Directory

Like most people who teach English, I was born to read. Not just classical literature, but everything from cereal boxes to the phone book, which inspired stories about the people behind the names. I’ve always been a bit of a magpie when it comes to knowledge. I’m interested in just about anything from science to literature. No surprise that I decided to teach English, allowing me to spend my life reading.

After receiving an MA from the University of Virginia and a doctorate from the University of Rochester, I joined the UCLA English Department. While teaching lecture classes on the short story and seminars on Victorian heroines, I wrote feature stories for newspapers on such subjects as Bingo, coyotes, drive-in movie theatres, and voodoo.

About this time, I started to write books about literature for the “intelligent common reader.” The first, The Friendly Shakespeare (1993, Viking/Penguin), asks the question, “What’s so great about Shakespeare?” While writing about the plays, I talked to dramaturges, directors, and actors, whose theatrical perspective revealed a view of Shakespeare that ultimately changed the way I teach the plays.

That book was followed by The Friendly Dickens (Viking/Penguin), which allowed me to meet fellow Dickensians from scholars and actors to descendants of Dickens himself. It led to a commission for a screenplay based on A Christmas Carol.

I then discovered a delightful book, The Technique of the Love Affair, by the fashion historian Doris Langley Moore. Published in 1929, it was a period piece on love, which I edited and annotated for Pantheon/Knopf in 1998.

Finally, with Jon Winokur, I compiled and edited Happy Motoring: Canine Life in the Fast Lane, (Abbeville Press, 2000), a collection of photographs chronicling dogs’ love affair with cars.

This brings me to what I call my “Dog Years.” While teaching at Stevenson University, I designed and taught seminars, “Dogs in Literature.” About this time I got my first dog, a border collie named Nellie. After she became a certified therapy dog, we visited hospices, drug rehabilitation centers, and correctional facilities.

As a lifelong reader, I’ve been immersed in words. But teaching at MassArt has introduced me to a more visual world. Watching my students transform literature into other art forms has been the highlight of my teaching career.

While at MassArt, I designed and taught a freshman seminar, Dogs and Their Humans. I loved seeing the fantastical dogs breeds designed by students, and I’ll never forget the “Stoksie,” the “Boston Motherhound,”and the ‘Papier Avion” dog.

My book in progress is Bred in the USA: The Unnatural History of Purebreds in America.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention BoBo, a therapy dog for MassArt and a frequent visitor to my classes. He stands by students as they gave their presentations and falls asleep while I talk.

Industry Experience

PUBLICATIONS, BOOKS

• The Friendly Shakespeare, Viking/ Penguin, 1993, paperback Ed, Penguin, 1994, 2nd ed., 2006
• The Friendly Dickens, Viking Penguin, 1998, paperback ed., Penguin, 1999
• Editor and Annotator, The Technique of the Love Affair by Doris Langley Moore, Pantheon Press, 1999; paperback, 2001
• Happy Motoring! (with Jon Winokur), Abbeville Press, New York, 2001

ARTICLES & ESSAYS

• Excerpts from Shakespeare and Dickens have appeared in Teacher’s Guides and the program notes of numerous productions, such as Masterpiece Theatre’s Othello and King Lear
• Book Reviews and Feature Articles, Baltimore Sun, Urban Dog Magazine, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, 1982-2012.
• Introduction, A Dickens of a Carol, a play by Kimberley Lynne, Loyola University Press, December, 2009
• Preface, The Ultimate Shakespeare Quiz Book, Thomas Delise, Book-Mart Press, 2005
• “Shakespeare’s Theatre” in “’Be Thou Now Persuaded:’ Living in a Shakespearean World,” Rhino Records, 1999
• Introduction “Who was Shakespeare?, Richard Whalen, Greenwood Press, 1994
• “Little Women: Read by Girls, Remembered by Women,” Baltimore Sun, April, 1992, reprinted, Goucher College Magazine
• “Sale or Sacrament? The Wife Auction in The Mayor of Casterbridge,” English Language Notes, Spring 1987

TALKS & PRESENTATIONS

Numerous presentations, both formal and informal, on Shakespeare and literature, in a variety of settings: libraries, churches, bookstores and on radio

• “Breeding Bad: Creating Canine Monsters,” Fenway Frankenstein Festival, October 25, 2018
• “On Julius Caesar,” Baltimore Shakespeare Festival, 2009
• Who Will Play Juliet?” Charles Theatre, Baltimore, MD, April 2007
• “On Creative Non-Fiction,” Keynote Speaker, Maryland Writer’s Association Annual Conference, 1996
• “Is Shakespeare High Brow or Low Brow?” Millsaps College, Jackson, MS, March1994
• “On Othello,” Center Stage, Baltimore, MD, 1993
“Returning to Shakespeare,” Inaugural Lecture, Newton Free Library, Newton MA, April, 1993
• “On Shylock,” Jewish Community Center, Baltimore MD, 1993
• On Shakespeare, Entertainment Tonight, April, 1993
• “Thomas Hardy’s Women,” New England Modern Language Association Conference, Hartford, CT, April, 1986
• Yale Canine Cognition, participant, 2018-2020
• Dog Therapy Partner, 2000-2023
• Organizer, “The Royal Shakespeare (Amateur) Company Meet up,” Fall, 2012–
• Screenwriter, commissioned to write screenplay based on A Christmas Carol, 2006- 2007
• Dramaturge, Baltimore Shakespeare Festival’s productions of Julius Caesar and Othello, Spring, 2005
• Dramaturge, Center Stage production of Othello, February 1994
• Consultant, Baltimore Shakespeare Festival production of A Christmas Carol, 2006
• Judge, Baltimore Public Schools’ Annual Shakespeare Competition,1993-1995
• Freelance Writer, Book Reviews and Features, Baltimore Sun,1983-93
• Editor, Researcher, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, 1990-1991