach bioethics at the Cleveland Clinic; I was struggling with the question of what to do. Imagine my surprise when Janna informed me that she had not only lived in Cleveland for years but also in a very small town in Pennsylvania ten minutes away from the small town in which I had grown up. Here was a woman who could understand me. She warned me against the gray weather in Cleveland, and I stayed in Charlottesville.

She told me about her past and her new husband, a guy named David who taught in Spanish. She was surprised that I did not know him. She told me all about the storybook courtship (he had swept her off her feet) and shared with me the pictures.

Then one day he showed up at the VQR, and I met David.

I was working in the Office of the Provost at the time, and we were all preparing for a big event President Casteen had been planning for ages: Virginia 2020. The idea was to try to project from where we were in 2000 what UVa would look like in the year 2020. What were our goals? Where did we want to be? Once the actual summit occurred, I had to choose from a number of competing sessions led by faculty facilitators previously appointed by the President’s Office. I chose David’s, thinking it would be the most fun.
I remember clearly what happened at this session: About thirty or thirty-five people sat in a circle, with David at the head. He asked us what we hoped for in UVa’s future. One woman identified herself as a professor in the nursing school and responded that she hoped women students would be treated as the equals of men in 2020. She added that she regretted her own college experience, when male professors would habitually favor men over women in class discussions. Silence, David asked in a sympathetic tone whether she thought women were under-privileged at UVa today, and the woman paused dramatically. When she began to respond, David briskly cut her off, “Oh, who really cares what you think? Let’s hear from someone else, someone interesting.”

For a split second I worried that David had lost his mind. The stupefied woman gaped at David, and, unable to control myself, I burst out laughing. I realized that David was joking, joking in a risky way. When the entire room next erupted in smiles and nods, I understood that David was a real character.

I liked David more and more and occasionally chided him for not teaching Catholicism. He loved Spain with a passion and wanted his department to be the best in the entire country. He agreed that Catholicism was an integral part of Spanish culture but didn’t seem the least bit inclined to add this subject to his department’s course offerings.

He did, however, agree to visit my “Cultural Catholicism” seminar in Spring 2005. It was one of the most animated groups I’ve had at UVa; we met in the luminous space of the Jefferson Debating Society (on the Range, very close to Janna’s office). Spain was voting on gay marriage in 2005, and the American media were following the polls closely. The pope himself visited Spain and pleaded with the people, his people, not to vote for it (they did). David won over my seminar with his easy intelligence, and at least one of my students asked him to be his academic advisor that day (Chad O’Hara).

I continued to get to know David and Janna better. I never exploited my friendship with the CLAS’s most popular boy until Karin Wittenborg in 2014 asked me to chair the University Library Committee, which had been a pretty lifeless group. I leaned on David to join, and once he agreed, I was ready to contact several in-demand professors and ask, “David Gies is on this committee, won’t you join it?” Each signed up.

In 2016 David and I were recruited to join the search committee for the new Dean of the University Libraries. Lots of meetings. David flavored the many routine steps with his puckish wit.

Nothing moved me more deeply, in retrospect, than something David observed in January 2018. I had just returned from five weeks in Italy, and he invited me to his condo for lunch – just the two of us. We discussed his imminent retirement and I asked how he felt about his closing career. His answer surprised me: he had been disappointed by academics — most of them are cowards, he lamented. Instantly I admired him more than ever before. Not only because he was right, but because I grasped that he is not.

Teaching Awards Banquet, April 2013 (picture below)

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The Perfect Gentleman

By Jo Labanyi

Dear David,

It is impossible to imagine Hispanism without you, but I am hoping that your retirement will give you the time to be more active than ever. Spanish 18th century studies would not be enjoying its current revival (even I am teaching it now!) had you not been able to make it so interesting and to convey your enthusiasm to others. And we have to thank you for your pioneering work on 19th century Spanish theater which reminded us—before Spanish cultural studies existed—that theater is an industry that depends on entrepreneurs and popular tastes, not to mention the craftsmen who built those stage props and created those special effects. Thanks to you, no longer is Spanish theater seen as just a collection of texts (which it was when I was a student).

Although we have not coincided personally all that often, I have taken away from those occasions an appreciation of your great generosity and sense of fun. I remember well the afternoon, during my visit to UVA, when you drove me round the local countryside, stopping off at local wineries where the conversation was as amazing (I’m tempted to say “delicious” because the gossip was the best part) as the wine. I hope you know that the word that comes to almost everyone’s mind when talking about you is “the perfect gentleman.”

May you have much enjoyment in your retirement.

Jo Labanyi

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My David Gies Story

By Kristin Carlson

My David Gies story is unique. I did not meet David in a classroom or in Spain, I do not speak Spanish and have never been on Semester at Sea. I love him as a brother as that is what he is to me!

I first met David through a phone call from my oldest (or shortest as she prefers to be described) sister, Janna. She called to tell me that she had met someone. Janna was working at the Virginia Quarterly Review and her boss, Staige, had a frequent visitor to the office. Supposedly, David was just writing reviews, but he was quite proficient in his reviews that fall. He also claimed Staige’s dog, who was always at the office, needed attention. Eventually, David asked Janna out for dinner and they began to get to know each other.

I am one of five sisters and although we live all over the world, we are very close. I was tasked with checking this man out to see if he was too good to be true. So, my Mom and I made the trip out to Charlottesville to meet David. We were staying at Janna’s and in the morning there was a knock on the door. There stood the distinguished professor with a jar of peanut butter in his hand. What a perfect introduction to this man who pays attention to details and somehow knew that my mother loves her peanut butter for breakfast. The next few days we experienced his hospitality in many ways. He gave us tours of the university, entertained us with his stories, invited us to attend one of his lectures and, of course, fed us his world renowned paella. And for dessert, he pulled a spaghetti maker out of his bread box and proceeded to make noodles out of ice cream topped with strawberry sauce for the spaghetti sauce!

When I got home from the trip, I immediately received phone calls from the other sisters and I very happily reported that yes, David Gies did get our rousing approval. Or, in movie review language, two thumbs up. In November of that year, Mom and Dad and all the sisters gathered in Charlottesville for Janna and David’s wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony on the UVA campus and we were all thrilled for them and the start of a new chapter in their lives.

In the years since then, my respect and love for David has continued to grow. I have so enjoyed living vicariously through their many adventures. I am pleased and proud to brag about my famous brother-in-law who has been knighted by the King of Spain, honored by the University of Virginia with many accolades, is the world’s foremost authority of 18th Century Spanish erotic literature (or some such thing), and has even been on Jeopardy. But I have to say that for me, the most important thing about David is his presence as a wonderful husband, step-father, grandfather (Lito), uncle to my kids, and my brother. Thank you, David, for enriching all of our lives.