English Retirees Newsletter

19th Edition, September 2009

Editor’s Introduction

I hope you enjoy this year’s newsletter. We got a great response, including several photos.

This issue is laid out in two columns, both because I think it’s easier to read that way and because if you want to enlarge the text on your computer screen, you’ll be able to read a whole column width without having to scroll sideways.

The font is 12-point Times New Roman, which is installed on almost all computers.

You should also be able to click on the use the hyperlinks in this newsletter by clicking on them.

If you prefer, of course, you can print the whole thing out and read it on paper. I let InDesign automatically hyphenate the text, so it may not be perfect.

Nobody asked for a contribution to be edited for posting on the Department of English website, so I will be getting that done in a couple of weeks. This is your last chance to opt out if you wish.

I copied some of the heading info from last year’s newsletter. If any of it is dated or otherwise erroneous, let me know if you change your e-mail address.

A note that may be useful to some of you: I just had to renew my emeritus access to the library’s resources (particularly the online OED). Last year, they decided to annually cancel all retirees’ access and require them to renew it. I got help from the online help desk.

The library offers a huge variety of electronic research tools and journals now, and it’s worth maintaining your access. The process of renewing seems to be somewhat complicated, so you need to keep checking to see whether it’s taken effect.

I recently got an interesting bit of spam aimed at academics. Someone had taken a set of guidelines for reviewers working for Elsevier publications and altered it to say that you could be paid handsomely for reviewing articles for them if you registered by sending in $200! I hope most of us are too sophisticated to be taken in by a scheme like that.

You can view great photos of many of our colleagues attending Dick Law’s retirement reception at Shutterfly.

Nick Kiessling calls our attention to an interesting interview with one of our most distinguished graduates, Noel Riley Fitch (Ph.D. 1969) in Washington State Magazine.

Many thanks to Bob Johnson and Nick for all their fine work on the newsletter over the years, and to George Kennedy for his continued support and encouragement.

Paul Brians

Email: paulbrians@gmail.com

Chair’s Message

September 16, 2009

Dear Retirees,

We are beginning this new fall semester with good energy and hopeful spirit as we finally turn the corner into the more fully understood landscape of fiscal restraint. Having been a part of the extensive University discussions on reducing the budget for the biennium, 2009-2011, the English Department weathered the fiscal storm in generally good shape. Except for the loss of one unfilled tenure-track faculty line in Pullman and the reduction and reassignment of some instructors in our Distance Degree offerings, our permanent and temporary faculty positions remain intact. And in fact, we have actually had the privilege of hiring a new tenure-track faculty member in Tri-Cities. Andrea Davis joins us as Assistant Professor of English with emphasis in rhetoric and composition and will fill the Writing Program Administration position we have needed in TC since the advent of their four year undergraduate program. We are lucky to have Andrea with us and welcome her warmly.

Despite the difficulties of last year, we continue to offer, with some adjustments, our usual broad and full range of courses, both in the English and Digital Technology and Culture majors and in GERs in English, humanities, and writing. Our classes are all being taught at full capacity; our new graduate student cohort of 17 students is finding its way with exciting energy; and our faculty colleagues are rejuvenated in both new and continuing research and scholarly projects.

The only area undergoing uncomfortable change as a result of budget cuts, is that of our wonderful support personnel. The consolidation of support personnel into central CLA service centers will mean a reassignment of duties for those who have worked so well and faithfully with us for years. These folks will continue to work with us but in different capacities, not yet fully understood. This will be a difficult time of adjustment for all, but especially for them, and we all are trying to pitch in to make the transition as smooth as possible.

Another area of change, which we here feel is uncomfortable, but for those to whom it’s happening is hardly so, is our loss to your ranks of Dick Law and Alex Hammond. After 39 years for Dick and 34 for Alex of marvelously dedicated scholarship, teaching, and service, both took their final official WSU bows and retired at the end of last academic year. We were able to fete Dick properly a couple of times in his multiple collegial capacities, but Alex, in his own way, successfully ducked party opportunities and resigned himself to watching our taped enthusiastic kudos in the privacy of his own Pullman home. Dick and Alex grew up together in Pullman, and this year, serendipity stepped in and they retired together. We will miss them greatly and wish them the very best.

Last year, in the face of budget cuts, I asked for help and support from everybody. And now as we know the surer realities of those reductions, I am again calling for everyone’s present and future support. It’s with your help that our students and faculty alike can continue to encourage some of the best thinking in the humanities and liberal arts that universities like ours have to offer. So, please keep us in your thoughts and in touch with you. Our best to all of you.

George Kennedy

Paul Brians (WSU 1968–2008)

After a full year of living in our house on Bainbridge Island we’re still delighted with it and very much enjoying our life on “the west side.” (Did you know Seattleites refer to Bellevue, Redmond, etc. as “the east side”? Their vision of the state stops at the Cascades, except at Apple Cup time.) It’s a good thing we like it here, because we can’t afford to carry out the elaborate travel plans we had made for our retirement.

We made the trip to Pullman for the retirement parties for Charles Argersinger and Dick Law and enjoyed reconnecting with old friends. I took the opportunity to privately catch up with and congratulate Alex Hammond on the latter occasion. He had adamantly refused to participate in any sort of farewell party for himself, but everyone knows the enormously valuable and generous contributions he made to the department over the years.

This summer Paula went Pullman a third time for a Knitters’ group dinner and reunion at Birgitta Ingemanson’s house, driving over with Bonnie Frederick and Patricia Watkinson. Several Pullman friends came over to visit us on the island this year, including the Kiesslings, Alice Spitzer, Jana Argersinger, and Dick and Fran Law.

We made weekend trips to Vancouver (spent a whole day exploring Stanley Park on foot), Portland, and the Oregon coast (Gearhart Beach). We enjoyed an afternoon with Susan Chan, former piano prof at WSU, in Portland. She’s going up for tenure at Portland State this fall.

The second edition of Common Errors in English Usage came out in November 2008, and is selling fairly well considering that most book sales are way down during the current recession. The fifth annual calendar based on the book has just been published as well. I had long interview about the book on “The Lionel Show” (Air America) and a short one with a very young journalist in Houston (Youth Radio).

With the help of a couple of volunteer web designers, I remodeled the Common Errors website to make it a bit more attractive and easier to use. I’ve also renamed it Common Errors in English Usage to match the book title. 

Our translations from the Reading About the World anthologies continue to be popular sources for textbooks and coursepacks around the country. I hear from permission seekers several times a year. Sometimes we even get paid.

I heard from two grad students using my South Asian lit work–one in Tunisia and the other in India. I try to keep up on the latest South Asian fiction in English. I’ve also heard recently from former advisees and have gotten a lot of help from Linda Carlson, who took Shakespeare from me way back in the early 70s. I ran into another student (now retired) when I gave my lecture this winter at Columbia Basin Community College. Nothing like meeting a retired former student to make you feel your age.

Besides working on my website, my main activities involve gardening (trying––mostly in vain––to find ways to outwit the deer and rabbits who use our garden as a salad bar), photography, cooking, walking, watching films, and reading whatever catches my fancy.

I’ve given several talks at area libraries on various topics and hope to do more. A book signing at the UW bookstore turned out to be scheduled for the same time as Obama’s State of the Union address, and drew a small audience; but we were delighted that the group included Leota and Dutch Day. We enjoyed catching up with them and hope to see more of them.

Despite the competition, not only are we still enthusiastic about Obama, but are especially enjoying finally living in a “blue” area of the state. Republicans are rarities on the island.

Last year was an outstanding one for photographing the island, with the most colorful autumn and the snowiest winter in local memory. Spring was typically wet and green (rhododendrons and dogwood everywhere), and summer was very hot. I’ve been recording the changes of the seasons with my camera and assembling the results into a series of photo books created in iPhoto.

Paula got a job as soprano section leader for a local church choir and joined the local chorale and a couple of other local vocal groups. But her biggest activities resulted from her part-time job as a program director for the local arts and humanities council. She organized and ran the local film festival (only films made by people from Bainbridge or films about Bainbridge), National Poetry Month, and some other events. All of this resulted in our getting connected with a wide variety of people in the arts.

Paula’s Sarah Palin portrait was a feature of the local “Pumpkin Walk” for Halloween.

After a snowstorm knocked out our power on Christmas Eve and we discovered that our generator had been rewired to not work with our heating system (following changes in the revised building code), we took refuge with our neighbors across the street and enjoyed dinner the next day with them as well, chatting in French with the wife’s Haitian-born mother. 

We viewed July 4th fireworks over the moonlit Eagle Harbor ferry landing from the balcony of Bev and Gerry Young, who moved from Pullman to the island several years ago and live in a condo where two other WSU retiree couples also live—the Iulos and the Bartuskas. We enjoy socializing with the Youngs frequently.

On Labor Day, we celebrated with a neighborhood barbecue in our breezeway—six adults and six kids. It was a delightful occasion, with the kids running around in our yard, smoked chicken provided by the couple across the street, and the sound of intermittent showers pelting the trees around us as we listened to 60s rock classics and chatted.

Paul

11734 Kirk Ave. NE
Bainbridge Island, WA 98110
paulbrians@gmail.com

Leota and Dutch Day (WSU l970-1988)

Hello, everyone,

I’m writing this as I sit in our car in our backyard waiting for Grandson Isaac to wake up. He fell asleep on our way home and now I, patiently and quietly, wait. Best not to disturb the little rascal. We still take care of him two days a week and will for the remainder of this year. He is joy bundled with mischief and keeps us running. This afternoon I hope to have him help me dig carrots, but if he manages ten minutes on this activity, it will be a win. He’d rather take a ride in the wheelbarrow (so would I, if I could convince someone to push me).

We’ve had a couple of changes since last year. The biggest is that our son, Chad, was laid off from work in January and is still unemployed. Inevitably, he was depressed, but now seems to be coming out of that.

Kecia continues working for Eddie Bauer, which continues to stay in business in spite of a bankruptcy. She and her family joined Dutch and me in Ixtapa this past February. Isaac was 1-1/2, then, and took to the ocean pretty well. Sand castle building was beyond him, but smashing them wasn’t. Jae and Kecia soon gave up on building castles.

This summer, we upgraded our home insulation with impressive timing—the work was completed just as the temperatures crested at a record 103 degrees. The insulation did an admirable job of keeping the accumulated heat ‘in’ for several days. I think it took a week to get the inside temperature below 85!

I don’t remember such a strange year for weather. Our garden has had a jumpstart this year. We planted vegetables in May rather than mid- to late- June and we began reaping peppers, carrots, and tomatoes in early August. Our dahlias are blooming a month and a half earlier this year than last. Even the house finches are taking advantage of the weather and are hatching at least their third nest.

Dutch will get his first retirement pay raise this fall when he begins collecting Social Security. With that increase, and the fact that our grandchild will begin preschool in January, we are beginning to imagine another European adventure. Except for our annual Mexican trip, we haven’t traveled as much as we had planned, so we’re very excited.

Dutch and I continue to be in good health––discounting the usual achy joints that seems to come with age. My golf game improves and then hits a sand trap. Dutch and I did play the new WSU course and it is a beauty.

Oops! The little terrorist (as Dutch calls him) has woken up. Talk wih you again next year.

Leota and Dutch

5653 11 th  Ave. NE
Seattle, WA 98105
carvil@comcast.net

Diane Gillespie (WSU 1975-2001)

When I wrote last year, we were looking forward to a fall trip through the Copper Canyon in Mexico by train, up the coast to San Diego by cruise ship, and back to Spokane by Amtrak. That was an extremely varied journey, including (in Mexico) everything from black coffins in the square at Creel, commemorating a recent clash between two drug cartels; to the subsistence-level living and basket-weaving of the Tarahumara Indians living in and near the Copper Canyon; to the tourist cities of the western sea coast. After seeing how the Tarahumaras lived, we were put off by the self-indulgence (gluttony?) of some passengers on the ms Oosterdam, but we thoroughly enjoyed Amtrak’s Coastal Starlight Express from LA to Portland. We badly need more rail transport in this country!

Other than a couple of short cross-country ski weekends during the winter, trips in 2009 began in June with the Nineteenth Annual International Conference on Virginia Woolf held this year in New York City at Fordham University, Lincoln Center. I presented a paper, then stayed after the conference for a few days with a friend from University of Alberta days who is a freelance writer in Manhattan. In July, Dick and I went hiking with Elderhostel in the Grand Tetons, just over the Idaho border in Wyoming. We had perfect weather; glorious scenery; and an education in wild flowers, wild critters, Teton geology, and Teton National Park history.

In early August, we flew to Iceland for another Elderhostel hiking trip. The weather there was not perfect, but the scenery––made up of active volcanoes (22 of them), glaciers, rivers and waterfalls––was amazing. We hiked amidst sulfurous steam spewing from bowls in the earth, over black volcanic sand and spongy moss, among oddly shaped formations of lava from long-ago eruptions, and even on a glacier with large blue ice-holes. Iceland is in dire economic straits, in spite of its large fishing industry and energy self-sufficiency (thermal and hydro-electric). Apparently political power was concentrated for too long in the hands of a cadre of men who turned out to be corrupt. 

We returned only to leave again for ten days in Minnesota to spend time with my sister Carole whose health is precarious. We stayed at the family cabin, a place much improved by her three sons. Our next trip, later this September, is to New Hampshire. With his son traveling from Oregon and his brother from Rotterdam, Dick’s nephew’s wedding will be a Domey family reunion.

I’m still writing, and have a chapter accepted for a book on the Hogarth Press. Last year’s Woolf conference paper, now in print in the selected papers volume, is a part of that longer chapter. An illustrated chapter on “Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, and Painting” is forthcoming in 2010 in a collection called The Edinburgh Companion to Virginia Woolf and the Arts. I’m still in an investment club and the League of Women Voters. Dick has been renovating our apartments with an eye to getting rid of some of them. He also has been volunteering at the Gladish Community and Cultural Center. We’ve done the usual concert and play going here and in Spokane. Although we’re still trying to improve our ballroom dancing with occasional lessons, we forget them too soon from lack of practice. We’re continuing work on our house, remodeling the front and residing, probably safer investments than the current stock market.

Greetings to all of you, and thanks to Paul for taking on the editorship of this newsletter.

Diane

945 SE Glen Echo Rd.
Pullman, WA 99163
gillespie@pullman.com

Doug Hughes (WSU 1968–2004)

In many respects it’s been a good twelve months. Personally have had good fortune. Maintained good health, continued physical activities, didn’t lose any money, visited my kids several times, hosted many guests throughout the year, visited Boston, Seattle, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Diego, Victoria, and a couple of times Pullman. Marcia is healthy and active and my 96-year-old father remains in good health in assisted living, though he’s had to give up croquet as well as the javelin now. And of course we bade adieu to one of the worst, most benighted, arrogant Presidents and embraced an intelligent, thoughtful, compassionate African American after a miraculous election. That election alone would have made the year a notable success.

But in other respects, as most would agree, the last year has been disastrous, especially financially for millions of American families and the country as a whole has been wounded. The greed and unethical, if not criminal, behavior of some on Wall Street and in the housing industry, the unconscionable actions of health insurers and the pharmaceutical industry have created a pall of suffering over the country. (“Ask your doctor if Levitra or Plavix or Celebrex is right for you.” By all means as your doctor, ask your doctor again, for more and more drugs.) These are not the good times for many people and for many brighter days are not around the corner. Whereas one would have hoped that Congress would have finally faced our problems directly, there’s only continuing paralysis. The Republicans remain relentlessly negative. Right wing zealots feel even less secure than under Bush and believe irrational rumors and peddle hatred. The Lizard People on the fringes arm themselves and the resurgence of militias in the last year has been documented by many organizations. So for some of us the sun is shining and the sky is blue but even for us there are dark clouds to the west, and for many others the storm has struck: unemployment, lost homes, broken marriages, child and spousal abuse, etc.

Perhaps my somber mood has been influenced or intensified by a book I finished a couple of nights ago. It reminded me forcefully of what I already knew and wanted to bury: this country is in deep trouble; it’s virtually bankrupt and almost no one is willing to face it. We’re in a curious collective denial. Peter G. Peterson is one of those relics, a good, moderate Republican who has served this country in a number of capacities, including Secretary of Commerce; he’s headed Lehman Brothers before that investment firm lost its bearings and he was one of the founders of the Blackstone investment group. In a newly published autobiography Peterson calmly points out that the country is facing an unimaginable, unsustainable crisis that threatens our future, that jeopardizes our very way of life. His is not the voice of a hysterical scaremonger; he speaks rationally about the unresting truth before us––and that’s truly scary enough. The current unprecedented budget deficits and the much talked about gargantuan national debt of 12 trillion dollars, which obviously concerns any rational person, are dwarfed by the total liabilities (entitlements) of the federal government, i.e., all of us. That total is 56 trillion dollars, four times the size of the entire economy, or about $184,000 for each of the 315 million citizens. And we talk of some home owners with shaky mortgages being “underwater”!

(It’s remarkable how big numbers have been tossed around in recent months without any understanding of what the numbers really mean. Most of us cannot get a grip on what a billion of anything really is, let alone a trillion. Possibly there would be greater appreciation of these numbers if we could use units of time as measurements. For example, in twelve days there are a million seconds. To count the seconds in a billion would require 32 years; and it would take 320 centuries to reach a trillion.)

Peterson, an admitted fat cat himself, raises another important point in trying to deal with our financial problems. Like Robert Shiller, Paul Krugman and other respected economists, he is deeply concerned with the widening gap between the rich––some of whom shamelessly evade tax obligations with secret accounts in Switzerland and the Caribbean––and the rest of us. Peterson writes, “The percentage of total income going to the upper one percent has ballooned since 1980 from 10 to 23 percent. Put in even starker terms, the top TENTH OF THAT ONE PERCENT, which also includes me, makes as much money as the bottom 50 percent combined.” Now this is the observation of a moderate who knows that democracy is endangered by this kind of income disparity and not some radical expressing class envy or fomenting class warfare. We could divest ourselves of pessimism taking in these problems and what they mean for the well-being of our children and especially grandchildren if we were focused on ways of dealing with them, but characteristically we cannot bear the reality. Let’s think about such matters tomorrow. Right now the congressman has to work for re-election and the rest of us have other things to do. Besides the sun will come up tomorrow.

Saw a carved, attractive wooden sign hanging over the walkway on Main Street in Nantucket this spring: Life is Good. That’s certainly true. Better end with that.

One final point: Dick Law retired this year. In my judgment he never received the support, let alone the applause, he deserved for his efforts on behalf of gen- eral education from the University faculty or even the English department. Nevertheless, he accomplished a great deal despite the head winds. Paul Brians and I, who worked with him from the beginning, know how successful Dick and Tom Kennedy were in creating courses in world civilizations. It wasn’t easy. Genuine applause.

Doug

1025 Joyce Road
Moscow, Idaho 83843
hughesd215@yahoo.com

Virginia Hyde (WSU 1970–2004)

Dear Friends,

When the “Indian summer” comes around and the crowds of students begin to walk back and forth to classes—and when new plaid skirts or jackets begin to appear on many––I always feel it’s time to start teaching again! But retirement is good, too. It’s been a quiet year in which we have not been traveling but have enjoyed reading good books, gardening a little, keeping up with careers of former students, and writing. So much of our “news” seems a continuation of topics from last year’s letter.

Dave and I continue to enjoy our location at the edge of Pullman near the Coliseum and also near a few orchard trees and pines. My college roommate spent some time with us recently and we recalled events of many years ago in Madison, Wisconsin. (She is a mathematician and a financial planner such as many folks could use these days! So she’s been busy.) We were studying in Madison during turbulent times of protests, bombing, martial law, and so forth. How different it seemed from our friendly WSU campus.

But of course our historic “Hello Walkway,” from the Bookie to Avery Hall, was caught up in the campus rebuilding project and is gone now. We are still saddened by the loss of most of the Avery Hall trees––and now by a loss of parking space and the bus route near our building. Without the Bookie, and with a sea of new concrete replacing many of the past shady walks on that side of our building, we miss the old hub that used to make the Avery area so easy to access and so much a gathering place.

This year my volume in the Cambridge Lawrence edition, Mornings in Mexico and Other Essays, finally came out, as did a book of critical essays. Most of you know that the volume took literally a decade and you’ll be glad to know of its completion.

But I’m intending to write more poetry in the future: that’s been my real ambition, to have time to attend to the muse! I know I keep saying that but am really starting to realize this plan!

A big thank you to Paul Brians for continuing the Newsletter and to Nick and Bob for past issues. I think of you all and hope you and your loved ones are all doing very well!

Very best wishes,

Virginia Hyde

hydev@wsunix.wsu.edu

Bob Johnson (WSU 1957–1988)

Dear Fellow Retirees:

Many thanks to Paul for taking on this thing. And to Nick Kiessling for all that he did. To coin a cliché: My, how things change! Now we’re on email.

One of the changed things is me. Anyone else changed? I’m now 83, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. Well, that seems overwrought. But I do need my glasses to read and to find things. For these jobs, I also try to use my mind, wherever it is.

Another change is that Barbara and I will spend no more winters in Arizona, but will mush through slush in Pullman. Slush mush? We sold our House on the Tenth Fairway and our car and have moved back home to stay. It was becoming too difficult to maintain two homes with one always 1,200 miles away. Our cute little pussycat Samantha told us that she is glad not to fly back and forth under the seat ahead. And our wallets say that they are very happy, too.

Warmest regards to all, most especially George Kennedy with thanks for his support.

My dear Barbara is in good health and spirits (this word does not refer to alcohol).

Cheerio,
Bob Johnson

1410 SE Fancy Free Drive
Pullman, WA 99163-5522
bajohnson2000@.com

Nick Kiessling (WSU 1967–2000)

Dear Fellow Retirees and Others,

I am very pleased that Paul Brians has volunteered to take over the editorship of the English Retirees Newsletter. Paul has skills that will make the next issue bibliographically up to date (on the web), and full of news and pictures that will interest us all.

The year 2008-9 brought many surprises, most of which were good. First the bad news. In June I had a routine prostate TURP which accomplished its purpose, but I also got blood clots in my calf and thigh, with ‘shooters’ in my lungs, and that complicated my recovery. So, Coumadin until December. Fortunately I am now back to playing tennis and racquetball several times a week.

Other than that setback, we are doing well and are enjoying a fifth year in our house with views of Kamiak Butte, the university, Lawson Garden, and Moscow Mountain. In Pullman, it can’t get better than this. There are indications that the quietness of the neighborhood may be compromised by the construction of the new Walmart on Bishop Boulevard. We are happy that the construction has been delayed, at least until next year.

Karen had a very busy year on the state board of the League of Women Voters, as the Voter Service Chair for the Pullman League, as the Chair of the Grand Avenue Greenway, as a member of the Pullman Police Advisory Board, and as a member of her beloved Fortnightly Book Club, now in its 116th year. I continue my work on Anthony Wood, and an edition of Wood’s ‘Secretum Antonii’, The Life of Anthony Wood in His Own Words, will appear shortly. I returned the proofs, which arrived in a large PDF file, to Oxford in early August and the index, a week later. Right now I am working on an article for a Festschrift for a mentor, Tom Birrell. The deadline is December 1.

Recently I prepared an address for a memorial service to commemorate the life of John Bamborough, a dear friend, colleague at Linacre College, and collaborator on Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy. It was read at the University Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Oxford on June 20 and will appear in the November issue of the Linacre College News. I remember Jack Lord, in about his tenth year of retirement, telling us that he was finishing what was to be his last article and was feeling sad about the final end of his professional career. I’m feeling the same way, and don’t think I will pursue any large scale project after 2009. I have been driving people to medical appointments as a volunteer for Whitman County Council of Aging and Human Services for the last several months and that will probably keep me busy in the future when we aren’t travelling.

Yes, as all retirees, we have been travelling and enjoying it. Priest Lake, Anna Maria Island, Florida, and New York City are regular places. England, though we would love to go there, is out of the picture since we’ve lost many of our Oxford friends and also our hold on several wonderful places to stay at more or less token rates. At least we won’t have to endure long plane flights and oppressive security restrictions.

All the best,

Nick

510 SE Crestview
Pullman, WA 99163
kiesslin@yahoo.com

Richard Law (WSU 1970-2009)

I’m still getting used to retirement, which began July 1st, though Fran and I have certainly been busy enough with both familiar and new things. I miss the people I worked with very much—without, however, missing WSU. We have been to more plays and musical events and seen more of our kids, grandkids, and old friends than ever before, and I certainly enjoy that. We are finding our way to a new kind of social life, and it is a revelation that every night is Friday night (with no work day on the morrow).

Speaking of grandkids, our son Dave and his wife Anna had a second child, Natalie, born on June 26, in Seattle. A wonderful addition to our growing family!

Immediately after retiring, we drove to Santa Fe to visit our daughter Susie and her family, including our granddaughter Sophia. I recommend Santa Fe to anyone inclined to enjoy the surprising diversity within the United States. I especially recommend side trips to the main well-preserved Indian ruins in the Southwest. 

I want to thank all of you who made my retirement receptions so memorable and fun.

Richard

richardlaw43@hotmail.com

Stanton Linden (1967–2002)

Since we’re scuffling rather madly to ready ourselves for a trip abroad in about a week, this installment will be short. This time it will be two weeks in England (mainly London) and two in France (primarily Paris), and the objective will be to have a good holiday and, perhaps, a wee bit of research in the Manuscript Room at the British Library following a Renaissance conference in Cambridge (see below). Lucy is fine and in good health: keeping busy with the League of Women Voters, her Pleiades investment club, and various fitness and social activities.

What have I been doing—(other than marveling at how little it takes to keep me busy)? Increasingly, I’m giving up larger, planned, self-directed scholarly projects, and am quite content to take up smaller, unsought for things that sound interesting and simply fall into my lap. Conservation of effort is definitely trumping ambition! For example, an invitation to give a paper at a Cambridge colloquium on “Western Esoteric Traditions in the Renaissance” has resulted in a paper on Sir Kenelm Digby, the 17th century natural philosopher (and dilettante). Similar requests have resulted in a forthcoming review for Speculum; a forthcoming Festschrift essay on Chaucer for a friend at Penn State; service as external evaluator for a promotion to full; a letter of support for a sabbatical project; and several readings of submissions for journals. For several weeks last winter, I even carried on long-distance, email dissertation advising conversations with a grad student at Wayne State Univ.

Outside of the academic: I woked hard for the Obama cause up until November 4, ’08, and then transferred some of those energies to volunteer work at one of our local food banks. The need is great. Lucy and I had a very interesting and enjoyable air/auto trip to Boston and New England (north as far as Bar Harbor and Acadia N.P. in Maine, then over to the White Mtns. and Robert Frost country in New Hampshire, and eventually back to Boston.) A little too early for “leaf-peeping,” it was a wonderful two weeks of catching up on American history, art and literature, going to museums, and eating lobster.

As is now our habit, we spent a month in Seattle in late January and February, delighting in the city’s increasing fine music scene––especially in opera and early music. This year’s highlights were a performance of Monteverdi’s Orfeo by a Milan opera company and a baroque concert by London’s Academy of St. Martin’s in the Field chamber orchestra. We look forward to Seattle Opera’s Verdi concentration this season. Recommended contemporary novelist: Robert Hellenga (Knox College, Galesburg, IL), for starters try The Sixteen Pleasures and The Fall of a Sparrow.

Best wishes and good health (and health care) to all,

Stan

500 S.E. Crestview Street
Pullman, WA 99163

Howard McCord (1960–1971)

I made my tenth consecutive summer trip to join Dan Mclachlan somewhere in the west for a week of camping and hiking again. We returned to City of Rocks, the Albion mountains, and the Jim Sage mountains of southern Idaho. If anyone would like to see photos of the outing, I can send them easily. Just let me know.

My 1997 novel, The Man Who Walked to the Moon, came out in France and Quebec last August as L’homme Qui Marchait Sur La Lune, and more than 13,000 copies are in print.

The French reviews were many and wonderful, and you can find them by Googling the title in French.

I have been delighted that the French audience has been so receptive to the story and understand it as a philosophical tale rather than as a fantasy-adventure, as it seems most American readers and reviewers did. After fifty some years of publishing, I finally got a decent royalty check!

Jennifer has a year or two of high school teaching left before she retires, and I hope it will only be a year. All the children and grandchildren are fine, and spread from Cambridge to Seattle.

I went hunting for Russian Boar in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan last fall and got one that weighed more than 300 pounds. I found the meat to be much more delicious than domestic pork, and we have eaten nearly all I brought back. I used my left-handed Ruger 77 in .30-06 for one shot at about 75 yards at a pig trot through brush.

Walking To Extremes:In Iceland and New Mexico (McPherson 2008), came out at about the same time as the novel in France, It is a collection of accounts of the various long walks or climbs I have done over the years. It has been well reviewed here, and I am hopeful that the French publisher, Gallmeister, will pick it up for that market, should the economy ever recover.

I have lost twenty pounds that crept up on me over the years, gone on a strangely meager diet, and stopped drinking alcohol. (After fifty-seven years of drinking, I guess I finally got full). I am healthy and happy and looking forward to next summer’s western trip.

My very best to you all!

Howard

15431 Sand Ridge
Bowling Green, OH 43402
texian555@aol.com

Ronald Meldrum (WSU 1965–1996)

September of 2008 Barb and I took a cruise to Alaska on the Holland-America Line. It was pleasant in all respects. It brought back many memories of my days aboard the Canadian Pacific Steamships, the Princess ships, now all scrapped, and one Canadian National Steamship, the Prince Rupert, between 1944 and 1950, a total of three and one-half years of traveling altogether. I never tired of the coastal scenery.

Our family was with us at Christmas in Moscow, the first time in several years at “The Christmas House” as grandson Tad named it when he was a wee one. Tad and Genna stayed with us an extra week, at their request, so it was nice to have them to ourselves for a while. We had almost more snow than we could cope with, but the kids delighted in the change from Phoenix. 

We made two trips to Vancouver, B.C., one for the funeral of an old Penticton schoolmate and fellow UBC student, George Killick, founder of a noted Vancouver architectural firm. I’d known him for 76 years. His firm built a huge resort complex in Saudi Arabia and dozens of schools in the Yukon. In April we visited Deirdre and family in Phoenix and also drove down to San Diego and Algadones across the border from Yuma for excellent dental care by a Harvard trained dentist, this after some very expensive and incompetent dentistry done locally. The lack of good affordable dental care in this country is disgraceful. Most of this summer we spent at our place on Powderhorn Bay, Lake Coeur d’Alene, with family and friends. 

Best wishes to former colleagues and friends,

Ron Meldrum

420 N. Polk St.
Moscow, ID 83843
barbmosc@msn.com

Shirley Price (WSU 1963–1989)

First, kudos to the English Department’s valiant efforts to save Avery’s beautiful, old trees. Also, a special thanks to Virginia Hyde for her detailing of the tree rescue attempt and the included pictures. The “beautification” project included a bus shelter for the Kimbrough’s marching band? What?

Upon a rereading of last year’s newsletter, I noted the many retiree accounts of experiencing the slings and arrows of age. The news from Bob Ross was especially of interest. Bob and Mary (and Boxer Pip) were our next-door neighbors during their first year of their brief time in Pullman. We enjoyed many pleasant visits with these dear people–and Pip. It’s also been a challenging 2009 for some of our friends; three have been diagnosed with Alzheimers, another is on kidney dialysis three times a week. In July we attended the memorial service for a vibrant woman. She fell at home, hitting her head on the corner of a table. The blow to her head caused a subcranial hematoma from which she never regained consciousness. Sometimes, when the human condition we all share affects my mood, I’m reminded of Isaac Asimov’s observation: “Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It’s the transition that’s troublesome.”

Happily, Bud and I are doing fine in the health department, with thanks to our good doctors’ vigilance.

Last September’s family week in Cannon Beach was all that we had hoped: good weather for beach time, good eating, and good times just hanging out. I refer to our small but noisy family as the thundering herd. During October and early November I spent some busy time at the Gig Harbor Democratic Headquarters. I wept emotional tears on election night, and proud tears at Obama’s inauguration. (I also cry at movies.)

The annual Christmas potluck/gift exchange was at our home on December 12. Then, three days later, Puget sound made the news with record-breaking snow and plummeting temperatures. All this wonderfulness remained with us until December 27, when the temperature climbed to 41 and we enjoyed a good rain. Of course, snow removal equipment is minimal at best on this side of the Cascades. Omitting details, it was an extremely inconvenient time. We finally got together for our family Christmas dinner on New Year’s Day

We settled into the winter months by having several large fir and red cedars limbed up. We were eye-popping surprised at the dramatic increase of light that this tree pruning would produce! It became obvious to us that the new light and December’s foliage damage meant we had some yard renovation in our future. Following our mid-May Cannon Beach week, we began the ambitious task. I can remember of blue of down-and-dirty digging in the hard pan. Two months, countless foliage plants, and ten bags of compost later, we completed the projects. The date was August 9th, which I noted on the calendar. I have a bit of carpal tunnel in my right hand from hard pan digging. But golf is still manageable.

June was the milestone month when I became 80. This big birthday occasion was delayed until mid-July when grandson Ross could join us. We enjoyed a divine dinner at Seattle’s Palisades Restaurant located on the north shoreline of Elliott Bay. The Palisades staff was polished, professional, attentive, and food knowledgeable. And the location offered a sweeping view of Elliott Bay. A lovely summer evening was had by all.

One week later, we attended my best friend’s 80th birthday, a family member occasion at Alder Brook Inn at Hood Canal. Bud and I were honored to be included. Some of our friendship history: When Sharon and I were seven years old, we became playmates when my family bought their house in her neighborhood in Aberdeen, WA. There were sixteen of us kids in a two-block area. Sharon and I lived a half a block from each other. Neither of us had any siblings. By the time we reached Jr. High, we were joined at the hip: same classes, Girl Scouts, and group of friends; and we also studied piano. In the summer of 1944, my little family moved to Tacoma, and Sharon and I managed to maintain our friendship through the years. At Sharon’s wedding I was her maid of honor; when Bud and I married three years later, Sharon was my matron of honor. Bud and I had our first date as dinner guests at the young marrieds’ home in Tacoma. They returned to Aberdeen, and we moved to Pullman. During our busy family raising years, we managed to join our young families for summer fun on the coast. Once the nests were empty, the four of us have enjoyed many play dates together. Sharon was surprised when I gave her a framed picture of the two of us, and her dog Rags. The picture was dated July 1944, when we had just turned fifteen.

The small family is well, and doing what they should be doing, and where they should be doing it. Except for Kimberly. Her Boeing program was discontinued last fall, so she’s among the many unemployed. I never dreamed we would experience another 30’s kind of depression

I hope we can get some acceptable form of health care passed in congress. It’s a national embarrassment that we don’t have this in our country when all of the other industrialized countries have workable health care. On the other hand, we’re no longer an industrialized nation.

My best regards,

Shirley

11003 37th Ave NW
Gig Harbor, WA 98332
bns2price@centurytel.net

Camille Roman

My greetings and best wishes to all! I have just finished celebrating Bastille Day and toasting my recently documented French heritage so this seems like a good time to consider the newly opened professor emeritus chapter of my life.

This year I have been completing projects and commitments made before becoming an emeritus. I gave a paper on Elizabeth Bishop’s ignored intimate friendship with Pauline Hemingway at MLA 2008 in San Francisco and had the opportunity to enjoy the company of Nelly and Cesar Zamora before the conference and Nick Kiessling towards its end and to catch up on WSU news. While the publication date of the third volume of the American poetry anthology has been scheduled for a later date due to the economic downturn, my two coeditors Steve Axelrod and Tom Travisano and I have been at work on completing this major three-volume project. In addition, my Hemingway Society coeditor Suzanne del Gizzo and I are nearing the August 1 deadline of the Frost/Hemingway roundtable publication project with Hsiu-ling Lin, Scott Donaldson, George Monteiro, and Travisano. I also am continuing my work on the boards of The Elizabeth Bishop Society and Twentieth-Century Literature.

It has been inspiring to learn that several publications are exceeding all expectations. My The Women & Language Debate: A Sourcebook (Rutgers UP, 1994), coedited with Suzanne Juhasz and Cristanne Miller is now available in a kindle edition. Though the library hardcover edition has gone out of print, the paperback and netlibrary.com editions continue to sell. Rutgers UP tells us that the book has been cited nearly a thousand times in many languages, cultures, and fields. It’s living up to its historical position, according to the New York Public Research Libraries, as a foundational text in the creation of women’s studies as an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary field. The American poetry anthology, The New Anthology of American Poetry (Rutgers UP), also has surprised us. Volume one is now available in a Kindle edition. Volume two is in its fourth printing.  

It seems that my work in cultural biography, literary/performing arts criticism, and literary/social/ cultural history is taking me further down these paths. When I look back over my own publishing history since the 1960s, I can see that I have always pursued variations of several major questions that have led in many directions: How does an artist/ thinker create in a given society and culture? What does the artist/thinker create? How does the artist/thinker respond to events and experiences? Where does the artist/thinker fit into the larger culture? What are the obstacles in the individual’s life and culture? How does one write about one’s life and creative/intellectual processes? How does one construct biography and history? This winter I joined a PBS biography film team as a consultant on Hawaiian poetry to help them with such questions. I am also considering several larger projects that deal further with one or more of these issues.

Meanwhile, I have been focusing primarily on preparing our 1928 traditional cottage for the real estate market in Portland. This has been no small matter because it has required freshening up, refurbishing, or refinishing nearly every indoor and outdoor space on our property. I began this work last summer, but Chris’s coccyx injury and then acute kidney failure with subsequent hospitalizations and rehabilitation stopped it and almost everything else between the end of August and early this spring. I am relieved to report that we are now in the final work of real estate staging and clearing out of everything but the bare minimum. This means only a small amount of furniture is left; and nearly all possessions have been packed in plastic boxes in closets or put into file cabinets. I have donated, given away, or sold everything that will not fit easily into a small one-bedroom condo. We are maintaining only the barest libraries.

I don’t know what will happen next. It all depends upon the real estate market.

However, I am sure that this next year will be filled with some surprises, if this last year is any gauge.

Have a great year!

Camille

camilleroman@comcast.net

Fred Schwarzbach (WSU 1987–1992)

I’m still happily settled in New York and in my position as Dean of the Liberal Studies Program at NYU. It’s been a phenomenally busy year for me: this past academic year we launched a new B.A. program in Global Liberal Studies, one of the unique features of which is that all students will spend the junior year engaged in an international study/work experience. The response has been astonishing—over 600 applications to yield only 60 freshmen in the program, including some of the most outstanding high school seniors in this and several other countries. The development of this new curriculum has expanded greatly my travel obligations of late—this coming fall semester, for example, I’ll be making visits to NYU global sites in Buenos Aires, Florence, London, Paris, and Shanghai. (This sounds like more fun than it is.) Helping to create a new undergraduate college was not what I envisioned when I took this position, but as I approach the last phase of my working life, I feel immensely privileged and very lucky to be where I am and to be doing what I’m doing.

Fred

fss3@nyu.edu

Barbara Sitko (WSU 1989-2005)

Dear Friends,

Greetings! This has been a quiet year. Health issues were paramount––knee replacements to take care of severe arthritis kept me fairly well home and garden bound. After a promising spring start, the vegetable garden shivered through the coldest July on record (not a single 10-degree day) and then a late August tomato blight. Broccoli and cabbages, however, thrive and are plentiful in the Amish markets, so our cancer-fighting chances are good. I continue to work with our congregational committee on socially responsible investing. Our current focus is coalition work on issues around soft coal mining, mountaintop removal, and the health of streams and rivers. A positive aspect of the decline of steel production is the reclamation of our waterways, although the going is slow. I did get in a little travel––in June I took advantage of a friend’s teaching in Gonzaga’s summer program to spend a few days in the warmth of the Northwest. A ride down the Palouse to Pullman and a lively lunch with George and Nancy caught me up on departmental doings. A special note of appreciation to all who helped save what remains of the Avery trees!

Warm regards,

Barbara

124 N. Lincoln St.
New Wilmington PA 16142
sitko@wsu.edu

John A. Stoler (WSU 1969-74)

Each year I am saddened by the loss of some of the many friends and acquaintances I made during my five years at WSU, but I am amazed at how many of the old crew are still around and about and contributing to the newsletter, some of whom I hear from over the holi- days. Several of them helped me a great deal when I was finishing my dissertation and I am forever grateful to them.

As I said last year, I am happy to have retired but even happier at being able to take part in the “modified service” program and teach a course each long semester. This fall I have an upper-division course on Fielding and Dickens and in the spring I will be teaching a grad course that I invented on the “panoramic novel.” I will be spending a lot of time in the Austin library preparing for it, but I look forward to the study (and to visiting Austin, which is a great city). When I arrived here in 1974, The U of Texas at San Antonio was in an office building (the campus was not yet opened) and we had about 15 students in the graduate program in English and no undergraduates at all. Now we have 28,500 students on campus with a thriving English major, about 80 MA students, and a dozen PhD candidates. (We have graduated five PhDs from our new program and four of them have gotten tenure-track jobs at pretty good universities.) It has been fun to be part of helping to build a university from the ground up, taking part in the writing of the English and Humanities programs, creating a professional advising center, and serving as Associate Dean. The latter, in retrospect, was more of a pain than a pleasure since I was in charge of student affairs, a synonym for the complaint department.

I seem to be completely recovered from my 2007 double by-pass surgery and the following stroke. The only aftermath that I can detect is the loss of motor skills in my right hand. My handwriting is now like that of a physician. I attribute most of that to my daily water aerobics workout. Mandy’s two years of broken feet are over and we finally managed to take a summer vacation to celebrate her 60th birthday (at the age of 62). Eight of us (stepson, stepdaughter and husband, three grandchildren, and us) went to Disney World for three days and then took a cruise to St. Thomas, St. Martin’s, and Coco Cay. We were on Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas, the largest cruise liner in the world with 4200 passengers. Actually, we were not too thrilled with the cruise because we had been to the three stops three times before, but the rest of the family enjoyed it a lot. The grandkids (girl 9, twins [boy and girl 5]) loved it. (We see a lot of them because we built a house a few blocks from them and they stay here every Friday night.)

Our travels are very limited compared to those of some of the retirees because I teach and Mandy, who is a psychological therapist, doesn’t like to leave her clients for long periods. But we did get back to Kauai for the seventh straight year in March and made our annual trip to visit Adam (stepson) in L.A. Mandy has made a couple of trips to New York and New Jersey to visit her brother and sister and I am going to Green Bay shortly to visit my cousin and to reminisce about the old days growing up in my favorite city.

Sadly, I am estranged from my girls, Sharon and Fran- cine, whom some of you knew. They have not been able to make successes of their lives. Carrie (stepdaughter) has done well with her kids and works in the family business (We Buy Ugly Houses). Adam is still in the film business in L.A. This year and the last three he has worked on the TV series “CSI” (which I have never seen) and recently was promoted to set decorator and purchaser. When they are not shooting, he gets regular work in movies, so he is doing very well.

Recently, we lost Casey, our 21-year-old cat, and Shel- by, our 14-year-old white German Shepherd. We still have Lucky Marvin, our tabby cat, and Abbie (German Shepherd and Collie mix) and Rocky a Papillon. Once we get over our mourning for Shelby we will rescue another dog, perhaps a golden retriever. After seven years of going to a local nursing home with our dogs for Delta Society, we have stopped since Abbie has terminal cancer and Rocky is a bit too eager for the old folk. However, we hope to get a young rescue dog to train for the therapy work.

Our big problem here is the two-year old drought. We had a drought in 2004-2005 but it was not nearly like this one. In July we had 22 days with temperatures over 100 and in the first six days of August, we have had five days over 100. We are on second stage water restric- tions and are on the verge of stage three, which would mean you can water your lawn only every two weeks at specific times. You can water plants with a hand held hose but again only at certain times. If we go to stage four, you can’t water anything.

The city is celebrating Sotomayor’s confirmation to the Supreme Court. Our city is 65% Latino/a and about that many people speak Spanish at some level. Before we moved into our new home five years ago, I counted 14 Mexican restaurants within a five minute drive of our old home. Years ago there were hardly any Hispanic English majors. A couple of years ago, I had a class of English majors (Major British Writers II) with 60 stu- dents and more than half of them had Hispanic names and there probably were married Hispanic women in the class without ethnic names. This mix leads to a cul- tural mingling that makes the city unique and exciting and accounts for the fact that while there is still racism here, it is not nearly what one finds in the Panhandle, Corpus Christi, Dallas, or Houston. Of course part of that is due to the large military presence here because of the number of interracial marriages in the services.

Best wishes to all.

John

2406 Rogers Loop
San Antonio, TX 78258
utsaretireej@yahoo.com

Nelly Zamora (WSU 1976-2003)

I simply can’t believe that I’ve been retired for six years now. I still have contact with most of you and some of the graduate students who finished their degrees when I was still on the job.

June 1-11 of this year, Cesar and I joined a Globus Travel tour called “Grand Catholic Italy.” We visited Rome, San Giovanni Rotondo, Assisi, Florence, Padua, and Venice. We made side trips to the Abbey of Montecassino, Monte Sant’ Angelo, Lanciano, Loreto, and Siena.  

My only surviving sister, Nori, came to the US last July 3 on an Immigrant’s Visa. We picked her up in San Francisco and toured her around the city and other neighboring places. While in San Francisco, we visited with my oldest daughter, Pauline. We then drove to Las Vegas (not to gamble but see the attractions), Los Angeles, northern California via the Redwood Highway and Avenue of the Giants, and the Oregon Coast, before heading back to Pullman.

In July, the three of us visited Seattle, the home of my youngest daughter, Jennifer. On our way home, we took a side trip to Mount Rainier. Here, my sister saw snow for the first time and made a snowball the size of a baseball. Quite thrilling for her!

In October, Cesar and I will fly to Philadelphia, meet our friend in Avondale, drive to Staten Island to pick up my cousin, then start a driving tour of the New England states. Hopefully, it won’t be too late to see some fall colors. We’ll then head to Quebec City and Ottawa in Canada, and back to Philadelphia to catch a plane home to Pullman.

In November, we are visiting the Philippines for a few weeks. We’ll attend a family wedding and visit with relatives and friends. My high school classmates are planning to have a get-together while I’m there. They will probably ask me again to color my hair as I am the only one with white hair. They jokingly tell me that I am giving away their ages.

I’ve kept busy this summer by hosting some out-of-state friends. I am also getting involved with some church activities and the Filipino American Student Association at WSU. Who says retirement is boring?  

Not me!

Nelly

1710 NW Deane Street
Pullman, WA 99163-3508
nellyczamora@hotmail.com