John D. Burt
42 Mystic Lake Dr.
Arlington, MA 02474
(781) 643-5431 burt at brandeis dot edu http://people.brandeis.edu/~burt Orcid Id: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7328-0643
Teaching Experience
2013–current Paul E. Prosswimmer Professor of American Literature Brandeis University Courses: Nineteenth Century American Literature; American Gothic and American Romance; Slavery in
the American Imagination; Writing Reconstruction: Race and Reaction after the Civil War; Fiction of
the Second World War; War in Twentieth Century American Literature; Tragedy: Love and Death in the
Literary Imagination; The Fierce Urgency of Now: Some Poetry in English Since 1945; Poetry: A Basic
Course; Twentieth Century Fiction of the South; Novels of William Faulkner; American Poetry; American
Poetry of the Nineteenth Century; American Realism and Naturalism; The Western Canon, Tragedy and
Epic; Blake, Wordsworth and Coleridge; Keats, Shelley and Byron; Introduction to Literary Method;
Twentieth Century American Literature; American Fiction since World War II; Pedagogy; American
and English Romanticism; Literature of the American South; Theories of Justice from Plato to Rawls;
numerous independent study courses and supervisions of senior theses.
(1998–2013) Professor, Brandeis University
(1989–1997) Associate Professor, Brandeis University
(1983–1989) Assistant Professor, Brandeis University Milton Petrie Term Assistant Professor of University Studies, 1987–1989.
(1981–1983) Acting Instructor, Yale University Courses: The Western Literary Tradition, Basic Composition, Advanced Composition, Daily Themes (one
of 2 lecturers).
(1980–1981) Teaching Assistant, Yale University Courses: Modern Poetry, Daily Themes (one of 25 tutors), American Literature 1850–1900.
(1979–1980) Lecturer, University of Nevada-Reno Courses: Basic Composition I, Basic Composition II.
Publications
Books:
Poetry:
Victory Turning Point Press, 2007.
Victory at Sea. (chapbook) R. L. Barth, Edgewood, KY, 2001.
Work Without Hope. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996.
The Way Down. Princeton University Press, 1988.
Fiction
A Moment’s Surrender (unpublished novel, 2022)
Scholarship:
Robert Penn Warren’s Brother to Dragons: A Parallel Text Critical Edition of the 1953 and 1979Versions, under consideration.
Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism Harvard University Press, 2013, paperback 2018.
Selected Poems of Robert Penn Warren. Louisiana State University Press, 2001.
The Collected Poems of Robert Penn Warren. Louisiana State University Press, 1998. Winner
of the 1998 Jules and Frances Landry Award. Winner of the 1999 Ambassador Prize from the
English Speaking Union. Winner of the 1999 Holman award from the Society for the Study of
Southern Literature.
After the Southern Renascence. (a section of the Cambridge History of American Literature,
vol. 7) Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Robert Penn Warren and American Idealism. Yale University Press, 1988.
Articles:
“The Promise of Equality in Lincoln and in Jaffa,” American Political Thought (forthcoming).
“Political Violence and The Persuasive Engagement in Frederick Douglass,” Literary Imagination,
Volume 23, Issue 2, July 2021, Pages 111–136, https://doi.org/10.1093/litimag/imab028
“Robert Penn Warren’s Democracy and Poetry,” forthcoming in Robert Penn Warren Studies.
“Review of Catholicism and American Borders in the Gothic Literary Imagination by Farrell
O’Gorman,” The Journal of Religion and Literature vol. 52 no. 2 (Summer 2021) pp. 160–163).
“Recovering John Crowe Ransom’s Poems,” Mississippi Quarterly vol 73 no. 1 pp. 91-120 (2020).
“Review of The Worlds of American Intellectual History,
eds. Joel Isaac, James T. Kloppenberg, Michael O’Brien, Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen,” Reviews inHistory (July, 2018) https://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/2263 (review no.
2263) DOI: 10.14296/RiH/2014/2263
“Biography, Main Trends in Criticism, and Annotated Bibliography of Criticism” for “Peter Taylor”
in Short Story Criticism, vol. 266 pp. 223-301 (Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Research and Layman
Poupard Publishing, 2019).
“Review of Man’s Better Angels: Romantic Reformers and the Coming of the Civil War by Philip F.
Gura,” Journal of Southern History, Volume LXXXIV, No. 3, pp. 51-4 (August 2018).
“The Lesson of Lincoln in the Age of Trump,” in Trump and Political Philosophy: Leadership,Statesmanship, and Tyranny, ed. Angel Jaramillo Torres and Marc Benjamin Sable, New York:
Palgrave Macmillan 2018, pp. 211-233.
Introduction and Afterword to Robert Penn Warren, The Ballad of Billie Potts, Charlottetown, PEI:
Bunim & Bannigan Ltd., 2018.
“Robert Penn Warren” in The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature, ed. Paula Rabinowitz
(2018).
“Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men (1946)” in Handbook of the American Novel of theTwentieth and Twenty-First Centuries, ed. Timo Müller (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017) pp. 264-277.
“Review of Lincoln’s Ethics by Thomas L. Carson,” The Historian, vol. 79 no.3 (Fall 2017), pp.
569–72.
“Review of Lincoln’s Last Speech: Wartime Reconstruction and the Crisis of Reunion by Louis
Masur” Journal of American History, Sept. 2016, Vol. 103 No. 2 , pp. 486-7.
(blog round table) “Implicitness, Pragmatism and Responsibility in Lincoln: Response to Richard
King, Peter Kuryla, and Peter Wirzbicki” (a discussion of Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism based on a
panel at the 2015 Society for U. S. Intellectual History Conference, Washington D.C.) http://s-usih.org/2015/11/roundtable-john-burts-lincolns-tragic-pragmatism-part-iii.html
“Collective Guilt in Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address” American Political Thought Vol. 4, No. 3
(Summer 2015), pp. 467–488.
“Prosperity and Tyranny in Lincoln’s Lyceum Address” in Abraham Lincoln and Liberal Democracy,
ed. Nicholas Buccola (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 2016) pp. 13–43.
“Review of Abraham Lincoln: Philosopher Statesman by Joseph R. Fornieri” The Journal of theAbraham Lincoln Association vol. 36 no. 1 (Winter, 2015) pp. 64–69.
“Robert Penn Warren’s Civil War” in A History of American Civil War Literature, ed. Coleman
Hutchison (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) 303–315.
“Negative Capability and Education” Literary Imagination vol. 16 no. 3 (2014), pp. 261-274.
“The Failure of Popular Sovereignty by Christopher Childers” (book review) American PoliticalThought Vol. 4, No. 1 (Winter 2015) pp. 166–169.
“Review of American Oracle: The Civil War in the Civil Rights Era by David Blight” The Register ofthe Kentucky Historical Society vol. 112 no. 2 (Spring 2014), pp. 319-322.
“Review of Southern Crossings: Poetry, Memory, and the Transcultural South by Daniel Cross
Turner” Mississippi Quarterly Vol. 65 no. 4 pp. 613-619 (2014).
“Hypotaxis and Parataxis” entry for The Princeton Encylopedia of Poetry and Poetics 4th edition (Princeton:
Princeton University Press 2012) p. 650-651.
“The Fugitive Circle” entry for The Princeton Encylopedia of Poetry and Poetics 4th edition (Princeton:
Princeton University Press 2012) p. 531.
“The Agrarian Movement” entry for The Princeton Encylopedia of Poetry and Poetics 4th edition (Princeton:
Princeton University Press 2012) pp. 25-6.
“Review of Laura Dassow Walls, The Passage to Cosmos: Alexander von Humboldt and the Shaping ofAmerica” The Wordsworth Circle Autumn 2011 vol. 42 no. 4 pp. 281-4.
“Lincoln’s Dred Scott: Contesting the Declaration of Independence” in Lincoln and Cultural Value, a special
issue of American Literary History vol. 21 no. 4 pp. 730–751 (2009)
“Edmargin: A Simple Design for Critical Editions with Multiple Endnote Series” User’s guide, compiled
software, and commented source code for edmargin, a LaTeX macro package for typesetting scholarly
editions. See “Computer software” below.
“Robert Penn Warren’s The Legacy of the Civil War and the Meaning of Pragmatism” American LiteraryHistory vol. 19 pp. 964-996 (Winter, 2007).
review of Selected Letters of Robert Penn Warren Volume 3: Triumph and Transition 1943–1952, Louisiana History, vol. 46 pp. 478–84 (2008).
“Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Kingfish” (essay-review of The Kingfish in Fiction Huey P. Long and theModern American Novel by Keith Perry), Mississippi Quarterly vol. 58 (no. 3-4) pp. 795–806 (SUM-FAL
2005) .
“Using poemscol for Critical Editions of Poetry” The PracTeXJournal Number 3, 2005.
“Purity, Panic and Pasiphaë in Brother to Dragons” rWp: An Annual of Robert Penn WarrenStudies. vol. 5 pp. 147–70 (2005) . Republished in Shawangunk Review, vol. xvii (Spring 2006)
pp. 4-23.
“A Note on ‘Uncertain Season in High Country,’ ” Southern Review, vol. 41, no. 2 pp. 243–249 (Summer
2005).
review of The Broken Tower, by Paul Mariani, in Resources for American Literary Study vol. 28 (2002),
pp. 211–217 (actually published December, 2003).
“Lincoln, Calhoun, and Cultural Politics” (review of Harry Jaffa, A New Birth of Freedom), Raritan vol. 23
no. 2 (Fall 2003), pp. 142–161.
“Typesetting Critical Editions of Poetry” TUGboat: Publications of the TeX User Group vol. 22 (2001) No. 4
pp. 353-361 (actual publication date July 2003).
“Rhys W. Williams” introduction to Triumphant Living: Sermons from Five Decades Celebrating the LiberalGospel, Boston: Pearson Publishing, 2003, pp. xix–xxxi.
“Robert Penn Warren” in The Oxford Encylopedia of American Literature, ed. Jay Parini (2003).
* “Typesetting Poetry Collections with poemscol” User’s guide, compiled software, and commented source
code for poemscol, a LaTeX macro package for typesetting scholarly editions of poetry. see “Computer
Software” below.
review of Invisible Fences: Prose Poetry as a Genre in French and American Literature, by Steven Monte,
Modern Philology vol. 101, no. 3 (February 2004), pp. 493-500.
“Warren Reflects on the Discontinuities of his Poetic Career” Style, vol. 36, no. 2 (Summer, 2002)
pp. 292-307.
“The Associative Style in Warren and Ashbery” rWp: An Annual of Robert Penn Warren Studies vol. 2
pp. 179-195 (2002).
“Reason Also Is Choice: Reflection, Freedom, and the Euthyphro Problem” in Never Again Would Birds’ SongBe the Same: New Essays on Poetry and Poetics, Renaissance to Modern pp. 147-189. University Press of
New England, 2002.
“Notes on Some Recent Poetry” (review of Richard Wilbur, Mayflies, Anne Carson, The Beauty of theHusband, Herbert Morris, What Was Lost, and Timothy Dekin, Another Day on Earth ) SouthernReview, vol. 37 no. 4 (Autumn 2001) pp. 836–850 reprinted in Contemporary Literary Criticism
vol 185.
“Idealism and Rage in Proud Flesh” rWp: An Annual of Robert Penn Warren Studies vol 1 pp. 45–64
(2001).
“History and Disaffection in Hill’s The Triumph of Love” Sewanee Review vol. CIX no. 4 (Fall 2001)
pp. 580-593.
“Becoming Historical: Twentieth Century Literature at Century’s End” College English, vol. 64 no. 1
(September 2001) pp. 11-16.
“Robert Penn Warren as a Poet of New England” in The Legacy of Robert Penn Warren, David Madden, ed.,
Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2000.
“W.S. Merwin’s The Folding Cliffs” Raritan vol 19 no. 3 (Winter 2000) pp. 115-134. Reprinted in Gale
Group, Poetry Criticism vol. 45.
“Liberalism’s Hope and Despair: Lincoln’s Peoria Speech of 1854” Social Research, vol 66 no. 2 (summer
1999) pp. 679-707.
“Peter Taylor” Columbia Companion to the Twentieth Century American Short Story. Columbia University
Press, 2001.
“Eudora Welty” Columbia Companion to the Twentieth Century American Short Story. Columbia University
Press, 2001.
Foreword for All the King’s Men: Three Dramatic Versions, ed. James A. Grimshaw and James A. Perkins,
University of Missouri Press, 2000.
Review of Soul Says, The Breaking of Style, and The Given and the Made by Helen Vendler, Journal of Englishand Germanic Philology, July 1998, pp. 458–466.
“Three Kinds of History” (review of Kyrie by Ellen Bryant Voigt, The Post Office Murals Restored by
Robert B. Shaw, and Selva Morale by John Peck), Partisan Review, vol. LXV no. 4 pp. 673–9
(1998).
Review of God and the American Writer by Alfred Kazin, Religion and Values in Public Life, September,
1998.
“Lincoln’s Address to the Young Men’s Lyceum: A Speculative Essay” Western Humanities Review vol. 51
no. 3 (Fall 1997), pp. 304–320.
* “On Poetic Autonomy” (review-essay of Hart Crane and Allen Tate by Langdon Hammer,)
Modernism/Modernity, vol. 2 no. 2 (April 1995), pp. 81–4.
Review of Poetry of Mourning: The Modern Elegy from Hardy to Heaney by Jahan Ramazani,
Modernism/Modernity, vol. 1 no. 3 (December, 1994), pp. 285–6.
“John Rawls and the Moral Vocation of Liberalism” Raritan, vol. XIV no. 1 pp. 133–153
(Summer, 1994). (Reprinted in Contemporary Readings in Law and Social Justice vol. 1 no. 1
(2009)).
“Thought and Feeling” (review essay about Tesserae and Selected Poetry by John Hollander), Partisan Review,
vol. LXII no. 1 pp. 133–8 (Winter, 1995).
“Tyranny and Faction in The Federalist,” Raritan vol. XIII no. 2 pp. 56–84 (Fall, 1993).
“Robert Penn Warren” A Companion To American Thought Blackwell, 1994.
“Learning to Write: The Narrative of Frederick Douglass” Western Humanities Review. vol. XLII no. 4
(1988) pp. 330–344.
Review of The Arkansas Testament by Derek Walcott, Partisan Review. vol. LVI no. 4 (1989)
pp. 669–672.
Review of The Fiction of Walker Percy by John Edward Hardy, Explorations. vol. III pp. 101–6
(1989).
“Charles Brockden Brown” Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia of American Literature, ed. George and Barbara
Perkins, (New York: Harper Collins, 1991).
“Robert Penn Warren” Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia of American Literature, ed. George and Barbara
Perkins, (New York: Harper Collins, 1991).
“Flannery O’Connor and What You Can’t Talk About” in Flannery O’Connor: Modern Critical Views (New
Haven: Chelsea House, 1987) pp. 125–143.
“The Self-Subversion of Value in Warren’s World Enough and Time,” in Robert Penn Warren: Modern CriticalViews (New Haven: Chelsea House, 1986) pp. 227–246.
“Romance, Character, and the Bounds of Sense” (parts 1 and 2), Raritan, vol. V no. 2 (Fall, 1985): 74–89 and
vol. V no. 3 (Winter, 1986): 48–60.
“Irreconcilable Habits of Thought in A Room of One’s Own and To the Lighthouse” ELH vol. 49 pp. 889–907
(1982). Reprinted in Virginia Woolf: Modern Critical Views (New Haven: Chelsea House, 1986) pp. 191–206
and in Modern Critical Interpretations: To the Lighthouse (New Haven: Chelsea House, 1988)
pp. 59–74.
Computer Software:
poemscol: a LaTeX style package for typesetting critical editions of poetry. Originally designed to
set the type for The Collected Poems of Robert Penn Warren, it provides all of the structures required
by the MLA Committee on Scholarly Editions, automatically ties endnotes to accurate line numbers,
automatically generates running headers of the form “Notes to pp. XX–YY” for the endnote sections,
and automatically marks every case where a stanza break falls on a page turn. Also annotates prose
sections (with line numbers), and prose with paragraph-sentence enumeration (such as the Bible).
Some macros for setting and annotating parallel texts. Available online at http://www.ctan.org
and at http://people.brandeis.edu/~burt. Released under the LaTeX Public License.
Version 3.1415926 released August 8, 2020.
edmargin: a LaTeX style package for typesetting critical editions. Provides a simple way of creating
multiple endnote sections. Endnotes can either have distinctive markers in the text, or marginal
references to the page in the note sections where the endnotes may be found. Notes may be set as
single paragraphs or in block paragraph mode. Note sections have running headers of the form “Notes
to pp. XX–YY.” Available online at http://www.ctan.org and at http://people.brandeis.edu/~burt. Released under the LaTeX Public License. Version
1.2 released September 4, 2012.
endheads: a LaTeX style package for providing running headers of the form “Notes to pp. XX–YY”
for users of the style package endnotes.sty. Available online at http://www.ctan.org and at
http://people.brandeis.edu/~burt. Released under the LaTeX Public License. Version
1.61 released April 8, 2017.
Poems:
“On the Will to Believe,” “Sonnets for Mary of Nazareth” republished in American Religious Poems,
ed. Harold Bloom (2006) pp. 553-5.
“1938,” “Love and Fame,” “What Ellen Said,” republished in Words Brushed by Music: Selectionsfrom Johns Hopkins Poetry and Fiction (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004).
“The Odyssey of Joel Barlow” (parts III, VI, and VII) River City, vol. 4, no. 1 (winter 2004)
pp. 27–33.
“Winter Sparrows,” Pivot vol. 55, pp. 40-50 (2003).
“New People,” “The Soldier of Love,” “ God Honor and Country,” “ Already,” “From the Dead
Woman’s Notes” (by Anna Janko, tr. Gwido Zlatkes and John Burt), przekładaniec: a journal ofliterary translation Special Issue 2001, pp. 91-99.
“The Hang-Glider,” Hartford Courant p. D-1, April 2, 2001.
“The Knifegrinder,” “The Principle of Flickering” in Words for Images: A Gallery of Poems, Yale
University Art Gallery, 2001.
“The Passing of the Armies,” Literary Imagination, 1:2 (1999) pp. 268–72. Revised version:
Shawangunk Review vol. xvii (spring 2006) pp. 136-141. Revised version republished in Homage toRPW: An Anthology of Poems for Robert Penn Warren, H. R. Stoneback, ed., Roncevaux Press, 2006.
“God Honor and Country” (by Anna Janko, tr. Gwido Zlatkes and John Burt), periphery vol. 23
no. 1–2 (1997), p. 125.
“Little Girl Alone With Doll,” America vol. 175 no. 8 (September 28, 1996), p. 6.
“Viglius Zuichemus,” Salmagundi no. 111 (Summer, 1996), pp. 166–169.
“Love and Fame,”Yale Review vol. 84 no. 2 (April, 1996) pp. 88–9.
“Starbuck’s Watch,” The Formalist, vol. 6 no. 1 (1995), p. 31.
“Night on the River Queen, ” Southern Review, vol. 31, no. 2 (Spring 1995) p. 256.
“What Ellen Said,” Southern Review, vol. 31, no. 2 (Spring, 1995) p. 256.
“The Phantom Arm,” New Letters, vol. 61, no. 3 (1995), p. 78.
“Mary’s Gift,” Paris Review vol. 134 (1995) p. 272.
“Ice Storm,” Paris Review vol. 134 (1995) p. 272.
“Charles Capers,” Paris Review vol. 134 (1995) p. 271.
“Barren Season,” Western Humanities Review vol. XLIX, no. 4 (Winter 1995) pp. 362–3.
“Song at Sunrise” The Spirit that Moves Us, (1981).
“After the Thunderstorm” The Spirit that Moves Us, vol. 4 no. 1 (1978) p. 44.
“Robert Falcon Scott Enters Paradise” Chicago Review, vol. 30 no. 4 (1978) p. 9.
“Three Songs from Paintings by J. E. Millais” Poetry Miscellany vol. 7 (1977) p. 33.
“Experience” Poetry Miscellany vol. 6 (1976) p. 26.
Education
Ph.D Yale University, December, 1983 (English) Dissertation: “American Romance and the Bounds of Sense”, directed by John Hollander and R.W.B.
Lewis
M.A. Yale University, May, 1978 (English)
B.S. Yale University, May, 1977 (English and Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry) summa cum laude
Presentations
“Robert Penn Warren’s Quarrel with Emerson: “Homage to Emerson, On Night Flight to New York,”
Robert Penn Warren Circle, Guthrie, KY April 21 2023.
“The James Family” Seminar organizer, Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers, October
20-22 2022, New Haven CT
“Pilgrims and Outcasts in 19th century Palestine: Melville’s Clarel” University of Haifa, October 26 2021
(on zoom).
“Robert Penn Warren’s Democracy and Poetry,” Robert Penn Warren Circle 2021, online, April 2021.
“Warren’s Brother to Dragons” guest lecture at the University of North Georgia, February 9, 2021 (via
zoom)
Poetry reading, University of Haifa (via zoom) December 7, 2020.
“Robert Penn Warren’s Quarrel with Emerson: “Homage to Emerson, On Night Flight to New York,”
Bristol Bookfest (via zoom), October 16-18, 2020.
“Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address” guest lecture class at University of Massachusetts, Boston, April 16, 2020
(and many other times).
“Robert Penn Warren’s World Enough and Time,” guest lecture at Catholic University, March 22, 2020 (via
zoom, because of the epidemic)
“[Frederick Douglass’s] Fourth of July Speech and the U.S. Constitution,” Association of Literary
Scholars, Critics, and Writers, Worcester MA, October 3-6 2019.
“Melville at 200,”(conveyor) Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers, Worcester MA,
October 3-6 2019.
“Collective Guilt in the Lincoln Second Inaugural Address,” American Studies lecture series, Brandeis
University, April 5, 2016.
“Lincoln and the Public Mind,” Conference on Intellectual History, Somerville Public Library, April 1,
2016.
“The Michael Lally Letters,” The Civil War Letters of Wellesley College and Brandeis University: Digital
Exhibition Kickoff, Brandeis University, November 11, 2015.
”Implicitness, Pragmatism and Responsibility in Lincoln: Response to Richard King, Peter Kuryla, and
Peter Wirzbicki”, Society for U.S. Intellectual History, Washington, DC, October 15-18, 2015
“History and Idealism in Robert Penn Warren’s Brother to Dragons,” Bridging the Two Cultures, Brandeis
University, October 7 2015.
“Robert Penn Warren’s The Legacy of the Civil War” 2014 Flair Symposium, Cultural Life During Wartime
Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin, September 20, 2014.
“Prosperity and Tyranny in Lincoln’s Lyceum Address,” Conference on the Political Thought of Abraham
Lincoln, Linfield College, May 8, 2014.
“Jefferson in Robert Penn Warren’s Brother to Dragons, Robert Penn Warren Circle, Austin Peay State
University, April 27, 2014
“Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address,” Committee on Social Thought, University of Chicago, April 21,
2014
“Negative Capability and Education,” Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers, Bloomington,
IN, April 5, 2014.
“Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address,” University of Notre Dame, December 5, 2013.
“Negative Capability, Fallennness, and Reconciliation in Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address” Mahindra
Humanities Center, Seminar on Philosophy, Poetry, and Religion, November 6, 2013.
“Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum and Library, Springfield, IL, July
24, 2013
“Lincoln and the Dred Scott Decision,” University of Augsburg, July 4, 2013
“The Gettysburg Address,” University of Augsburg, July 2, 2013
“The Gettysburg Address,” Yale University, May 3, 2013
“Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” Yale University (panel discussion hosted by Steven Smith), May 3, 2013
“Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” (appearance on Morning Joe, MSNBC)
“The Image of Lincoln in Robert Penn Warren,” Robert Penn Warren Circle, Clarksville, TN, April 20,
2013.
“Warren’s Regional Poetry,” (panel discussion), Robert Penn Warren Circle, Clarksville TN, April 20,
2013
“Lincoln and American Politics,” University of Massachusetts, Boston, April 11, 2013
“Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” Arlington Community Education, April 9, 2013
“Lincoln’s Tragic Pragmatism,” (television interview) Scully: The World Show (recorded July 12, 2012,
broadcast August, 2013)
“What is the New Birth of Freedom in the Gettysburg Address,” Brandeis University Department of
English Faculty Talk, October 2, 2012
“Robert Penn Warren’s Poetry,” Catholic University of America, October 27, 2011.
“Douglas and Lincoln on the Dred Scott Decision” Brigham Young University, February 5, 2010
“Caesura and Enjambment” Brigham Young University, February 4, 2010
“Defending the Declaration of Independence: Lincoln’s Dred Scott speech,” Rolde Lecture, Brandeis
University Library, November 9, 2009
“LaTeX for Beginners” Brandeis University October 19, 2009
“Bleeding Kansas in Warren’s John Brown: The Making of a Martyr,” Robert Penn Warren Circle
Conference, Bowling Green KY, April 17, 2009
“Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address” Brookline Historical Society, March 22, 2009.
“Lincoln’s Major Speeches and the Lincoln-Douglas Debates” two-day seminar for Teachers as Scholars,
Cambridge MA March 16, 23 2009.
“Lincoln’s 1857 Dred Scott speech” University of Illinois Lincoln Bicentennial Conference, November 8,
2008.
“All the King’s Men in Historical Context,” Intiman Theater, Seattle Washington (after a production of the
play), November 2, 2008.
“Speeches of Abraham Lincoln” Pursuing Justice, week-long seminar for teachers from Eastern
Massachusetts organized by Teachers as Scholars, held at Brandeis University, July 2008.
“Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men” Radio panel discussion, The Diane Rehm Show, WAMU
(Washington DC), April 30, 1008.
“The Dred Scott Case,” Newhouse Center of Humanities, Wellesley College, March 15, 2007.
“Robert Penn Warren’s Poetry,” Louisiana Book Fair, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, October 28, 2006.
American Individualism Week-long Kompaktseminar at the University of Augsburg’s “Maison Blanche”
in Sion, Switzerland, with Professor Steven Whitfield (of Brandeis) and Professor Hubert Zapf (of the
University of Augsburg), July, 2006.
“The Cambridge History of American Literature,” American Literature Association Conference, San
Francisco, California, May 26, 2006.
Keynote Address, “Robert Penn Warren’s The Legacy of the Civil War,” Robert Penn Warren Annual
Symposium, Robert Penn Warren Center, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, Kentucky, April
23, 2006.
“Typesetting Critical Editions of Poetry,” presentation for class at Boston University Editorial Institute,
April 18, 2006.
“The Political Culture of the Federalist. All day seminar for teachers from Eastern Massachusetts,
organized by Teachers as Scholars, February 15 2006.
“Warren’s non-fiction: The Legacy of the Civil War’ Robert Penn Warren Centennial Conference, Yale
University November 1, 2005.
“Typesetting Critical Editions of Poetry with Poemscol,” PracTeX(TeX User’s Group), Chapel Hill, NC,
June 12–17, 2005.
“Warren and Race in the 1960’s” (chair) American Literature Association, Boston MA, May 27, 2005.
“Wild Metaphor and Dark Transcendence in Brother to Dragons, Robert Penn Warren Circle, April 21-4,
2005; Robert Penn Warren Centennial Conference, SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, New York, May 2-3,
2005.
“Poetry and War,” New England Poetry Conference, University of Massachusetts–Lowell, April 6-7 2005.
“Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address,” (radio broadcast) What’s the Word?, Sally Placksin, producer,
Modern Language Association, October 2004.
“Into the Whirlwind: Lincoln’s House Divided Speech,” University of Kentucky, April 18, 2002.
“Reason Also Is Choice: Reflection, Freedom, and the Euthyphro Problem,” Brandeis Faculty Seminar on
Humanistic Inquiries, February 5, 2002.
“The Political Philosophy of The Federalist” two day January 2002 seminar for teachers from Eastern
Massachusetts given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public
Schools and the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
“The Infinite Act and the Impossible Agent in Emerson,” University of Dortmund, Dortmund, Germany,
December 14, 2001.
“Cultural Change and Political Change in Recent Southern Fiction: Margaret Walker, Ernest Gaines,
Flannery O’Connor, Alice Walker, and Peter Taylor,” Teachers’ Conference arranged by U.S. Department
of State, Muenster, Germany, December 13, 2001.
“The Lincoln-Douglas Debates,” University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany, December 12, 2001.
“Emerson and Romantic Idealism,” University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany, December 12, 2001.
“Generational Conflict in Recent Southern Fiction: Flannery O’Connor, Alice Walker, Reynolds Price, and
Peter Taylor,” University of Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany, December 11, 2001.
“Law and Justice at Odds with Each Other in Warren’s All the King’s Men,” University of Bamberg,
Bamberg, Germany, December 10, 2001.
“The Political Culture of All the King’s Men” Kents Hill School, Kents Hill, Maine, December 3, 2001.
“Law and Justice at Odds with Each Other in Warren’s All the King’s Men,” University of Augsburg,
Augsburg, Germany, July 22, 2001.
“What is the Self in “Song of Myself?” ” University of Augsburg, Germany, July 15, 2001
“Robert Penn Warren Reflects on His Poetry,” Keynote Address, Robert Penn Warren Center Annual
Meeting, April 2001.
“Herman Melville’s Poetry of the Civil War,” Robert M. Gay Memorial Lecture, Simmons College, April
2001.
“The Associative Style in Warren and Ashbery,” Modern Language Assocation, Washington DC,
December 2000; Northeast Modern Language Association, March 2001; Connotations Conference on the
Poetics of Conversation, Halberstadt Germany, August 2001.
“Moral Conflict in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates,” two-day December 2000 seminar for teachers from
Eastern Massachusetts given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public
Schools and the Harvard Graduate School of Education
“Idealism and Rage in Proud Flesh,” American Literature Association, Long Beach, May 2000.
“Becoming Historical: Twentieth Century Literature at Century’s End,” Modern Language Association,
December 1999.
“Poetry of Emily Dickinson” two day December 1999 seminar for teachers from Eastern Massachusetts
given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public Schools and the
Harvard Graduate School of Education
“Lincoln’s Peoria Speech of 1854,” Invited lecture, New York University, February 3, 1999. Repeated
at Harvard Divinity School Center for Study of Values in Public Life, March 18, 1999, and Brandeis
American Studies Department, April 1999.
Program Chair, Robert Penn Warren Circle, American Literature Association, Baltimore, MD, May 27–29
1999.
Program Chair, Robert Penn Warren Circle, Bowling Green Kentucky, April 23–25 1999
“Vincent Persichetti’s settings of poems from Wallace Stevens’ Harmonium” (with Carol Ryzcek, soprano,
and Robert Winkley, piano) New England Conservatory, March 2, 1998, Brandeis University Festival of
the Arts, March 25, 1999, Longy School of Music, December 19, 2002.
“Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men,” December 1998 seminar for teachers from Eastern
Massachusetts given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public
Schools and the Harvard Graduate School of Education
“The Political Philosophy of The Federalist” February 1998 seminar for teachers from Eastern
Massachusetts given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public
Schools and the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
American Individualism Week-long Kompaktseminar at the University of Augsburg’s “Maison Blanche”
in Sion, Switzerland, with Professor Steven Whitfield (of Brandeis) and Professor Hubert Zapf (of the
University of Augsburg), June 1997.
“What was the Promise?” (on Robert Penn Warren’s 1957 Promises) American Literature Association,
Baltimore MD, May 23–25, 1997.
“Literature of the Reconstruction Era” January 1997 two-day seminar for teachers from Eastern
Massachusetts given through the Teachers as Scholars program, sponsored by the Brookline Public
Schools and the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
“Lincoln’s Address to the Young Men’s Lyceum” (invited lecture) State University of New York at Buffalo,
November 5, 1996.
“Editing Robert Penn Warren’s Poetry,” (keynote address) Robert Penn Warren Circle Conference, North
Adams, MA, August 1, 1996.
“Robert Penn Warren in Vermont,” (shortened version of the next paper) Northeast Modern Language
Conference, April 1, 1995.
“Robert Penn Warren as a Poet of New England,” (invited paper) The Legacy of Robert Penn Warren,
Louisiana State University, March 2–5 1995.
respondent to panel “Quotation as Originality: Citation and Self-Consciousness” Modern Language
Association Conference, December 1994.
“Stern Landscapes in the Poetry of Robert Penn Warren”(revised version of the next paper) Modern
Language Association conference, December 1992.
“Late Poetry of Robert Penn Warren” American Literature Association conference, May 1992.
“The Lincoln-Douglas Debates” Brandeis University National Women’s Committee itinerant lecturer,
1992.
“Collectivities in Composition” Modern Language Association, December 1989.
Respondent to “Man Hath No Part in All This Glorious Work” (by Barbara Packer), Romantic Revolutions Indiana University, Bloomington, March 2, 1988.
“Learning to Write: The Narrative of Frederick Douglass,” Interdisciplinary Nineteeth-Century Studies
Conference, Boston, April 15, 1988.
“Frederick Douglass, Freshman Composition, and Literary Theory” (Revised version of above)
Composition and Literary Theory, University of San Francisco, June 9–11, 1988.
Lecturer for Brandeis Educational Outreach (1985–current) Presentations on American Literature at area
high schools.
Traveling Lecturer for Nevada Humanities Committee (1980) lecture series in Eureka (NV) Public Library,
and Ely (NV) Public Library.
Administrative Experience
Chair, Department of English 2008-9, 2020–
Humanities Fellows Program, co-Director, 2015–
Division Head, Division of the Humanities, Brandeis University, 2014-8
President, Association of Literary Critics, Scholars, and Writers, 2011-12. (Also, Program Chair,
Eighteenth Annual Meeting, March 9-11 2012, Claremont McKenna College, Claremont, California.)
Vice President, Association of Literary Critics, Scholars, and Writers, 2010–11
Director of University Writing (Spring, 1999 – Summer 2002 (Co-director 2000-2001)), 2010-11,
2013-2014, 2016
Literary Executor for Robert Penn Warren 1989–
Chair, Humanities Council (2001–2)
Board member, Robert Penn Warren Center, Western Kentucky University 1996– (Chair, 2003-4)
Board member, Robert Penn Warren Circle 1996– (Program Chair, 1998-9, Vice-President, 1999,
President, 2000-2001), Treasurer 2002–
Moderator, Massachusetts Bay District of Unitarian-Universalist Congregations (1991-7).
Co-Director, Brookline Public Schools NEH Summer Institute. (Three grants: 1988–9, 1990–91, and
1994–5) Provided general planning, administration, and instruction for four week summer Institute for
Eastern Massachusetts Primary and Secondary Teachers (1988–9 and 1994–5) and teachers from around
the nation (1990–1), on Literary Study and the Teaching of Writing. Taught six hours daily during the
actual institute.
University Studies in Humanities Development Grant. Helped write grants for summer institute on African
and African-American literature, 1991 and 1992
Secretary, The English Institute. (1984–1987) Responsible for all of the administrative and financial
affairs of an organization of 5000 English Professors. Maintained mailing list, prepared advertising
and brochures, prepared tax returns, arranged a yearly four-day convention, solicited nominations to
Supervising Committee and ideas for discussion panels from membership. Arranged yearly Business
Meeting.
Evaluator, Brown University Great Books Program (1989–1992). Retained to evaluate program for NEH.
University Service
Kay Fellow Search (Disability and Classical Studies) 2023
Faculty Senate, 1989–92, 2002–4 (Senate Council 2003-4), 2022-
Digital Literacy Committee 2018– (with the reorganization of the committee in 2021, I am now the only
member of the committee.)
Search Committee Chair, British Modernism Search, 2007
Search Committee, Kay Postdoctoral Fellow, 2005
Chair, Faculty Seminar in Humanistic Inquiries (2001–3)
Freshman Advising, 1999– (and many other years)
Director, Freshman Writing Seminar. (Spring 1985–Summer 1992) Trained and supervised staff of 20
Teaching Assistants, placed incoming freshmen, scheduled sections of FWS course, oversaw Basic
Composition course. Selected and trained staff of Writing Center during its first two years of operation,
offered (fall 1986) training seminar to teachers of Writing Intensive courses.
University Curriculum Committee 2000–3
Curriculum Revision Subcommittee 1999-2000
Undergraduate Fellows Program chair 1999
Director Of Graduate Studies, 1995–7
Admissions Liasion to English Dept., 1991–3, 1995–
Writing Skills Advisory Group. (1985–1993) Considered and proposed curricular reforms concerning
writing, including establishment of the Writing Center, offering of Basic Composition for Credit, and
establishment of Writing Intensive courses and Writing Fellows program.
Arlene Durkin Prize Committee
Grossbardt Prize Committee
Freshman Advising (almost every year)
One of two administrators of the Writing Center (1985–7)
Other Experience
Article reviewer American Political Thought 2018, 2022
Article Reviewer Twentieth Century Literature 2022
Article Reviewer Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 2022
Article Review Law, Culture, and the Humanities 2015
Town of Arlington Poet Laureate Selection Committee, 2015– (chair 2019–)
Promotion to Full Professor, University of Georgia, 2019
Chartier Prize Judge, Framingham State University, 2015–
Reviewer, Peirce Transactions Journal, 2013
Reviewer, Promotion to Full Professor, Tulane University, 2013
Reviewer, Yale University Press, 2013
Outside Evaluator, English Department, Trinity College (Hartford, CT), 2012