Richard Joseph Schoeck

Memorial services for Richard Joseph Schoeck, 87, Lawrence, will be at 11 a.m. Saturday at Trinity Episcopal Church in Lawrence. Mr. Schoeck died Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2008, at Lawrence Memorial Hospital.He was born Oct. 10, 1920, in New York, the son of Gustav and Frances Kuntz Schoeck. He graduated in 1949 from Princeton University, where he received a Master of Arts and a doctorate in literature.Mr. Schoeck served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps and as a paratrooper during World War II. He taught at Cornell University, Notre Dame University, St. Michael’s College, the University of Toronto, where he served as chairman of the department of English, the University of Colorado and University of Trier in Germany. He also served as director of research at the Folger Shakespeare Library and as editor of the Shakespeare Quarterly in Washington, D.C. He was a visiting lecturer or scholar at Yale, Princeton, the University of Dallas, College of St. Thomas and Corpus Christi College at Oxford University in England. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and was a member of the Royal Historical Society. He was the recipient of four Fulbright scholarships, a Guggenheim scholarship and a Ford scholarship, as well as several Canada Council Fellowships. Mr. Schoeck worked on the Thomas More project at Yale University during the 1950s and 1960s and edited several volumes of More’s writings. He authored a two-volume biography, “Erasmus of Europe.” He was the author of four volumes of poetry and hundreds of scholarly articles, papers, addresses and a number of edited volumes, including two volumes of literary criticism with Marshall McLuhan. He was a dedicated volunteer at Audio Reader in Lawrence and a longtime member of Imagination and Place after he retired. He enjoyed spending time with his children and friends.Mr. Schoeck married Reta Haberer in 1945. She died in 1989. He married Megan Lloyd on Feb. 14, 1977. She died in November 2005. Survivors include a son, Eric Schoeck and wife Deborah, East Haven, Conn.; two daughters, Christine Schoeck and husband John Molleson, Edinburgh, Scotland, and Jennifer Schoeck and husband Greg Karas, Saskatchewan, Canada; a sister, Madelaine “Sugie” Simon, Atlanta; five grandchildren, Jordan, Adam, Kate, Nadya and Thomas. He was preceded in death by a brother, Robert.The family will receive friends at the church after the services.The family suggests memorials to Douglas County Visiting Nurses Association or Imagination and Place at the Lawrence Arts Center, sent in care of Warren-McElwain Mortuary.Online condolences may be sent at www.warrenmcelwain.com, subject: Schoeck