Jaume Medina i Casanovas (Vic, Barcelona 6 April 1949 – Barcelona, 11 March 2023)[1] was a Catalan philologist, latinist, writer, translator and poet.[2]
Medina went to the high school in his birthplace and he got his degree in Classical Philology in the University of Barcelona (1972). In 1976 he wrote his doctoral dissertation about The classical Rhythms in Catalan poetry in the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where he got his doctoral degree, and where he worked as a Latin Philology teacher since 1972 (professor since 2009).
His researches have been basically philological, and have been dedicated to the Latin language and literature from all ages, with a special attention to vulgar, late, medieval and humanistic Latin, together with classical rhetoric, metre and stylistics, and also to Roman thought and civilization. He has taken part in several courses of introduction to Latin and he has also managed several master courses. He has collaborated in many research projects and he has become the director of a research project whose main aim is the edition of several Ramon Llull's Latin works. As a researcher he has published more than three hundred works about Latin Philology (language and literature), classical tradition and Catalan Philology (language and literature). He has taught many courses, seminars and conferences about ancient and modern literature. He was the founder of the Catalan Society of Classical Studies (1979), and also coordinator of the Carles Riba Symposium (1984). He was member of the editorial staff of the Fundació Bernat Metge. He has been one of the collaborators of the Riquer-Comas-Molas' Historia de la literatura catalana.
Medina made several translations into Catalan that were published in the collections of Textos Filosòfics (Philosophical Texts) Clàssics del Cristianisme (Classics of Christianism) and Fundació Bernat Metge. He was collaborator of the Raimundus-Lullus-Institut from the University of Freiburg (Germany) in the task of edition of Ramon Llull's Latin works. He has published also in Corpus Christianorum, Continuatio Mediaeualis collection, published in Turnhout (Belgium) by Brepols.
His articles and studies have appeared in several research and creation reviews, such as Presència, Els Marges, Faventia, Reduccions, Llengua & Literatura, Serra d'Or, Revista de Catalunya, L'Avenç, Clot, Faig, Quaderns de Pastoral, Ausa, Qüestions de Vida Cristiana, Cala Murta, Estudis Romànics, Ínsula, Revista de Filología Románica, Revista de lenguas y literaturas catalana, gallega y vasca, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, Quaderns de Versàlia, Llengua Nacional, Studia Lulliana, and the digital reviews Methodos, Mirandum, Convenit, Revista Internacional d'Humanitats, Notandum, Mirabilia.
Medina also collaborated in daily newspapers such as La Vanguardia, El País, Avui, Catalunya Cristiana, El 9 Nou and the digital newspaper Núvol.
Medina developed an important task in the field of literary creation. He was a member of the 1970 generation, and he took part in the foundation of the poetry collections Llibres del Mall and Ausiàs March (1973), where he published his first verse books. His poems dealt with a wide range of matters. He also wrote literary critiques and essays. Medina was the author of a theater work and a novel. His translations of ancient and modern authors have had a wide circulation.