MATHILDE MONNIER
1876 - 1954
Mathilde Monnier, Professor Emeritus of French, was
born in Switzerland on May 26, 1876, and died there
at her home in Porrentruy, on April 22, l954.
She came to Vassar in 1909, after teaching for seven
years at Putnam Hall in Poughkeepsie, and served the
college as a distinguished member of the French
Department until l944.
Miss Monnier's work in the first World War was
significant. In 1918 she was granted leave of absence
to assist American soldiers of foreign origin at Camp
Devens, and in the summer of 1919 she was with the
Y.W.C.A. in France, dealing with the problem of sending
French war brides to America - an experience she
described in the Vassar Quarterly of May 1920.
While greatly attached to her work and her friends
here, Miss Monnier remained the the European in our
midst. Her summer vacations and her subsequent
leaves of absence were spent in travel and, most often,
at her apartment in Paris - where she entertained many
of the contemporary writers with whom she was acquainted.
Miss Monnier's students were admiring and devoted; they
felt her power and her charm and were appreciative of
her tireless efforts on their behalf. All her life she
counted many lasting friends among them. As a teacher
she maintained strict discipline and the highest
standards. Under her instruction the students worked
their hardest, and longed to excel. They discovered
not only the meaning of the classics but also the rhythm
and the tone. For Miss Monnier was one of the rare
teachers of language and literature who was herself a
poet. This was proved - long before her own volume of
verse appeared - by her exquisitely sensitive and musical
reading of the literature she taught. She introduced and
established in the Vassar curriculum the first courses
in contemporary French literature and in diction.
In 192k Miss Monnier and Miss White collaborated in
translating from the French a novel by Isabelle Sandy,
Andorra, which was published by Houghton Mifflin.
Miss Monnier's volume of poems entitled Dispersion,
appeared in l942, published in New York By Ehe Editions
MATHILDE MONNIER (Continued)
de la Maison francaise, in a series which included
works by several of the leading French writers. One
of the publishers remarked after reading the manuscript:
"I1 y a de la musique dedans." As in her work, so in
her bearing, there was artistry and distinction, and
in her life clarity of purpose courageously carried out
to the end.
Respectfully submitted,
Winifred Smith
John R. Miller
Margaret de Sghweinitz
XIII - 468