Hammond, Robert M. (Robert Morris), 1920-

Robert Hammond (b. 1920) is Professor Emeritus of French Literature and Cinema from SUNY-Cortland. He earned a BA from the University of Rochester (1942), and both an MA (1947) and PhD (1952) from Yale University. He was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to France (1949-1950) along with numerous other honors, fellowships and grants. Hammond was an instructor, and then professor of French at the University of Arizona-Tucson (1953-1967). He later was professor of French at Harvard University (1965-1966), and a visiting professor of French Literature and Cinema at Wells College in Aurora, NY (1967-1968). Since 1968, Hammond has taught at SUNY-Cortland, where he also served as chair of the International Communications and Culture Department. Hammond currently resides in Paris, France. Along with being a dedicated instructor, Hammond has published numerous analyses and criticisms of French literature and films, translated texts between French and English, and contributed countless papers and general scholarship on the French cinema. Much of Hammond's extensive scholarly work focuses on French filmmaker Jean Cocteau, and his bilingual edition of Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast (NYU Press, 1970) is widely cited. Hammond is also the author of over 40 plays in both English and French and various other works of both poetry and prose.

Robert Hammond (b. 1920) is Professor Emeritus of French Literature and Cinema from SUNY-Cortland. He earned a BA from the University of Rochester (1942), and both an MA (1947) and PhD (1952) from Yale University. He was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to France (1949-1950) along with numerous other honors, fellowships and grants. Hammond was an instructor, and then professor of French at the University of Arizona-Tucson (1953-1967). He later was professor of French at Harvard University (1965-1966), and a visiting professor of French Literature and Cinema at Wells College in Aurora, NY (1967-1968). Since 1968, Hammond has taught at SUNY-Cortland, where he also served as chair of the International Communications and Culture Department. Hammond currently resides in Paris, France. Along with being a dedicated instructor, Hammond has published numerous analyses and criticisms of French literature and films, translated texts between French and English, and contributed countless papers and general scholarship on the French cinema. Much of Hammond's extensive scholarly work focuses on French filmmaker Jean Cocteau, and his bilingual edition of Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast (NYU Press, 1970) is widely cited. Hammond is also the author of over 40 plays in both English and French and various other works of both poetry and prose.

Hammond began collecting film scripts in 1953 when he realized that this category of literary production by such writers as Sartre, Cocteau and Prevert risked falling into oblivion. To Hammond, their work in film deserves the same literary merit as their poems, novels and plays; serious and thorough study of a writer requires consultation of almost everything he/she committed to paper. Further, he observed that critics blandly judged the quality of dialogues in a film from what they remembered having heard during the showing of the firm, whereas, in the case of a play, the same or similar critics would spend significantly more time and attention studying the written dialogue before drawing a definite conclusion. Hammond concluded that the written script was crying out to be studies as a facet of literature. So he decided to find as many scripts as he could, and to accumulate them in the hope that some day a new generation of scholars might find them a valuable resource.

Robert Hammond (b. 1920) was Professor Emeritus of French Literature and Cinema from SUNY-Cortland. He earned a BA from the University of Rochester (1942), and both an MA (1947) and PhD (1952) from Yale University. He was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to France (1949-1950) along with numerous other honors, fellowships and grants. Hammond was an instructor, and then professor of French at the University of Arizona-Tuscon (1953-1967). He later was professor of French at Harvard University (1965-1966), and a visiting professor of French Literature and Cinema at Wells College in Aurora, NY (1967-1968). After 1968 Hammond taught at SUNY-Cortland, where he also served as chair of the International Communications and Culture Department. He died in Paris, France in May 2009.

Hammond published numerous analyses and critiques of French literature and films, translated texts between French and English, and contributed countless papers and general scholarship on French cinema. Much of Hammond's scholarly work focused on French filmmaker Jean Cocteau, and his bilingual edition of Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast (NYU Press, 1970) is a widely cited work. Hammond was the author of over 40 plays in both English and French and various other works of both poetry and prose.

Hammond began collecting film scripts in 1953 when he realized that this category of literary production by such writers as Sartre, Cocteau and Prevert risked falling into oblivion. Hammond believed that their work in film deserved the same literary merit as their poems, novels and plays, and that serious and thorough study of a writer requires consultation of almost everything he/she committed to paper. Further, he observed that critics blandly judged the quality of dialogues in a film from what they remembered having heard during the showing of the film, whereas, in the case of a play, the same or similar critics would spend significantly more time and attention studying the written dialogue before drawing a definite conclusion. Hammond concluded that the written script was crying out to be studied as a facet of literature. He decided to find as many scripts as he could, and to accumulate them in the hope that some day a new generation of scholars might find them a valuable resource.

Robert Hammond (b. 1920) was Professor Emeritus of French Literature and Cinema at SUNY-Cortland. He earned a BA from the University of Rochester (1942), and both an MA (1947) and PhD (1952) from Yale University. He was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to France (1949-1950) along with numerous other honors, fellowships and grants. Hammond was an instructor, and then professor of French at the University of Arizona-Tuscon (1953-1967). He later was professor of French at Harvard University (1965-1966), and a visiting professor of French Literature and Cinema at Wells College in Aurora, NY (1967-1968). After 1968 Hammond taught at SUNY-Cortland, where he also served as chair of the International Communications and Culture Department.

Along with being a dedicated instructor, Hammond published numerous analyses and critiques of French literature and films, translated texts between French and English, and contributed countless papers and general scholarship on the French cinema. Much of Hammond’s extensive scholarly work focused on French filmmaker Jean Cocteau, and his bilingual edition of Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast (NYU Press, 1970) is widely cited within the academy. Hammond wrote over 40 plays in both English and French and various other works of both poetry and prose. Hammond died in May 2009 in Paris, France.