In
an old American foursquare house near downtown Baraboo (The Circus
City). It’s a new experience for me to live in such an old home. In
general, we love it. Our house does, however, have its own. . . quirks
(such as a sloping hallway floor, a dungeon-like basement, and squirrels
in the attic).
In
2004, I completed a dissertation on the novels of Raymond Chandler. As
I write in the abstract, “Chandler’s
protagonist Philip Marlowe is much more than merely a modern knight; he
is a man with a pre-modern code of chivalrous behavior on a modernist
quest for truth in an increasingly postmodern milieu where his code and
his quest are rejected. Marlowe serves as a sort of reluctant prophet
of the postmodern era.” Bored yet? I realized that there is little
market for a Chandler scholar, so I have also branched out into
Hemingway and Fitzgerald, as well as film studies (film
noir in particular).
and you’ll never work a day in your life.” The reverse of that also has
truth—“Do what you love and you’ll turn what you love into work.” I
find that I often use pleasure reading time to fill in the blank spots
on my mental list of “must reads.” For example, I’m finally reading
Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred
Years of Solitude. Then I’m going to read Bill Drennan’s
book. (My wife Bridget already read Bill’s book; she says that it is
scholarly, yet gripping. She also says that Katie is correct; don’t
read it at night in a prairie box house.) I love the books of Douglas
Adams
and David Lodge. Finally, I confess a weakness for comic books,
especially a Japanese epic manga series from the 1970s (reprinted in
English in recent years) called Lone
Wolf and Cub; through that title, I have learned much about
feudal Japanese history and culture (plus the art is incredible).
I
did my undergrad work at Florida State University (class of ’89). (Hey,
someone has to
counterbalance all the University of Florida alumni!) I got my M.A.
from University College London in 1996 and my PhD from the
University of South Florida in 2004.
I worked for three years in an elementary school after-school program (1986-89). I taught high school English for six years in southwest Georgia (1989-95). I taught middle school language arts for three years in north Florida (1996-1999). Now I have been teaching at the college level for eight years.
I truly love what I do. I am a very lucky man. There is no one on earth with whom I would trade places.
(my
faculty picture) 
(This is Bridget and me at the Hemingway conference in Spain last summer.)
Here is a picture from December 2005 of me with my wonderful dog Logan. He looks the same. I, on the other hand, have lost a few pounds, grown a beard, and grown my hair a bit longer. Sorry about the red-eye; neither of us have glowing, demonic eyes in real life. . . .
And this is my signature:
_______________________________________________________
Marc Seals, PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of English
University of Wisconsin-Baraboo/Sauk County
http://www.baraboo.uwc.edu/academics/directory_detail.asp?ID=59
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