Doris Jakubec

She served between 1981 and 2003 as director of the "Centre des littératures en Suisse romande" (CRLR / "Center for Swiss Francophone Literatures") at the University of Lausanne.

Under her direction it evolved into a more broadly based reference institute on French-language literature, while continuing to develop its core mission of conserving and improving access to original manuscripts and documents.

During her period in charge, reflecting the international political and economic trends of those times, there was an increase in interest by researchers from Japan, China, America, Russia, the Czech Republic, Romania, and Hungary.

Her own passions include "genetic criticism" and a preference for original manuscripts, enabling researchers to study texts without the mediation of intervening generations of scholars.

[14] Other important projects to which she had contributed include numerous re-issues of out-of-print novels by Guy de Pourtalès, such as "Nous, a qui rien n'appartient, voyage au pays Kmer" ("We who have nothing, journey to the land of the Khmer")[15] and La Pêche miraculeuse ("The miraculaous peach").

[16] She also gathered, edited and produced a three volume compilation of the correspondence of de Pourtalès between 1909 nd 1941, thereby bringing together in one research tool a number of important authors, essayists and critics from the interwar years.

[18] Although he was born in Switzerland, Joël Jakubec's family roots track back to the central European region defined by twentieth century Czechoslovakia.

Through her husband, Doris Jakubec discovered the breadth and richness of Czech literature, from the works of Jan Hus and Franz Kafka to those of Vaclav Havel.

Through her new-found insights into Czech literature she was able to identify many currents with which she was already familiar in the Romandy region of western Switzerland, notably with regard to the parallel evolutions of Protestant Christianity in a surrounding internationally Roman Catholic political context, but also with respect to minority cultures and languages.