Inside Issue 12: Remembering Jane
This issue is dedicated to the memory of our dear friend and gifted colleague Elizabeth Jane Doering (1933-2024). As a colleague Jane was “hands on,” always there to help, especially when it came to inspiring young scholars and teachers. Her contributions to this Journal were many and valuable. As a Weil scholar, Jane was both informed and imaginative; she had a knack for nuance of the kind that illuminates texts. Spirted though collegial, Jane’s presence in the room was uplifting — she had a way of bringing out the best in people. In thinking of how to honor Jane, we thought it fitting to offer commentaries on a famous Weil essay (“Reflections on the Good Use of School Studies with a View to the Love of God”) — the kind of Weil essay Jane surely valued as a teacher and a Weil scholar.
Kathryn Lawson organized our symposium tribute to Jane’s memory. It is also fitting that she should do so if only because Jane’s last recorded exchange was with Kate (see here).
Eric Springsted, Jane’s friend and longtime colleague, has penned a tribute to her in this issue, a quote from which appears below:
While it comes out in the work, what underlies being a good colleague is character. Jane was personally a great person, willing to give of herself. For all the years of the Weil Society, she continually thought of “the young people,” as she always put it, i.e., the students of Weil’s thought, and the future generations of Weil scholars. She was a delight to be with, witty, an astute observer of people, a good raconteuse, and a sympathetic ear, as through the years many of us shared our personal and family joys and sorrows at each year’s meeting. That is what a great colleague is.
See video of Memorial Mass for Jane here.
Video Images of Jane
Though she certainly had her scholarly side, Jane was no wooden academic figure. She was, to be sure, a colorful soul. And when required, the Irish side of her could take charge and, as they say, “captain the ship.” While the five video clips below do not really reveal her more spirited side, they nonetheless provide a filmed glimpse of Jane “in action.”
- E. Jane Doering : Simone Weil and the Empire of Force (in French)
- Event with E. Jane Doering and Ruthann Knechel
- Decreation for the Anthropocene Book Launch
- A Summer Solstice Fire in Pandemic Time: Prophetic Imaginations of Flannery O’Conner & Simone Weil
- Simone Weil and the Empire of Force, The Open University of Israel (at 27.05)
Books by Jane
- Simone Weil and the Specter of Self-Perpetuating Force (University of Notre Dame Press, 2010)
- When Fiction & Philosophy Meet: A Conversation with Flannery O’Connor and Simone Weil (Mercer University Press, 2019) (coauthored with Ruthann Knechel Johansen)
- Christian Platonism of Simone Weil, Doering & Springsted, eds. (University of Notre Dame Press, 2004)
Jane’s Ph.D. Dissertation
- “The Development of Simone Weil’s Social and Political Thought” (Northwestern University, 1992)
Selected Articles by Jane
- « La vérité face aux structures injustes. Paul Farmer en Haïti », Cahiers Simone Weil, XLVII, no. 1 (2024)
- “Literature at the Service of Truth: Simone Weil and ‘L’Enracinement’,” Labyrinth, vol. 25, pp. 13-33 (2023)
- E.J. Doering & Ruthann Knechel Johnson, “Prophetic Voices: Simone Weil and Flannery O’Connor,” Philosophical Investigations, vol. 43, pp. 101-114 (2019)
- Review of “On the Abolition of Political Parties” by Simone Weil, Common Knowledge, vol. 21, pp. 516-517 (2015)
- “Despair is the Handmaiden of War,” in The Relevance of the Radical : Simone Weil 100 Years Later, A. Rebecca Rozelle-Stone & Lucian Stone, eds. (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2009), pp. 159-175.
- “Comment la force se perpétue elle-même,” Diogene, (2003), pp. 121-138
- “Gaining Competence in Communication and Culture through French Advertisements,” The French Review, vol. 66, no. 3, pp. 420-432 (1993).
