I -

STAFF

Professor

Senior Lecturer

Lecturers

THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

FACULTY OF ARTS

DEPARTMENT OF FRENCH

ANNUAL REPORT 1967

38/1968

D.P. Scales, B.A.(Syd.), D. de l'U. (Paris)

Ethel E. Tory, B.A. Dip.Ed . (W. Aust.), D. de l'U. (Paris) - On leave in 1967

G.J. Halligan, M.A. (N.Z.), M.Litt. (Cantab.) Viviane Smith, L. es L., Dip. d'Etud. Sup.

(Rennes) J.A. Grieve, B.A. (Belf.), M.A. C.G. Crisp, M.A. (N.Z.), D. de l'U.

(Aix-Marseille)

Temporary Lecturer Jacqueline Lecorcher, L. es L., Dip. d' Etud.

Secretary

OBJECTIVES

Sup. (Paris), Agregee d'anglais

Katharine J. Walker (During Miss Walker's absence on leave without pay from July to November, Mrs R. Muusze, a former Secretary in this Department, came back as Temporary Secretary.)

Research activities are referred to elsewhere in this report. The principal concern of the academic staff as a body has been to provide a range of challenging courses for our undergraduates. We aim at helping our students to achieve a high degree of proficiency in the language, and ou_r means to that end are the use of French in certain courses of lectures, discussions in small tutorial groups with French as the mediurn 6 language laboratory sessions and regular written exercises. Our courses are also designed to give students a soundly based and fairly comprehensive knowledge of France and its civilization, mainly through the study and critical appraisal of works of literature. The present programme appears to be meeting these ·objectives quite well, but we are conscious of the need to keep the contents and methods under scrutiny. A particularly pleasing feature has been the consolidation of the honours school: we now regularly have a core of good honours students at all stages of the course.

ENROLMENTS AND EXAMINATION RESULTS

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Initial Number Passed Failed

enrolment examined

French Language & Literature I 53 41 30 (incl. 6 HD, 6 D, 8 Cr) 11

French Language & Literature II 28 22 18 ( incl. 3 HD, 2 D, 2 Cr) 4

French Language & Literature III 13 11 10 ( incl. 1 HD, 4 D, 2 Cr) 1

L·· rench Studies B 13 11 10 (incl. 2 HD : 1 D, 1 Cr) 1

French IV 3 3 One candidate was awarded First Class Honours, and the other two were classed as H2A.

* + 1 to take deferred examination in February 1968.

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Two of the students in French IV were holders of Final Honours Year Scholarships. Alliance Fran9aise Prizes were awarded as follows: First Year, D.R. Fraser: Second Year, Deborah J. Wilkins: Third Year, Judith A. King: Fourth Yeart Jane P. Gilmour.

RESEARCH

Professor Scales completed the first draft of a monograph on Aldous Huxley and France. During her study leave, Dr Tory continued the revision of her doctoral thesis with a view to publication, and accepted an invitation from Harrap to produce an edition of Giraudoux's Intermezzo. Mr Halligan has had an article, "La Chronigue de Mathieu d'Escouchy", accepted for publication in Romania, and is now working on an article on Chretien de Troyes. Miss Smith, who is a candidate for the Doctorat es Lettres, is gathering material for her study of the novelist Rene Behaine. Mr Grieve is primarily interested in certain aspects of the twentieth-century novel, but has also been doing some work on Montaigne; he began a year's study leave in December. Dr Crisp continued working on Saint-Exupery. Mrs J. Hensen was awarded a Master's Scholarship and enrolled in June: her research, supervised by Mr Halligan, is on Chretien de Troyes.

OTHER ACTIVITIES

Professor Scales completed his second year as Dean of the Faculty at the end of October, when he was succeeded by Professor Learmonth. He again acted as external examiner for B.A. final honours in the University of Tasmania. He was re-elected Vice-President of the Alliance Fran9aise de Canberra, and Miss Smith and Mr Grieve were also re-elected to the Committee. In March M. Maurice Brueziere, Directeur de l'Ecole Pratique de l'Alliance Fran9aise de Paris, visited Canberra and gave a lecture on Albert Camus at the University. In May, the "Treteau de Paris" Company gave performances of Moliere's Les Femmes savantes and Anouilh's Antigone at the Canberra Theatre: this was an exciting and epoch-making event. On a lower plane artistically, but of considerable value to the participants and enjoyed by the audience, was the students' play, performed in July during "French Week". The play chosen this year was a comedy by Jacques Prevert. The performance was preceded by a talk on Prevert given by Miss Lecorcher. During the August vacation all members of staff (except of course Dr Tory, who was away on leave) attended the Eleventh A.U.L.L.A. Congress, at the University of Sydney.

D.P. Scales Professor of French