Date posted: 11-28-01

Editors: You are encouraged to use this story in your publication. Please credit the author and DeKalb News Service as shown. And, please send two tearsheets to: Jim Killam, Department of Communication, Watson Hall, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115.

Tranplanted Texan brightens NIU classroom

By Bob Nelson
DeKalb News Service

The class is American Short Story. The building is Reavis Hall, Northern Illinois University's hottest building (or coldest, depending on which day you're in it). The professor, James Giles, strolls in, exactly when class is supposed to start. He's wearing a long-sleeve shirt despite the sweltering conditions; he has large dark-rimmed glasses and gray hair that falls across his forehead.

In his trademark Texas drawl, he talks about the book assigned for that day. Sometimes he'll stutter at the beginning or end of a sentence, and it'll take him a few seconds to get it out. After about a half-hour of lecture he departs from the lesson plan and tells a story about his trip to Morris, Ill.-the worst place on Earth, according to him (besides Oklahoma). He was pulled over for speeding by Officer Leroy, who happens to be the dumbest person on Earth. Every student Giles has ever had knows this story. Almost every English major or minor at NIU knows about Officer Leroy-either having heard it from him directly or from their friends.

There are other tales. Like the time he got an invitation out of the blue from musician Don Henley to an environmental awards ceremony, where he met Bill and Hillary Clinton (his Web site boasts a picture of him shaking hands with Bill). Apparently he had taught Henley in one of his classes 33 years ago. Looking back, he can vaguely remember a quiet student who didn't really stand out, who was probably Henley.

And there's the time when he had a student's car towed from his parking spot right outside Reavis Hall. It's not the most exciting or climactic story ever, but every student knows it. He usually takes a break from the lecture to tell an anecdote. It gets people's attention back.

"If you talk forever about the same thing it gets hard to listen," he says.

Giles grew up in Bowie, a small town in north Texas. "It's not close to anywhere," he says. His Web site boasts that he enjoys "The Baffling Cultural Phenomenon Known as The State of Texas." He still considers himself a Texan, even though he's been away more than 30 years.

His Web site also mentions that he "enjoys baseball and football (spectator)" as if someone would have confused him for a football player. He never played football when he was younger, not even in Texas, where "football isn't a sport, it's a religion."

Giles started reading at a young age, and remembers reading "Tarzan" among his first books. He can't remember not loving literature. As soon as he got old enough to start reading Hemingway, he was hooked. He thinks the Lost Generation writers are the best to have come out of this country; he even has a large, framed portrait of Hemingway in his office.

He received his undergrad degree from University of North Texas, then called North Texas State, and his doctorate from University of Texas. He never really knew that he wanted to teach. He figured he wanted to study literature his whole life, and teaching is one of the only ways one can do that.

He started teaching at North Texas in 1965, which he considered "very painful." There were two or three senior professors who acted like dictators, laying out the salaries and deciding what everybody taught, not allowing for any input. "There was no shared governance there," he said. So after teaching there for four years, he began looking for another job, even though he had tenure.

He looked all over. But a friend from his first year of grad school in 1961, James Mellard, knew he wasn't happy at North Texas, and suggested he come up to DeKalb.

Giles started teaching at NIU in 1970. At first he was overwhelmed. He was teaching new classes on top of being in a new town that was freezing- he's never gotten comfortable with the weather even after all this time. His wife (a free-lance editor) also moved with him, but was used to the weather. "She's from southern Indiana, which is a whole different world, but it was still less scary to her."

Despite the freezing temperatures and icy winds, Giles still likes Illinois. He likes Chicago is a great place, and he and his wife have season tickets to the Goodman Theater. And despite being overwhelmed at first he has been at NIU for more than 30 years.

He originally just wanted to teach in order to study literature. He has managed to do that, contributing to eight books, co-editing five, and writing three-his most recent, "Violence in the Contemporary American Novel," being published in 2000. He says more professors now continue to publish after they get their tenure, which many didn't do before he started teaching.
His most recent book is consistent with his love for American literature and his fascination with modern, ethnically-diverse writers. "There are probably more good writers in the U.S. from '62 to the present than in any other place or time," he says.

Michelle Averman took Giles' short-story class last summer. During the intermission on the first day she walked outside the sweltering classroom and told her friend, "I think he's crazy." He talked the whole time, not pausing too often, and went off on many tangents, some lasting for quite a while. At one point he talked about a different, unrelated book for 10 minutes. He even told the story of Morris, Ill, the worst place on Earth.

But there's only so much information you can cram into one class period.

Source contact info available on request.