Curriculum Vitae

JAMES SHERRY

Poet, essayist, editor, publisher

12/30/1946, Pennsylvania, USA

AB History, Reed College, 1968, Portland, Oregon, USA

300 Bowery

New York, New York 10012

(917) 608-2733

James Sherry’s papers are archived at Columbia University with the papers from Roof Books & Segue Foundation: https://findingaids.library.columbia.edu/ead/nnc-rb/ldpd_12444545

Summary:

James Sherry graduated from Reed College, Portland, Oregon, USA in 1968 with a Woodrow Wilson fellowship to Brandeis University in History of Ideas.
He is the author of 14 books of poetry and prose.
In 1976, he began Roof Magazine, a magazine of innovative writing published quarterly for 10 issues. Roof was notable for documenting the New York School, Beat poetry and as a seminal publication of Language Writing.
In 1977, he started the Segue Foundation, Inc. (seguefoundation.com) producing more than 10,000 literary and art events. In 1979, he started Roof Books (roofbooks.com), an imprint that has published more than 150 titles of innovative writing. Roof has notably published the current writing styles of primarily English-language poetry including Language Writing, Flarf, Conceptual poetry and Environmental Poetics. The online presence of Roof Books details those styles and individual publications.
From 1981 until 1999, he worked as a technologist and consultant in publishing and banking: Hearst Corporation, Von Holtzbrinck, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley among others.
Until 2012, he worked as a systems analyst and business development manager for IBM. He participated in patents in computer to computer communications, secure broker technology and inefficient computing using multicasting.
He is currently editor and publisher of Roof Books and President of The Segue Foundation, Inc. in New York City.

Books:

Selfie: Poetry, Social Change & Ecological Connection (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2023, prose, 357p.
The Oligarch (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2017), prose, 170p.
Entangled Bank (Victoria, TX: Chax Press, 2016), poetry, 85p.
Oops! Environmental Poetics (Buffalo, NY: BlazeVOX, 2013), prose, 252p.
Four For (Buffalo, NY: Meow Press, 1995), poetry, 20p.
Our Nuclear Heritage (Los Angeles, CA: Sun & Moon Press, 1991), prose, 262p.
Doscapade (New York: Hot Bird 1991), poetry, 10 p.
The Word I Like White Paint Considered (Windsor, VT: Awede Press, 1986), poetry, 20p.
Lazy Sonnets (Hartford CT: Potes and Poets Press, 1986), poetry, 26p.
Popular Fiction (New York, NY: Roof Books, 1985), prose, 82p.
Converses (Windsor, VT: Awede Press, 1983), poetry, 72p.
Integers (New York, NY: DTW, 1980), poetry 12p
In Case (Los Angeles, CA: Sun & Moon Press, 1980), prose, 52p.
Part Songs (New York, NY: Segue Press, 1978), poetry, 30p.

Essays:

“Against One Model Alone,” Aufgabe 13, 2017 https://jacket2.org/reissues/aufgabe/
“The Poet's Theater of Fiona Templeton: An Environmental View.” Postmodern Culture, 20.1 (2009)

Anthologies:

Annual Survey of American Poetry: 1986, editorial board (Great Neck, New York, Roth Publishing, 1986), 279p.
Boundary 2, vol. xiv #2, Winter 1986, Binghamton, NY.
49 + 1 Nouveaux Poets Americains, ed. Emmanuel Hocquard et Claude Royet-Journoud (Royaument: Bureau Sur L'Atlantique.Action Poetique, 1991), 340p.
From the Other Side of the Century, ed Douglas Messerli (Los Angeles, Sun & Moon Press, 1994), 1100p.
In the American Tree, ed. Ron Silliman (Orono, ME: National Poetry Foundation, 1986), 628p.
The L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Book, ed. Bruce Andrews and Charles Bernstein (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1984), 428p.
Language Poems, trans. Yunte Huang and Ziqing Zhang (Chengdu, P.R. China, Sichuan Literature and Art Publishing House, 1993), 180p.
Language Poetries, ed. Douglas Messerli (NY: New Directions, 1987), 125p.
"Language Sampler" in Paris Review, #86, 1982.
Out of This World, ed. Anne Waldman (Crown, NY, 1991), 690p.
The Poets' Encyclopedia, special issue of Unmuzzled Ox, vol. 5, 1979, New York, NY.
"Realism: An Anthology of 'Language Writing' in Ironwood, 1983.
Patterns / Contexts / Time, ed. Phillip Foss & Charles Bernstein, special issue of Tyuonyi, (Santa Fe, NM, 1990), 236p.

Reviews and interviews:

Review of The Oligarch in MoneyWeek, October 2017 https://moneyweek.com/475147/the-oligarch-james-sherry/
Interview with David Perry at NYU Shanghai https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWezvN5zpGc
Interview on The Oligarch with Ben Tripp in Guernica https://www.guernicamag.com/james-sherry-leadership-is-magnetic-as-power-is-aphrodisiacal/
Review of Entangled Bank in American Book Review, August, 2018 https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/39045
Review of Oops! http://www.conservationgateway.org/ScienceChronicles/Pages/1213sc.aspx
Review of Our Nuclear Heritage in Hank Lazer’s Opposing Poetries (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1996)
Interview with Zoe Rivka in Bomb. http://bombmagazine.org/article/1000013/james-sherry
Interview with Stan Apps in Jacket. http://jacketmagazine.com/39/iv-sherry-ivb-apps.shtml
Interview with Farnoosh Fathi in Brooklyn Rail. https://brooklynrail.org/2004/10/books/james-sherry-with-famoosh-fathi

More than 100 magazine publications (Poetry & Prose)

Selected works are available online at: http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/sherry/

Selected readings are recorded and available online at: http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Sherry.