Terry Heller -- Biography

TERRY HELLER (3 February 1947 - )

Terry Lynn Heller (3 February 1947 - ) is the son of Rollin Goembel Heller (1918-2010) and Betty Jean Ragan (1926-2014). His sister was Treasure Ann Heller (Mrs. Steven) Jargo (1950-2017).

He grew up on a farm in western Illinois, graduating from Annawan High School in 1965. He then completed a B.A. (1969) in English and Humanities at North Central College in Naperville, IL, an M.A. (1970) and a Ph.D. (1973) in Literature at the University of Chicago, writing a dissertation on novels of William Faulkner.

faulkner 2017

William Faulkner and Terry Heller -- 2017

Linda Mary Marchand (19 August 1947 - ) married him in June 1969. Their son, Gabriel Aaron, was born 23 March 1976.

He became a professor of English, teaching mainly American Literature, Film Studies and Creative Writing, beginning as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Missouri, St. Louis. Then followed a year as a Fulbright lecturer in American Literature at the University of Turin, Italy. Upon returning to the United States, he began teaching at Coe College in Cedar Rapids, IA, from 1975 until retirement in 2013. From 1990, he was Howard Hall Professor of English; he is now Howard Hall Professor of English Emeritus.

While at Coe, he received several internal and external grants and awards. Among the most gratifying were the following.

1977 NEH Summer Seminar on American Humor, University of New Mexico
1982 Mellon Fellow, Faculty Development Seminar, University of Kansas
1982 Best Book Review Award from Arizona Quarterly
1986 Young Alumnus Merit Award from North Central College
1995 NEH Summer Seminar on Harriet Beecher Stowe, Newberry Library
1998  Associated Colleges of the Midwest Newberry Library Faculty Fellow
2002  Murray Faculty/Student Summer Research Grant, with student Travis Feltman.
2004  Murray Faculty/Student Summer Research Grant, with students Heather Petsche and Laura Crow.

During his career, in addition to teaching, he wrote reviews, essays, and books, and he also edited several collections of writing.

The Delights of Terror: An Aesthetics of the Tale Of Terror, University of Illinois Press, July 1987.
Henry James's "The Turn of the Screw": Bewildered Vision, Twayne, March 1989.
Co-editor of The Alcott Family Arrives by Ann Struthers, Coe Review Press, 1993.
Co-editor of My Father Becomes the Wind by Robert Drexler, Coe Review Press, 1995.
Editor of The Country of the Pointed Firs and Other Fiction by Sarah Orne Jewett, Oxford University Press, March 1996.
Co-editor of Holding On & Letting Go, Coe Review Press, October 1996.
Co-editor of Turning Up the Leaves, Coe Review Press, 2000.
Editor of Sarah Orne Jewett at the Jewett-Eastman House, Jewett-Eastman Memorial Committee, 2004.

Over the years, his interests gradually shifted toward horror film and American author, Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909). While his early writing was on Faulkner, after his book on tales of terror, he developed a popular course on monsters in film and, to balance that emphasis on "the dark side," he turned to writing about Sarah Orne Jewett, a genial realistic writer.

His interest in Jewett eventually developed into the Sarah Orne Jewett Text Project (1998 - ), an internet archive of her published works, most of which were no longer in print when he began the archive. In retirement, he has devoted himself to transcribing, annotating, dating, and presenting on the Internet, her voluminous correspondence, consisting of thousands of hand-written and usually undated letters. He produced and for several years maintained a research guide, "Sarah Orne Jewett," for Oxford Bibliographies On-Line, Oxford University Press, (2012- ).

In retirement, in addition to his work on Jewett, he enjoys traveling with Linda, visiting family and friends, tennis, bicycling, home-maintenance, movies, and trying to catch up on his reading.

mark and terry