Academics
English Faculty
Nathaniel Lewis
Department Chair
Professor of English
B.A. Yale University; M.A. University of North Carolina; Ph.D. Harvard University
Dr. Lewis has written on western American literature, literary aesthetics, and nature writing. He is the co-editor of True West: Authenticity and the American West and the author of Unsettling the Literary West, which won the Western Literature Association’s 2004 Thomas J. Lyon award for Best Critical Book in the field. He serves on the editorial board of the Postwestern Horizons series for the University of Nebraska Press and is a past member of the Western Literature Association’s Executive Council. He is currently at work on a collaborative book, tentatively titled Morta Las Vegas: CSI and the Problem of the West. Dr. Lewis teaches courses on literary theory, environmental writing, and multiethnic literatures.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 335
Phone: 802.654.2308
Box 245
E-mail: nlewis@smcvt.edu
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Kathleen M. Balutansky
Professor of English
B.A. Goshen College; M.A., Ph.D. University of Notre Dame
Dr. Balutansky specializes in Caribbean and post-colonial literature and theory, with a special focus on women writers. She is the author of The Novels of Alex La Guma: The Representation of a Political Conflict (1990). Her publications include scholarly articles on Caribbean writers, translations, interviews, a co-edited anthology of essays by Caribbean writers, Representing Caribbean Creolization: Reflections on the Cultural Dynamics of Language and Literature (1998), and Haiti: Writing under Siege (2004). She is currently Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the College.
Learn more about Dr. Balutansky in her faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Klein Hall
Phone: 802.654.2640
Box 242
E-mail: kbalutansky@smcvt.edu
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Frank Nicholas Clary
Professor of English
B.A. LaSalle College; Ph.D. University of Notre Dame
Courses Taught: Milton, Shakespeare, and Genres: Drama
Areas of Expertise: Shakespeare, Milton, Renaissance Literature, Drama
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Published the journal article "Maclise and Macready: Collaborating Illustrations of Hamlet" (The Shakespeare Bulletin, April 2007). Published the journal article "Having It Both Ways: Reading Two Early Acting Editions of Hamlet" (The Shakespeare Newsletter, April 2006).
On Teaching and Research: Dr. Clary is a Renaissance specialist who is working on the New Variorum Edition of Hamlet, which will be published by the Modern Language Association. He is also one of four editors who created and now supervise the Hamlet Web site that was celebrated at the International Shakespeare Conference during a champagne reception in the gardens of the Shakespeare Institute in Stratford-upon-Avon, England (www.hamletworks.org). He and his co-editors have received three substantial grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support this work. Dr. Clary has also published several articles on Shakespeare's plays, particularly on Hamlet, and reviews books on Shakespeare for The Sixteenth Century Journal and Shakespeare Quarterly.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Clary enjoys fishing, and he has a modest coin-collection.
Learn more about Dr. Clary in his faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 343
Phone: 802.654.2390
Box 353
E-mail: nclary@smcvt.edu
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Liz Inness-Brown
Professor of English
Director of the Writing Center
B.A. St. Lawrence University; M.F.A. Columbia University
View Professor Inness-Brown's Curriculum Vitae
Courses Taught: The Examined Life; Fiction Writing II; Writing I; Teaching Writing; The Writing Center Internship
Areas of Expertise: Ms. Inness-Brown is a publishing fiction writer. Her main area of interest and research outside is pedagogy - the teaching of writing and the use of writing as a mode of teaching in the classroom; also collaborative learning and other student-centered pedagogies.
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Author of two books of short stories, Ms. Inness-Brown (a.k.a. Liz Monley) is also a novelist. Her most recent novel, Burning Marguerite (Alfred A. Knopf, 2002) received national acclaim and has been published in many languages, including: German (as Das Rosenkind; Goldmann, 2003); Italian (Salani, 2003); and Dutch (Cargo, 2003). The San Francisco Chronicle called her novel "a stunning debut," and the New York Times Book Review said "Vivid yet concise, Inness-Brown's language burns away all but the essence of her story."
On Teaching and Research: Ms. Inness-Brown teaches fiction writing, of course, but she also runs Saint Michael's Writing Center, a peer-tutoring program, and trains the tutors through her course Teaching Writing. As an author, Ms. Inness-Brown's own writing helps her to understand the problems her students face, and she is able to address those problems using her own experience as a model. She feels she is fortunate in that she teaches what she know best, and can share with her students both her experiences as a teacher and her experiences as a writer.
Outside Saint Michael's: Ms. Inness-Brown lives on an island in Lake Champlain with her husband, eleven-year-old son and her two black cats. She loves to garden, both flowers and vegetables. Most of the rest of her free time goes to exercising and, of course, writing.
Learn more about Ms. Inness-Brown in her faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 333
Phone: 802.654.2441
Box 359
E-mail: einness-brown@smcvt.edu
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Carey Kaplan
Professor of English
B.A. Barnard College; M.A. University of Chicago; Ph.D. University of Massachusetts
Dr. Kaplan has published books on Doris Lessing and on canon formation (The Canon and the Common Reader). She is interested in collaborative composition, critical theory, feminist theory, queer studies and women’s writing. She is the driving force behind the establishment of the gender studies program and co-teaches a course in this program every spring. She also teaches Critical Theory, British Modernism, 18th Century Literature and Women’s Literature.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 342
Phone: 802.654.2359
Box 126
E-mail: ckaplan@smcvt.edu
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Christina Root
Professor of English
A.B. Bryn Mawr College; M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D. Columbia University
Dr. Root teaches courses in British literature, Romanticism, post-colonialism and British fiction. She is working on a full-length study of Romantic literary thinkers who offer ecological alternatives to the dominant, Western, mechanistic modes of consciousness.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 336
Phone: 802.654.2439
Box 282
E-mail: croot@smcvt.edu
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Lorrie Smith
Professor of English and American Studies
B.A. University of Massachusetts-Boston; M.A., Ph.D. Brown University
View Dr. Smith's Curriculum Vitae
Courses Taught: American Literature I and II; African American Literature; The Middle Passage (Transatlantic Slave Trade in History, Memory, and Imagination); Genres: Poetry; Senior Seminar on various topics (latest: Literature and the Blues); First-Year Seminar on Race and Culture
Areas of Expertise: African American literature, especially poetry
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Smith is currently working on a book entitled Reports from Vernacular Valleys: Post-Sixties Black Poetry and the Public Sphere. She published a book chapter, "Hungry Ghosts and Restless Spirits: Lyric Voices of the Middle Passage" in Africa and Its Diaporas: History, Memory, and Literary Manifestations (Eritrea: African World Press, 2008).
On Teaching and Research: Dr. Smith's classes offer the opportunity to engage students in discussions of race, racism, African American literature and history. She has worked hard to develop strategies for safely approaching what can often be loaded material that challenges students' comfort zones. She often incorporates experiences that combine classroom study with activities in the community. This includes overnight field trips to Charlestown, Massachusetts with her First-Year Seminar course and a three-week service-learning program in Ghana with students from her Middle Passage class. Through these cross-cultural encounters, students have a chance to examine and enlarge their own perspectives. Dr. Smith is also a faculty member in Saint Michael's American Studies program.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Smith enjoys yoga, meditation, dance, gardening and cross-country skiing. She participates in anti-racism efforts and anti-war activism.
Learn more about Dr. Smith in her faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 337
Phone: 802.654.2392
Box 167
E-mail: lsmith@smcvt.edu
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Greg Delanty
Associate Professor of English
B.A. National University of Ireland
Courses Taught: Poetry workshops; Irish Literature; Genres: Poetry; Introduction to Literary Studies: Modern American Poetry
Areas of Expertise: Poetry and literature
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Mr. Delanty was born in Cork, Ireland and is a widely published Irish poet. His latest poetry collection is The Blind Stitch (Oxford Series, Carcanet Press and LSU 2002). His other published works include The Hellbox (Oxford Series, Oxford University Press, 1998), American Wake (Blackstaff/Dufour, 1995), Southward (LSU, 1992), and Cast In The Fire (Dolmen Press, 1986). His poems have appeared in American, Irish, English, Australian, Japanese, and Argentinean anthologies, including the Norton Introduction to Poetry. He also co-edited Jumping Off Shadows: Selected Irish Poetry (Cork UP, 1995) and The Selected Poems of Patrick Galvin (Cork UP, 1995). He has read his poems widely and was invited to give a recorded reading at The Library of Congress in 2002.
On Teaching and Research: Mr. Delanty enjoys teaching all of his classes, and he considers himself a lucky person to have a job teaching what he loves - the reading and writing of poetry.
Learn more about Mr. Delanty in his faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 341
Phone: 802.654.2824
Box 383
E-mail: gdelanty@smcvt.edu
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Bob Niemi
Associate Professor of English
B.A. University of Massachusetts at Amherst; M.S. Columbia University; M.A., Ph.D.
University of Massachusetts at Amherst
Courses Taught: Genres: Film; American literature surveys; Critical Theory; advanced film courses
Areas of Expertise: American Studies; American literature and cultural history; film studies; critical theory; popular culture studies
Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Niemi has just completed a book on Russell Banks and has published a bibliography of Weldon Kees. He is beginning work on another study, Class Representation in Film.
On Teaching and Research: Most of Dr. Niemi's research and publishing is in American Studies areas (i.e., contemporary literature, film, cultural studies and critical theory), which makes for a close and lively reciprocity between his research and teaching.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Niemi and his wife keep a "hobby farm," complete with numerous chickens, roosters, goats, dogs, cats, and a 3-year-old pet Vietnamese potbellied pig named Leonard.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 345
Phone: 802.654.2569
Box 394
E-mail: rniemi@smcvt.edu
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Kerry Shea
Associate Professor of English
B.A., M.A. Middlebury College; M.A., Ph.D. Cornell University
Dr. Shea has published on women and film as well as Middle High German and Old Norse literature and is working on a book, Engendering Romance: Women and European Medieval Romance. She teaches courses in film, early British Literature, mystery fiction, utopian fiction and women’s literature.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 339
Phone: 802.654.2287
Box 392
E-mail: kshea@smcvt.edu
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Maura D'Amore
Assistant Professor of English
B.A. Brown University; M.A., Ph.D. North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Dr. Maura D'Amore joined Saint Michael's as an assistant professor of English beginning with the Fall 2009 semester. She is a specialist in American literature up to 1900 and in American Studies. Dr. D'Amore has an essay forthcoming in New England Quarterly titled, "Thoreau's Unreal Estate: Playing House at Walden Pond." She has four other essays on the subject of masculine domesticity scheduled to appear in important journals, including "'A Man's Sense of Domesticity'; Donald Grant Mitchell's Suburban Vision," forthcoming in ESQ: A Journal of the American Renaissance, and "Suburban Men at the Table: Culinary Aesthetics in the Mid-Century Country Book," forthcoming in an edition of essays on Culinary Aesthetics and Practices in 19th Century American Literature.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 331
Phone: 802.654.2742
Box 102
E-mail: mdamore@smcvt.edu
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Joel Dando
Visiting Assistant Professor of English
B.A University of Arizona; A.M., Ph.D. Harvard University
Courses Taught: Introduction to Literary Studies; Genres: Poetry; British Literature II; Modern Civlization (in Humanities); British Romantic Poets
Areas of Expertise: Romantic Poetry in general and the life, poetry, and letters of Lord Byron in particular; literature and the visual arts; fiction and film.
Recent Scholarly Achievements: In addition to teaching at Saint Michael's, Dr. Dando has lectured on British Romanticism, poetry, Shakespeare, and American Popular Cinema at universities in Australia and the United States.
On Teaching and Research: At a liberal arts college like Saint Michael's, Dr. Dando enjoys the stimulation of daily contact with colleagues in other disciplines, and the pleasure of participating in (and sometimes helping to shape) interdisciplinary programs such as the First-Year Seminar and the Humanities programs. The commitment to discovering, mastering, and incorporating diverse and unfamiliar materials not only keeps his teaching fresh; but it also reminds him of the challenges and rewards his students are facing at their stage in the learning process.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Dando enjoys movies, tennis, yelling at politicians (on the TV screen), and avoiding yard work.
Learn more about Dr. Dando in his faculty spotlight.
Contact Information
Box 334
E-mail: jdando@smcvt.edu
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Will Marquess
Instructor of English
Coordinator of First-Year Seminars
B.A. Duke University; Ph.D. Harvard University
View Dr. Marquess' Curriulum Vitae
Courses Taught: First-Year Seminar (Off the Grid); Fiction Writing Workshops
Areas of Expertise: Dr. Marquess' special interest lies in writing fiction. His research consists of reading as much fiction as possible and also just paying attention to the world.
On Teaching and Research: Dr. Marquess has published a study of Keats. He is a fiction writer and teaches writing workshops and introductory literature courses. He says that writing fiction makes him pay attention to everything - the eye color of the person he's listening to, the quality of the light, the timbre of a voice. Paying attention to students is crucial in teaching, and teaching keeps him in touch with youth, which is part of the world he wants to write about.
Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Marquess speaks French and Italian, and usually travels to Europe twice a year.
Learn more about Dr. Marquess in his faculty spotlight.
Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 329
Phone: 802.654.2802
Box 171
E-mail: wmarquess@smcvt.edu
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Antonia Messuri
Instructor of English
B.A. State University College at Potsdam; M.A. University of Vermont
Areas of Expertise: Ms. Messuri specializes in the theory and practice of teaching writing. She teaches Introduction to Literary Studies, Writing I, and first year seminars. She is currently working on a collection of essays. She serves as Director of Accessibility Services here at the college.
Outside Saint Michael's: Ms. Messuri is a student of classical piano. She is also a part-time student in the Saint Michael's College Master of Arts degree in Theology and Pastoral Ministry.
Campus Office
Klein Hall 111
Phone: 802.654.2828
Box 389
E-mail: amessuri@smcvt.edu
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Joan Wry
Instructor of English
B.A. Saint Michael’s College; M.A. University of Virginia
Ms. Wry teaches the American Literature surveys, Literary Studies, and first-year seminars. She has published papers on Shakespeare, Shelley, Whitman and antebellum women writers. She is currently serving as the Assistant Dean of the College.
Campus Office
Founders 111
Phone: 802.654.2347
Box 107
E-mail: jwry@smcvt.edu
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Tim Mackin
Henry G. Fairbanks Visiting Humanities Scholar-In-Residence
B.A. Colgate University; M.A., Ph.D. Johns Hopkins University
Dr. Mackin specializes in American and British modernism with a particular interest in the relationship between modernism and contemporary philosophy of language and mind. His research attempts to place modernist conceptualizations of knowledge in dialogue with early-twentieth century logic and epistemology and focuses on the writings of Virginia Woolf, Ezra Pound, Bertrand Russell, and Gottlob Frege. Dr. Mackin is also the former Associate Editor of English Literary History and served as Director of the Johns Hopkins University Writing Center.
Contact Information
Box 121
Phone: 802.654.2945
E-mail: tmackin@smcvt.edu