.
By Jen Vos
Collection Overview
Abstract
Personal papers, notes, and manuscripts of poet James Den Boer (1937-2022). The collection includes poems, articles, programs, bibliography, and unpublished manuscripts.
Collection Historical Note
The James Den Boer Collection contains published and unpublished poems, manuscripts, notes, and papers. There are several notebooks filled with informal notes, sketches, and jottings that can be useful in studying the thought process of a working poet and writer.
Biographical Note
Poet, author, editor, and publisher were just a few hats worn by James Den Boer. He was born in Sheboygan, Wisconsin on August 21, 1937, educated in local schools, and attended Calvin College (AB 1960) and the University of California, Santa Barbara (MA 1969). He served in the US Naval Reserve from 1955-1963 and married Cady Williams in 1970.
Throughout his life, Den Boer was honored with numerous awards, grants, and prizes from prestigious institutions such as the National Endowment for the Arts, National Arts Council, and the International Poetry Forum. He published numerous books of poetry and occasionally branched out into translations, novels, and screenplays. Den Boer lived in Sacramento, CA from the mid-1990s where he continued to write, also serving as editor of Swan Scythe Press, and the proprietor of an online book shop, Paperwork.
Administrative Information
Repository:
Heritage Hall, Hekman Library
Alternate Extent Statement:
4.284 cubic feet
Access Restrictions:
This collection is open for research use within Heritage Hall.
Acquisition Method:
Donation
Related Materials:
Nicholas Wolterstorff Collection
Preferred Citation:
[item], folder, box, James Den Boer Collection, Heritage Hall (Hekman Library), Calvin University
Box and Folder Listing
Browse by Series:
[
Series 1],
[
Series 2],
[All]
- Series 1
- Box 1
- Folder 1: Biographical Information
- Folder 2: Application for Fellowship --- 1976
- Folder 3: Items regarding award-winning Learning the Way
- Folder 4: Accolades
- Folder 5: National Center for Health Education—Booklet edited by James Den Boer
- Folder 6: Critical Essays
- Folder 7: Speeches at AWP Conferences
- Folder 8: Need for Project—VD Treatment
- Folder 9: Poetry Notebook --- 1998
- Folder 10: Book of Sketches, Poems, and Jottings --- 1969-1973
- Folder 11: Book of Notes and Jottings --- 1973
- Folder 12: Book of Notes, Drawings, and Jottings --- 2001-2004
- Folder 13: Class Notes and Doodles
- Folder 14: Correspondence - Barbara Reid, Nicholas Wolterstorff --- 1973, undated
- Series 2
- Box 2
- Folder 1: American Literature Papers --- 1957-1958
- Folder 2: English Paper - ”A Brief Study of Jonsonian Metric”
- Folder 3: English Paper – ”The Alchemist” by Ben Johnson
- Folder 4: English Paper – ”The Blair-Charters Letter”
- Folder 5: English Paper – ”The Duchess of Malfi”
- Folder 6: English Paper – ”Digging for China – The ‘American’ Poetry of Louis Simpson”
- Folder 7: English Paper – ”Eliot, Laforgue and the Uban Metaphor”
- Folder 8: English Paper – ”The Faerie Queen – Book One”
- Folder 9: English Paper – ”Hard Times by Charles Dickens”
- Folder 10: English Paper – ”The Decline and Fall of the Roman Ideal by F.L. Lucas” --- 1959
- Folder 11: English Paper – ”The Idea of a University by John Newman”
- Folder 12: English Paper – ”James Joyce’s Dubliners”
- Folder 13: English Paper – ”James Joyce’s Chamber Music” --- 1968
- Folder 14: English Paper – ”John Gould Fletcher – The Arkansas Anygist”
- Folder 15: English Paper – ”Language and Stanza Form in Chaucer, Spenser, Keats, & Byron”
- Folder 16: English Paper – ”Lord Chesterfield’s Letters to His Son”
- Folder 17: English Paper – ”The Malone-Booth Letter”
- Folder 18: English Paper – ”The Music of Poetry in the Work of Louis Zukofsky”
- Folder 19: English Paper – ”The Poetic context of Keat’s ‘Ode on Melancholy’”
- Folder 20: English Paper – ”Romantic Theories of Poetry”
- Folder 21: English Paper – ”Shakespeare by Mark Van Doren”
- Folder 22: English Paper – ”Short Lyrics and Songs of Six Romantic Poets”
- Folder 23: English Paper – ”A Song to David by Christopher Smart”
- Folder 24: English Paper – ”Stylistics and Grammar” --- 1968
- Folder 25: English Paper – ”The Symbolist Movement in Literature”
- Folder 26: English Paper – ”Systems of Belief in Hardy and Yeats”
- Folder 27: Play – ”Indio Muerto”
- Folder 28: Play – ”The Birds at Geneva” by William Brown and James Den Boer
- Folder 29: Short Story – ”Just Writing”
- Folder 30: Manuscript of ”Strophes”
- Box 3
- Folder 1: Novel – Crocodile Isle Part I
- Folder 2: Novel – Crocodile Isle Parts II and III
- Folder 3: Novel – Flaws and Hitches
- Folder 4: Novel – Two Horses
- Folder 5: Novel – The Neon Air
- Folder 6: Mystery Novel (Untitled Draft)
- Folder 7: Novel (Missing Title Page)
- Box 4
- Folder 1: Screenplay - The Cubists
- Folder 2: Screenplay - Azteca
- Folder 3: Screenplay - Bad Blood
- Folder 4: Screenplay - Coming Apart
- Folder 5: Screenplay - Long Ago, Someday
- Folder 6: Screenplay - Two Horses
- Folder 7: A Play in One Act
- Folder 8: Manuscript - String of Pearls—Sixty ”Romance” Kharjas
- Box 5
- Folder 1: Information regarding Kharjas
- Folder 2: String of Pearls – Sixty ”Romance” Kharjas
- Folder 3: Book Review – Making Health Whole
- Folder 4: Poetry – Steps --- 2009
- Folder 5: Poetry – Coming Apart (Black Dog, Day Moon, Steps)
- Folder 6: Poetry – Trying to Come Apart
- Folder 7: Poetry – Standing Between My Eyes (Traces, Day Shift/Steps)
- Folder 8: Poetry – Lost in Blue Canyon and Other Poems --- 1976
- Folder 9: Poetry – Learning the Way (printed copy) Winner of the US Award of the International Poetry Forum --- 1967
- Folder 10: Poetry – Dreaming of the Chinese Army --- 2000
- Folder 11: Poetry – Traces
- Folder 12: Poetry – Four Poems --- 2009
- Folder 13: Poetry – Just Enough Lights
- Folder 14: Poetry – Stonework: Selected Poems --- 2007
- Folder 15: Poetry – Music (Bit, Gap, Heap, Note) --- 2008
- Box 6
- Folder 1: Poetry – Nine Poems
- Folder 2: Poetry – A Visible Light --- 1960-1964
- Folder 3: Poetry – Standing Between My Eyes --- 2008
- Folder 4: Poetry – SACAMIFESTO (Or, Why I Rarely Go to Local Poetry Readings) --- 2008
- Folder 5: Poetry – Black Dog: An Unfinished Segue Across Two Seasons --- 2005
- Folder 6: Various Poems
- Folder 7: Various Poems
- Folder 8: Various Poems
- Folder 9: Various Poems
- Folder 10: Various Poems
- Folder 11: ”Walking to the Sea” Poster copy
- Folder 12: Paper – ”Talking with the World”
- Folder 13: Paper ”Venantius Honorius Clemantainus Fortunatus”
- Folder 14: The Tule Review – Published Poetry --- 2003
- Folder 15: ANGELS (Biography of Jimmy and Marie Angel)
- Folder 16: Novel (Untitled Draft)
- Box 7
- Folder 1: Paper - The Christian Comedy of Chaucer's A Knight's Tale
- Folder 2: Papers by Nicholas Wolterstorff
I. Artistically Man Acts
II. Art and Responsibility
- Folder 3: Various Poems
- Folder 4: Prose Poems - Back Until Then, or Unjustified, or Ragged Right
- Folder 5: Kids Poems
- Folder 6: Novel - Making Names
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