I am a retired teacher and wrote this the other day reflecting on my 32 years in classrooms as a teacher and another 18 as a student. I am happy to be outside classrooms after half a century in them. I am not advertising anything here except, perhaps, it could be argued, my poetry.-Ron

I only skirted the edges of the institutionalization of poetry, the formal instruction in the study and writing of poetry in educational institutions, as a teacher of literature and creative writing among other subjects–-earning my living along the way in the last decades of the 20th century and the early years of the 21st century. I helped in the education of students, in their acquisition of a common and essential base for their advancement in the system of learning, helped them to write English, to write essays on many subjects so that they could pass exams at least to some extent and as best I could engender through my several teaching skills. I did this in primary, secondary and post-secondary schools, colleges and universities.

Perhaps some of those students I taught over those decades would find their creativity, their genius, and their home in the world of writing but most, I’m sure, would only be helped “to put bread on the table,” as they say. Few would be those who in time would come to immerse themselves in creative literary expression and, of those few, only a small handful---if any at all---would come to exemplify Ezra Pound’s imperative to be original, to be uninfluenced and to “make their work new.”1 -Ron Price with thanks to 1Ruediger Heinze’s review of Paul Hoover’s Postmodern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, W. W. Norton & Company, NY, 1994---‘The Dream of the Unified Field’: Originality, Influence, The Idea of a National Literature and Contemporary American Poetry,’ in the European Journal of American Studies, Volume 2, 2008.

Current poetry, and certainly mine, is based on the rhythms
of speech, on a reinforced oral tradition….This can be seen
in open-mic readings frequently held in public venues which
I used to take on years ago. Now my writing is private….it is
the least public of traditional literary genres, but it gets read by
many thousands in cyberspace. Whitman’s invitation of poetry
is still true for me–---“Stran ger, if in passing you meet me----
and desire to speak, why should you not speak to me?/
And why should I not speak to you?”1

1 Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, Harold W. Blodgett and Sculley Bradley, eds., W. W. Norton & Company, NY, 1965, p.14. These simple lines from this famous American poet define or express the base, the basis, of much of the conversation I have had in life and some of the very raison d’etre of the poetry I have initiated and which others have read.
29 August 2010

1. EMPLOYMENT-SOCIAL-ROLE POSITIONS: 1943-2010
1999-2010-Writer & Poet, Publisher & Journalist, Editor & Independent Scholar.
Retired from the following roles: Teacher & Lecturer, Tutor & Adult Educator, Taxi-Driver & Ice-Cream Salesman
George Town Tasmania Australia
2002-2005-Program Presenter City Park Radio Launceston
1999-2004-Tutor and/or President George Town School for Seniors Inc
1988-1999 -Lecturer in General Studies and Human Services
West Australian Department of Training
1986-1987 -Acting Lecturer in Management Studies and Co-ordinator of
Further Education Unit at Hedland College in South Hedland WA
1982-1985 -Adult Educator Open College of Tafe Katherine NT
1981 -Maintenance Scheduler Renison Bell Zeehan Tasmania
1980-Unemployed due to Bi-Polar Disability
1979 -Editor External Studies Unit Tasmanian CAE
Youth Worker Resource Centre Association Launceston
Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour Tasmanian CAE
Radio Journalist ABC Launceston
1976-1978 -Lecturer in Social Sciences & Humanities Ballarat CAE Ballarat
1975 - Lecturer in Behavioural Studies Whitehorse Technical College,
Box Hill Victoria
1974 -Senior Tutor in Education Studies Tasmanian CAE Launceston
1972-1973 -High School Teacher South Australian Education Department
1971 Primary School Teacher Whyalla SA Australia
1969-1971 Primary School Teacher Prince Edward County
Board of Education Picton Ontario Canada
1969 Systems Analyst Bad Boy Co Ltd Toronto Ontario
1967-68 -Community Teacher Department of Indian Affairs and Northern
Development Frobisher Bay NWT Canada
1959-67 -Summer jobs-1 to 4 months each- from grade 10 to end of university
1949-1967 - Attended 2 primary schools, 2 high schools and 2 universities in
Canada-McMaster Uni-1963-1966 Windsor Teachers’ College-1966/7
1944-1963 -Childhood(1944-57) and adolescence(1957-63) in and around
Hamilton Ontario
October 1943 to July 1944-Conception to Birth in Hamilton Ontario

2. SOME SOCIO-BIO-DATA TO 2010

I have been married twice: 8 and 35 years, respectively. As of 2010 my Tasmanian wife is aged 64. We’ve had one child: age 33. I have two step-children ages: 43 and 40 and two step-grandchildren ages: 17 and 14. I am 66, a Canadian who moved to Australia in 1971 and have written several books–all available on the internet. I retired from full-time teaching in 1999, part-time teaching in 2003 and voluneeer teaching/work in 2005 after 35 years in classrooms. In addition, I have been a member of the Baha’i Faith for 51 years. Bio-data: 6ft, 230 lbs, eyes-brown/hair-grey, Caucasian. See my website for 450,000 words at: http://www.users.on.net/~ronprice/ or go to any search engine and type: Ron Price followed by any one of a number of words: poetry, Bahá'í, literature, history, BPD, psychology, sociology, culture, philosophy, inter alia for more of my subject/topic-related writing.