The Tor House Foundation is proud to announce that the Book Club of California has named Trustee James Karman as the 2016 recipient of the Oscar Lewis Award for Western History. See details at www.bccbooks.org/programs/awards. Here is the announcement:
JAMES KARMAN
OSCAR LEWIS AWARD FOR WESTERN HISTORY
James Karman , Emeritus Professor at California State University, Chico, is considered the world’s foremost scholar of the life of poet Robinson Jeffers, having previously published many books, articles, and book reviews on the California poet during his distinguished career. “In his scholarly detective work,” says Jed Wyrick, chair of the Department of Comparative Religion and Humanities at CSU, Chico, Karman pursues “the thorniest references in the letters of Jeffers, and those of his wife Una Jeffers, until he uncovers hidden nuances of personal interactions and pierces each letter’s mythological and philosophical resonances. It is his loving fascination with this rich world that makes Karman’s edition more than just a collection of documents, which would be impressive enough. These three volumes also provide a guided tour of the cultural and intellectual orbit of a truly astounding American literary giant.”
James Karman is the author or editor of nine books about Jeffers, including five published by Stanford University Press—Stones of the Sur: Poetry by Robinson Jeffers, Photographs by Morley Baer (2001), The Collected Letters of Robinson Jeffers, with Selected Letters of Una Jeffers (2009, 2011, and 2015), and Robinson Jeffers: Poet and Prophet (2015). He is the recipient of the 2016 Lawrence Clark Powell Award for Distinguished Scholarship from the Robinson Jeffers Association.