TWAIN'S
DEFECTIVE CHARACTERS
People and Pets
Page
Literature
THIS WAS IN BRYAN SHORT'S
CLASS AT NAU
We read Roughing It
and many other works of American Literature
Must be about 1971 or 2 or so Northern Arizona University
Somewhere on a paper he criticized a little and then relented
with...
"STILL, GRACEFULLY DONE."
Home
Go School
Days and College Writing
BRYAN SHORT DECEMBER 26, 2003
Bryan Short.jpg
Memoir from
Northern Arizona
University website
Professor of English and special assistant to the
president of Northern Arizona University, Bryan’s professional
life was shaped and honed in the NAU community. He was a friend,
a colleague, a teacher and a mentor to many of us. He also was
an administrator of multiple talents and great effect, and a
scholar and participant in the profession. And, of course, Bryan
was an outstanding citizen of NAU.
Bryan received his B.A. from
Yale in 1964, and he earned both his M.A. and Ph.D. from
Claremont Graduate University. His dissertation was on Herman
Melville’s poetry, and he became a well-known and respected
Melville scholar in his academic career. Most recently, as the
treasurer of the Melville Society, he worked to provide a forum
in which scholars, students and readers alike could celebrate
the great American writer.
Bryan served at NAU for 36 years, beginning in
1967 as an assistant professor of English. He earned tenure and
a promotion to associate professor in 1971, and directed the
English Composition program from 1971 to 1980. In 1980, he
assumed the position of department chair and was promoted to
full professor. In 2000, he was named executive director of the
Academic Chairs Council, where he brought new leadership and
participation in university governance to department chairs.
Bryan was selected to serve as special assistant to NAU’s
president in May 2003.
During his career at NAU, Bryan returned
to Yale twice as a visiting fellow in English: as a Newberry
Library Fellow, and as a postdoctoral fellow in Comparative
Literature. Bryan’s long and very distinguished career as a
teacher and scholar in the English Department at NAU was
exemplary: his colleagues honored him with both the Faculty
Mentor Award and the Excellence in Teaching Award. He was also
recognized by the Honors Program as one of the best teachers on
campus, and was presented with the prestigious NAU President’s
Award.
Bryan married Frances Sibal in 1966, and their first
child, Ray Collier, was born in 1967; Lisa Marie was born in
1973. Frances died of breast cancer in 1993. On New Year’s Day
in 1996, Bryan married Valeen Avery, professor of history at
NAU. Their marriage and new life, with Bryan’s two children and
Val’s four children — Nathan, Christopher, Thad and Maureen —
filled them both with adventure and joy.
Dean of the College of
Arts and Humanities Susan Fitzmaurice recalls, “I am the last of
many chairs of English that Bryan trained, mentored, advised and
guided through the mysteries of academic middle management. He
called me “boss,” entirely affectionately but always with his
tongue tucked in his cheek. Nobody was Bryan’s boss. He was a
mentor of new faculty, new chairs and even new deans. He was
very generous with his time, experience and perspective on
administration and scholarship alike. Politically astute and
extraordinarily persuasive, Bryan shaped the careers of many
people at NAU. He was intimately concerned for and deeply
interested in his colleagues, students and friends. Bryan had
the most uncommon gift of seeing each of us as an individual;
not an individual according to his own ideas of us, but an
individual comparable with no other individual.”
A former
student, Danny Robins, writes: “Dr. Short’s teaching — his
enthusiasm for poetry and American literature, his energy, his
sense of humor, his perceptive comments about the books we read
and my early efforts at literary analysis — woke me up. He
introduced me to a richly imaginative world that continues to
fascinate and inspire.”
At Bryan’s memorial service in January
2004, the NAU community celebrated Bryan’s enthusiasm,
extraordinary political sense about people and about issues, as
well as his energy and spirit. He was, in President John
Haeger’s words, truly the author of what has moved the
institution forward over the past few years, and “an NAU
original.”