Melanie changed my life. We first met in 1972 when as a UC Berkeley undergrad I signed up for the first Women’s Studies class ever taught on the campus and there she was in all her brilliant intense radiance. She was our professor, but she soon became, at least for me, at least for awhile, my closest friend. First there was her boundless love of literature. The syllabus was prescient and perfect: Alice Walker, Tillie Olsen, Adrienne Rich and so many more — each class, each reading, a transformative experience as mediated by Melanie. Then there was her compassion, and her acceptance of me as a pretty bruised, lost soul. She, like me, grew up in a working-class, violent household and she insisted in naming it and deshaming it. We healed together in recognition. When Melanie took her job at Portland State in the English Department, I went, too — enrolled in the MA program and taught writing. I didn’t stay for long but our friendship endured. Thank you for believing in me, Melanie. Thank you for giving so much to so many.
—Dorothy Sue Cobble, Rutgers University-New Brunswick