Professor Hazel Walford Davies

It is with sadness that we report the passing of Professor Hazel Walford Davies, a former Aberystwyth University lecturer, historian and literary critic. She died aged 85 in November. Former colleagues have paid the following tributes:

David Ian Rabey, Emeritus Professor, Department of Theatre, Film & Television Studies: Hazel Walford Davies conducted vital work on contemporary Welsh dramatists, inviting specific writers to visit Aberystwyth and conduct workshops with students as part of their study of their wider work, endorsing and augmenting the department's vital principles of incorporating work by and with living practitioners of theatre. This informed her collection of essays, State of Play, including a section on the work of Ed Thomas which importantly helped foster the working relationship between that dramatist-director and the department, which issued in a day symposium on his work in Aberystwyth which Hazel chaired in 2008, and extended into working opportunities for students on the production of the television series Y Gwyll/Hinterland.

Professor Jamie Medhurst from the Department of Theatre, Film & Television Studies said:

I have very happy memories of working with Hazel in the Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies and when I joined the Department in 1996, she was among the first to welcome me warmly. One wonderful memory I have is back in 1999 when we as staff had the opportunity to look around our new building, the Parry-Williams Building on the Penglais campus. The building wasn't ready, but we went in, single file, and I'll never forget Hazel dressed very smartly, as usual, wearing a pair of wellington boots and striding through the scaffolding, wooden planks, and mud!

So many Aberystwyth drama students have benefited from her teaching and scholarship, particularly in the fields of American drama and theatre in Wales. Her love for her subject and her love for her students was clear to everyone who met her. Already, one student has contacted me to say that ‘she was a great lecturer, full of life and so supportive' and another has simply said, 'Legend!'.

I extend my deepest sympathies to Walford, Damien, Jason, and to all the family.