Before Kodachrome - Paperback

by Diane Kistner (Editor), Don Schofield (Author)

Set in Fresno, the Sierra Nevadas and Greece, the poems in Before Kodachrome look back unflinchingly at a fractured California childhood in the 1950s and '60s. In the process they lay out in stark contrast the dimensions of a life where parents, real and surrogate, are at once loving and violent, attentive and neglectful, righteous and morally bankrupt. From his adopted homeland, the cradle of Western civilization, the poet weaves stories from classical mythology, the Old Testament, fairy tales and popular American culture that show how a balanced adult self can be formed, not by avoiding childhood trauma and insistently "moving on," but by using language and narrative to delve deep into one's past and bring back artifacts that provide meaning, stability and, yes, at times, transcendence.

Author Biography

Don Schofield's poems, essays and translations have appeared in numerous American and international journals. Among his awards are the John D. Criticos Prize (UK), the Allen Ginsberg Award, and a Stanley J. Seeger Writer-in-Residence appointment at Princeton University. His books include Approximately Paradise, (University Press of Florida, 2002). Kindled Terraces: American Poets in Greece (Truman State University Press, 2004), and The Known: Selected Poems of Nikos Fokas, 1981-2000 (Ypsilon Press, 2010). A resident of Greece for over 30 years, he currently lives in Thessaloniki, where he serves as Dean of Special Programs at Perrotis College, the higher education division of the American Farm School.