Myers, Doris T. 1934–

(D.E. Myers, Doris Thompson Myers)

PERSONAL: Born March 12, 1934, in Gilbert, AR; daughter of William F. (a farmer) and Mae L. (an elementary schoolteacher; maiden name, Williams) Thompson; married Thomas M. Myers (a professor of German and an electronics technician), September 8, 1962; children: Thomas, Andrew (deceased), Elizabeth Myers Campbell (stepdaughter). Ethnicity: "Scotch-Irish." Education: Arkansas State Teachers College (now University of Central Arkansas), B.S., 1954; Ohio University, M.A., 1956; University of Nebraska—Lincoln, Ph.D., 1967. Politics: Democrat. Religion: Episcopalian. Hobbies and other interests: Birdwatching, fitness workouts, playing Scrabble and other word puzzles.

ADDRESSES: Home—2157 27th Ave., Greeley, CO 80634.

CAREER: High school teacher in Newport, AR, 1954–55, and Quantico, VA, 1956–59; University of Northern Colorado, Greeley, began as instructor, became professor, 1967–94, professor emeritus, 1994–.

MEMBER: Mythopoeic Society of America.

AWARDS, HONORS: Fellow of National Endowment for the Humanities at Yale University, 1979; Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for scholarship in Inklings Studies, Mythopoeic Society of America, 1995, for C.S. Lewis in Context.

WRITINGS:

Understanding Language, Boynton-Cook (Upper Montclair, NJ), 1984.

C.S. Lewis in Context, Kent State University Press (Kent, OH), 1994.

Bareface: A Guide to C.S. Lewis's Last Novel, University of Missouri Press (Columbia, MO), 2004.

Contributor to books, including The Pilgrim's Guide: C.S. Lewis and the Art of Witness, Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1998; and Reading the Classics with C.S. Lewis, Baker Book House (Grand Rapids, MI), 2000. Contributor to scholarly journals and literary magazines, including Chaucer Review, Cimarron Review, Anglican Theological Review, Inklings: Jahrbuch für Literatur und Asthetik, and Arkansas Historical Quarterly. Some writings appear under the pseudonym D.E. Myers.

SIDELIGHTS: Doris T. Myers once told CA: "At age seven I was captured by the words 'Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free' (John 8:32). Those words have defined my life as a person and a writer. I love to learn, and the best way to understand a subject is to write about it. My biggest problem is to limit myself to subjects for which I am fitted by temperament and previous experience."

"The death of our son Andy in 1989 provided a deeper motivation for writing: to create a truthful book worthy of his memory. I choose to write scholarly-critical works on the fiction of C.S. Lewis because his stories have created an important link with the truths of the past. A current project, titled Facing Reality, is a study of Till We Have Faces, in which Queen Orual sets out to write a perfectly truthful book.

"My style has developed from years of teaching general linguistics, history of the language, and rhetoric. Two of my many models—for friendship, scholarly exactness, passionate conviction, and intense joy in life, more than style—are the late Amy Clampitt, poet, and Paul A. Olson, Foundation Professor of English at the University of Nebraska—Lincoln.

"My writing process is like that of any other sailboat struggling into the wind—constant tacking. I move between careful research and speculative free writing, between grandiose outlines and disciplined sentence-shaping. The first three drafts are the hardest; for the others I call in my husband Tom as editor and devil's advocate. My efforts to face the reality of water and wind set me free."