Quiet life for university don

Press, 2 November 1981, Page 12

Quiet life for university don

NZPA London A Cambridge University don has revealed that he has taught only 16 students in his 33 years on the staff. ‘ Dr Ilya Gershevitch. aged 66, is reader in Iranian studies, embracing one modern and six ancient languages, each with • its own script It is the only course of its type in Britain. Dr Gershevitch told a reporter that although the total of 16 students “was not a lot.” seven who successfully gained their B.A. degree in Iranian studies went on "to high-powered jobs in the great universities of Europe.” The don’s small but select band of students came to light when the council of the Cambridge University Senate, facing economies in spending, considered abolishing the subject of Iranian studies from the syllabus.

In a vote seen by some, teachers as a test case for other less popular subjects, the Regent House — the Cambridge governing body — voted to retain it by 195 votes to 157.

“I’m very pleased,” Swissborn Dr Gershevitch said. “It makes me very proud to be part of the academic com-

munity. It is a wonder place and this decision illi trates the respect for kno ledge and civilised vak which I have always asso ated with England. \ • “If it had been remov this time it might not ha been restored for 200 years Just one undergrhdua started the subject this ter the first to do so for mo than 10 years. Dr Gershevitch said: “It not only a specialist subje but a lot of young men a women who come here a not intellectually w< equipped to begin studying “You must have some cla sical background. You mu be able to read easily Latin and Greek and have least a reading knowledge French and German ai preferably Russian. “These are not the lai guages of the Shah and Ay; tollah. They do not incluc modern Persian. These lai guages give a great insigi into English and other Indi European languages.”

He said that when he wa not teaching he did researc in libraries, "Any library can lay my hands on. Ther is a great deal of work to b done. There is much virgi soil left on the, subject.”