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I am so sad to hear about Mr. Addis's passing. The world is the poorer for it, but I feel very lucky to have been a student of his as a seventh grader at St. Paul. I think of his class, and him, often.
I am an essayist and short story writer now in large part because of Mr. Addis's talents as a teacher and his deep regard for his students. He was the first person in my life who really seemed to read what I had written, who cared why this word was chosen instead of that, who made the artistry of writing feel like something important and beautiful and real, and not just the workings of my overactive preteen mind. In Mr. Addis's classroom, novels were *real*: characters had voices, chapter breaks were followed by dramatic pauses, and thunderstorms sounded like the other end of his pointer banging on the file cabinet. Every time I see a heron, I remember Mr. Addis's explanation of the imagery of the heron and the snake in "Of Mice and Men"--its allusion to the Garden of Eden, its foreshadowing of Lenny's death--and just being completely gobsmacked that what I thought was a boring nature description slowing down the plot was in fact this ornate masterpiece of writing. I had always loved to read, but in seventh grade Mr. Addis cracked open the world of literature to me, a world I still don't like to leave.
Thanks to email and Mr. Addis's improbable eventual adoption of it (I know all class materials were typewritten as of the late 90s; I assume that continued for longer), I was able to bring up some of our correspondence. Over the years, I would send him pieces that I had gotten published--my writing since I was his student all felt like it flowed directly from his influence, so it seemed natural that he should see it. I will share one of his responses, to a short story of mine, "The Island," that was published in an online-only literary magazine:
"I tried reading it on the computer screen but didn't have any luck. I broke down and bought a new printer just for 'The Island'. I have to have the written word on paper in front of my face to decipher properly. Old dog, you know."
God bless, Mr. Addis.
I am an essayist and short story writer now in large part because of Mr. Addis's talents as a teacher and his deep regard for his students. He was the first person in my life who really seemed to read what I had written, who cared why this word was chosen instead of that, who made the artistry of writing feel like something important and beautiful and real, and not just the workings of my overactive preteen mind. In Mr. Addis's classroom, novels were *real*: characters had voices, chapter breaks were followed by dramatic pauses, and thunderstorms sounded like the other end of his pointer banging on the file cabinet. Every time I see a heron, I remember Mr. Addis's explanation of the imagery of the heron and the snake in "Of Mice and Men"--its allusion to the Garden of Eden, its foreshadowing of Lenny's death--and just being completely gobsmacked that what I thought was a boring nature description slowing down the plot was in fact this ornate masterpiece of writing. I had always loved to read, but in seventh grade Mr. Addis cracked open the world of literature to me, a world I still don't like to leave.
Thanks to email and Mr. Addis's improbable eventual adoption of it (I know all class materials were typewritten as of the late 90s; I assume that continued for longer), I was able to bring up some of our correspondence. Over the years, I would send him pieces that I had gotten published--my writing since I was his student all felt like it flowed directly from his influence, so it seemed natural that he should see it. I will share one of his responses, to a short story of mine, "The Island," that was published in an online-only literary magazine:
"I tried reading it on the computer screen but didn't have any luck. I broke down and bought a new printer just for 'The Island'. I have to have the written word on paper in front of my face to decipher properly. Old dog, you know."
God bless, Mr. Addis.