Word: dunne
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Born in Arbuttnott, Scotland, Dunn lived in Edinburgh until he was 12, when his family immigrated to Boston. Hisf father was a Presbyterian clergyman (there are seven in Dunn's immediate family) and his mother a graduate of the University of London. "We came over in a ship called the Celtic," Dunn recalls...
...Dunn's specialty is medieval literature of Scotland and Ireland, but his academic capacities are enormous and his interests awesome. At Ontario's MacMasters College, he majored in and English with a Latin-Greek option, but he also managed a full program of chemistry courses. "I was interested in the courses we used to call 'radio-active', which, as you know, have become rather important," Dunn says...
...during graduate school, Dunn finally decided to commit himself to medieval language and literature; he received Harvard degrees in that field. He won a post-graduate Dexter travelling fellowship and recalls that "the money was supposed to be for a Harvard man visiting the cathedral towns of England." He persuaded the fellowship officials to let him try something else, arguing that "it wasn't a very good time to be seeing the cathedral towns of England and I had seen them all anyway." He went instead to Cape Breton to study the Scot-Gaelic settlements there, and took his bride...
Since that honeymoon-research trip, Dunn has been happiest as a travel-scholar. His interest in Celtic fluctuates between medieval literature and the few remnants of authentic Celtic culture in the world today. "They call it 'folk' culture," Dunn says, "but they're more than folk to me--they're friends. My wife and I go to Cape Breton every chance...
After the first year in Cape Breton, Dunn's career took the wandering course usual for young scholars. He taught at Stephens, a two-year college for girls in Missouri, and then at Cornell, Toronto, and N.Y.U. Sabbaticals took him back to the British Isles many times; it was while in Britain on a Guggenheim that he received the offer from Harvard...