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Reading and Discussion Scholar Bios |
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“Sharing Our Past — Shaping Our Future” Since 1974 |
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Sherry Olson is a poet (Breakfast on the Wayside, 2000) and a voracious reader. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Earlham College with concentrations in psychology and literature. She has taught adult basic education and elementary school. Her interests are diverse, ranging from women’s and family issues to animals, southern U.S. literature, poetry, and the novel. In addition to leading reading and discussion groups, she leads poetry writing workshops for all age levels.
Verandah Porche, a poet and writing partner based in Guilford, works as an artist-in-residence in communities and schools throughout New England. Her books include The Body’s Symmetry (Harper and Row) and Glancing Off (See Through Books). In 1998, the Vermont Arts Council honored her contribution to the cultural life of Vermont. Her focus areas in the humanities include contemporary poetry, multicultural fiction, and Vermont Literature.
F. D. (Franklin) Reeve is a poet, novelist, critic, translator, professor of letters emeritus at Wesleyan University, and a member of the core faculty at the New England College low-residency M.F.A. program in Poetry. Publications include The Moon and Other Failures, The Urban Stampede, and the annotated reprint of Robert Frost in Russia. He has been honored by the American Academy of Arts and Letters and by the New England Poetry Society’s Golden Rose.
Jim Schley has a bachelor’s degree in English and Native American Studies from Dartmouth College and an M.F.A. in poetry from Warren Wilson College. He has edited the literary quarterly New England Review and the book Writing in a Nuclear Age, as well as nearly a hundred other books on a variety of subjects. Schley has performed and toured with four professional, experimental theatre troupes. His chapbook of poems, One Another, was published in 1999. Check out Jim on the web at www.solarnet.org/JS.
Mark A. Stoler is professor of history at the University of Vermont, where he has taught since 1970. He received his bachelor’s degree from the City College of New York (1966), and his master’s and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1967, 1971). He specializes in U.S. diplomatic and military history and is the author of numerous books and articles in these fields. He has also received numerous university and national awards for his scholarship and teaching.
Patricia (Pat) Stuart is a lifelong lover of books. She is recently retired from teaching English at Norwich University where her specialty was children’s literature, but she also likes all sorts of fiction, biography, and history. Pat’s degrees are from The College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota, and John Carroll University in Cleveland. She is married with four grown-up kids.
Gregory Supernovich has been writing professionally for 20 years. He has a master’s degree in broadcast journalism from Boston University, and worked 10 years as a newspaper reporter and public affairs writer/editor. For the past 10 years, he has been teaching English courses at Castleton State College. Supernovich has studied fiction writing at Harvard University, Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and Wesleyan College’s Writers’ Conference, among others. He is currently working on a novel, The Tenderness of Eagles.
Victor Swenson is an adjunct professor of humanities at Johnson State College. He served as executive director of the Vermont Humanities Council from 1974 to 2002 and helped launch the council’s library reading and discussion programs. He holds an earned doctorate in international studies from Johns Hopkins University and honorary degrees in humane letters from Middlebury College and the University of Vermont. His interests include Middle Eastern, classical Greek, European and American history and literature.
Richard Taskin has a solo practice in North Adams, Massachusetts with a focus on criminal defense. He is a former American History teacher and journalist who contributed several entries to the Encyclopedia of New England History and Culture, including one on former U.S. Senator and North Adams attorney Henry L. Dawes. His focus areas include American politics and popular culture.
Joyce Thomas is Professor of English at Castleton College where she teaches courses in world, English, and children’s literature. A Vermont State Colleges Faculty Fellow, she has published essays and poetry in a variety of periodicals and anthologies. Her first collection of poetry, Skins, appeared in 2001; she is also the author of Inside the Wolf’s Belly, which treats the narrative art and folklore of fairy tales. |
