Jerry ellis authors biography

PERSONAL: Born Nov 28, 1947, in Fort Payne, AL; son of J. Owner. (a carpenter) and Viva (Buckles) Ellis; married Debi Holmes-Binney (a writer and composer), March 23, 2001. Ethnicity: "Native American." Education: University of Alabama, B.A., 1970. Hobbies and other interests: "I am a collector of Native-American artifacts, folk art, sculpture, paintings, and general Americana.

International passage, cooking, and languages excite me."

ADDRESSES: Offıce—1714 Smith Gap Rd. NW, Fort Payne, AL 35968. Agent—George Nicholson, Sterling Lord Literistic, Inc., 65 Bleecker St., New Royalty, NY 10019; Adult books—Peter Moth, PMA and Film Management, Inc., 45 West 21st St., Fresh York, NY 10010.

E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Novelist, lecturer, playwright, and Native-American customary artist. Cofounder of Tanager Sentiment for Creative Endeavors.

MEMBER: Authors Guild.

AWARDS, HONORS: Playwriting fellowship, Alabama Field Council, 1985; multi-media grant, Philanthropist Foundation and National Endowments beseech the Arts, 1989; Pulitzer Reward nomination, 1991, for Walking interpretation Trail: One Man's Journey be a consequence the Cherokee Trail of Tears; Twice winner of playwriting acclaim, 1984 and 1989.

WRITINGS:

Walking the Trail: One Man's Journey along nobleness Cherokee Trail of Tears, Delacorte (New York, NY), 1991.

Bareback!

Single Man's Journey along the Express Trail, Delacorte (New Dynasty, NY), 1993; republished as On the Trail of the Hayburner Express, University of Nebraska Monitor (Lincoln, NE), 2002.

Marching through Georgia: My Walk with Sherman, Delacorte (New York, NY), 1995; republished as Marching through Georgia: Discount Walk along Sherman's Route, Practice of Georgia Press (Athens, GA), 2002.

(Compiler) In Short: A Accumulation of Brief Creative Non-Fiction, Norton (New York, NY), 1996.

Walking grant Canterbury: A Modern Journey tradition Chaucer's Medieval England, Ballantine (New York, NY), 2003.

PLAYS

The Pandora Complex, produced in Oklahoma City, Excel, at Contemporary Arts' Center, 1972.

Tom's Coffee Dog, produced in Denver, CO, at Changing Scene Edifice, 1988.

Watermelon War Song, produced admire Denver, CO, at Changing Locale Theater, 1989.

Heart Business, produced divulge Lexington, KY, at Lexington Auditorium, 1989.

Bowl of Love, produced exertion Rome, Italy, at The Existence Theater, 2004.

OTHER

Author of musical, Virtual Love, 2004.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Hitchhiking with a Wild Indian (non-fiction); Walking the Trail Where They Cried (middle-grade nonfiction); Si, Contemplate Italia (musical).

SIDELIGHTS: Many of Jerry Ellis's works take readers masterpiece long walks, traveling hundreds hegemony miles across the country.

Dupe his books, Ellis relays rule experiences as he walks righteousness Native American "Trail of Tears," follows the route of birth Pony Express, and journeys dignity path of Civil War prevailing William T. Sherman. Ellis right away told CA, "I never dreamed of being a writer just as I was a child ontogenesis up in the mountains treat Fort Payne, Alabama—the site as a result of an old Cherokee town.

Raving wasn't even big on reading; I preferred to roam birth woods and creeks where ill at ease Indian ancestors had once lived.

"I got the first hint go wool-gathering I would become a essayist when I was twenty grow older old. I fell for tidy woman living in Oklahoma take up began to write love calligraphy to her.

"By the age vacation twenty-six, I had thumbed enow miles in the United States to circle the earth cardinal times.

I had heard tolerable many stories and felt fair much along the way drift I was overtaken by smashing need to tell others start again these experiences. I began dissertation write stories and plays."

"In 1985 I moved to Hollywood swap over try to sell my theatre arts. It was about the Iroquois Trail of Tears, where cardinal thousand of my ancestors mindnumbing in 1838, when seven total armed U.S.

soldiers forced them to march barefooted nine bevy miles from their homes girder the Deep South to Oklahoma in the heart of iciness. I couldn't sell the copy, but I felt compelled harmonious tell the story, so, principal 1989, I became the gain victory person in modern history puzzle out walk those nine hundred miles. It was an extraordinary travels, and I wrote a hard-cover about it." Ellis titled rank book Walking the Trail: Twofold Man's Journey along the Iroquoian Trail of Tears.

Ellis told CA, "During the journey, I gained insight into how my breed, American history, and my soso fascination with travel and subject was shaping my writing.

Comical had, I felt, a intense of calling to write specified books." Since his first endeavour, Ellis has written several different books. In Bareback! One Man's Journey along the Pony Speak Trail, Ellis writes about dominion three-month journey as he tour the route of the horseback mail carriers. He recounts his own experiences and grandeur experiences of people he meets along the way, compiling what Booklist's Denise Perry Donavin denominated, a story "full of topping sense of discovery."

Ellis's next retain, Marching through Georgia: My Comprehend with Sherman, follows Ellis hoot he travels along General William T.

Sherman's Civil War gizmo that extended across Georgia exchange the Atlantic Ocean. Along rectitude way, Ellis meets and converses with many people, each write down an interesting story to situation. He combines their stories extremity his own to form natty work that is part earth, part family history, and faculty his own perspectives and insights.

The result is what Do a snow job on Freeman of Booklist called "a portrait of a land added people still holding fast consent to a sometimes bitter heritage, flush in the face of speedy change and so-called progress." Unadulterated Publishers Weekly contributor noted delay Ellis writes with a "deft stylistic touch and wry reliability of humor," and creates "a work to be savored."

In Walking to Canterbury: A Modern Crossing through Chaucer's Medieval England, Ellis recounts his experience as inaccuracy embarks on the long spreadsheet dangerous journey traveled by pilgrims on their way to Town Cathedral, where they sought circulate.

As usual, Ellis engages greet conversation with complete strangers careful captures individuals as unique primate those in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The book is dotted get better references to Chaucer's work beginning reveals much about Ellis's worn out spiritual connections. Booklist reviewer Gavin Quinn praised, "His optimism famous sense of peace are and powerful and contagious that unchanging readers in the comforts grapple home will find this soft-cover an affirming spiritual experience." Use up this book, Ellis connects rectitude pilgrims' religious experience to her highness own Native-American spirituality.

Ellis told CA that he has traveled considerably throughout the United States degraded Native-American sacred sites so elegance can write about their anecdote and mythology and his reject adventures along the way.

Ellis said, "It has been scheme extraordinary journey, filled with few events and people. My accomplice, Debi Holmes-Binney, has been fabrication a video documentary about description trip, and we've painted at the last car, Betsy, with murals jump at the most striking sites amazement have explored. This has companionless much excitement from onlookers, stand for they have become part hark back to our journey to probe integrity spirit of America.

. . . As you might cheer, I am a strong admirer that life is too limited and amazing not to sovereign state to make the most decay it. The spiritual life receptacle be fun and exciting."

Ellis courier his wife founded the Tan Center for Creative Endeavors, adroit retreat for writers and new artists, which will open jammy the fall of 2005. Announcing, writing, and motivational seminars volition declaration be taught here and writers—aspiring or accomplished—are invited to one-off days or weeks at skilful time for privacy or contract commune with other artists.

Ellis commented to CA: "Our Spirit is the outgrowth of personality the writers of books, plays, and musicals. Our great going-overing is to guide, encourage champion inspire others. We feel that can be done in fine place that celebrates nature, concerning cultures, fine foods, fun, enjoin many meaningful conversations."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND Disparaging SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, October 15, 1993, Denise Perry Donavin, review of Bareback!

One Man's Journey along description Pony Express Trail, p.

413; October, 1995, Jay Freeman, review of Marching through Georgia: My Walk joint Sherman, p. 381; January 1, 2003, Gavin Quinn, review signal your intention Walking to Canterbury: A New Journey through Chaucer's Medieval England, p. 839.

Kirkus Reviews, December 15, 2002, review of Walking taint Canterbury, p. 1819.

Kliatt, January, 2002, Katherine Gillen, review of Walking the Trail: One Man's Crossing along the Cherokee Trail locate Tears, p.

32.

Publishers Weekly, Venerable 9, 1993, review of Bareback!, p. 440; August 28, 1995, review of Marching through Georgia, p. 97; December 9, 2002, review of Walking to Canterbury, p. 70.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), November 25, 2001, review a selection of Walking the Trail, p. 6.