Monday, December 6, 2010

Late Fall Harvest: Dowsing and Science

As noted in a previous post, the harvest is coming in.

There will be a list of other items later this week, but for now I am pleased to report that my first essay collection, Dowsing and Science, appears on page 49 of the Spring/Summer Catalog of the Texas A&M University Press Consortium.

Published by consortium member Texas Review Press, whose authors include Richard Burgin, George Williams and Eric Miles Williamson, Dowsing and Science consists of essays appearing in publications such as Boulevard, Chelsea, and Pleiades. The topics range from the title essay to a discussion of Romanian history as symbolic condition and the survival value of esthetics. A few personal accounts appear in the collection as well, discussing my first experiences with salt water (a rude shock for a Midwesterner) and how in some circles I came to be known as a king. The bulk of the collection, though, is made up of what could be called the "Impersonal Essay" in a tradition practiced by Montesquieu, eighteenth-century English writers such as Addison, Johnson and Steele, and nineteenth-century American writers like Emerson and Thoreau.

I have been going over page proofs in the last several days and plan to make this collection the best possible experience for a wide range of readers.

Watch this space for a few more announcements in the days ahead.

2 comments:

Sue Guiney said...

Now that's what I'm talkin' about. I never thought I'd have a reason to say this but "Hooray for Texas A+M"!!

J.D. Smith said...

Thanks, Sue.

The part of the consortium that is publishing my book is based at Sam Houston State in Huntsville, but I think the Aggies are doing the heavy lifting of distribution.

As a University of Houston Writing Cougar I don't know what to make of all this, but I could say that of a great many things.

At any rate, I think the book will make a valuable addition to libraries from Baltimore to Bucharest.