About
Ross K. Tangedal
Since 2016, I have been Assistant Professor of English and Director of the Cornerstone Press at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. I am the author of The Preface: American Authorship in the Twentieth Century (Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2021) and co-editor (w/ Joshua M. Murray) of Editing the Harlem Renaissance (Clemson University Press, forthcoming 2021). My articles have been published or are forthcoming in a number of journals, including The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, South Atlantic Review, the Hemingway Review, the F. Scott Fitzgerald Review, Authorship, and others.
My areas of research and teaching expertise include American print & publishing culture, book history (1800-the present), bibliography (descriptive & analytical), authorship, and textual editing (documentary, scholarly, and copy), with emphasis on Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and the American Midwest. I am a contributing editor for the Hemingway Letters Project (Cambridge University Press), as well as essays editor for Scholarly Editing, the journal of the Association for Documentary Editing.
RESEARCH
Ross K. Tangedal
Books
The Preface: American Authorship in the Twentieth Century
Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2021 | New Directions in Book History Series
American writers wrote prefaces to sell themselves and their books in a changing literary marketplace. More specifically, the kind of authorial self-fashioning reflected in authorial prefaces is integral to the growth of professionalism in twentieth-century American letters. Building on insights from the fields of textual criticism, bibliography, narratology, and print culture, The Preface: American Authorship in the Twentieth Century clarifies the character and purpose of authorial prefaces in the twentieth century. By examining prefaces written by Willa Cather, Ring Lardner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Robert Penn Warren, Ralph Ellison, and Toni Morrison, I show how writers struggled to make public their personal artistic expectations. Authorial prefaces serve as sites of conversation, as each illustrates working with editors, publishers, writers, and readers. These relationships tell stories of literary compromise, artistic integrity, and authorial legacy deeply embedded in the U.S. literary marketplace of the twentieth century.
Editing the Harlem Renaissance
Clemson University Press, forthcoming 2021 | African American Literature Series
co-edited with Joshua M. Murray
This collection foregrounds an in-depth approach to relevant editing and editorial issues particular to the Harlem Renaissance, offering a variety of voices to create a centralized authority on the subject. Rather than limiting the examination to a narrow understanding of editorial practices, the book takes a broad and inclusive approach, exploring not only those figures of the Harlem Renaissance who edited in professional capacities, but also those authors who employed editorial practices during the writing process, as well as those texts that have been discovered and/or edited by others in the decades following the Harlem Renaissance. To achieve this end, the book comprises chapters in several areas, including professional editing, authorial editing (or textual self-fashioning), textual editing, bibliography, and pedagogical approaches.
articles and chapters
My work has been published or is forthcoming in various journals, including The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, South Atlantic Review, the Hemingway Review, the F. Scott Fitzgerald Review, Authorship, MidAmerica, and Midwestern Miscellany. Along with an essay in Editing the Harlem Renaissance, I have also contributed to a number of essay collections, including Approaches to Teaching the Poetry of Robert Frost, F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Composite Biography, Teaching Hemingway and Race, Teaching Hemingway and the Natural World, A Scattering Time: How Modernism Met Midwestern Culture, and the Handbook of the American Short Story. For a detailed listing of my publications, download my full CV here.
editorial work
I currently serve as a contributing editor for the Hemingway Letters Project, a multi-volume series of the correspondence of Ernest Hemingway, published by Cambridge University Press. I am associate editor of volume 6: The Letters of Ernest Hemingway (1934-1936), forthcoming 2022. In recent years, I have edited the first edition of John Herrmann's lost World War I novel Foreign Born, as well as a new edition of Charles McCarthy's history of the progressive era in Wisconsin, The Wisconsin Idea (w/ Jeff Snowbarger).
TEACHING
Ross K. Tangedal
I teach a variety of English courses at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, as part of both the Cornerstone Press operations and the English Department's major emphasis in Writing, Editing, and Publishing (WEP). Our publishing program is staffed year-round with three primary courses: Editing and Publishing (Fall), Book and Publication Design (Spring), and Small Press Management (Summer). These courses produce all titles released by the Cornerstone Press, amounting to four books published per year. Check out the press website for more details.
In addition to practical, curricular publishing offerings, I also teach print studies courses for our major: Book History, Editorial Process, and The Profession of Authorship. These courses provide students with a detailed survey of writing studies, print culture studies, editorial theory and practice, and bibliography. I also teach multiple sections of freshman and sophomore composition, and on occasion I have taught Creative Nonfiction, Advanced Freshman English, and Intermediate Composition. I am currently developing courses in copyediting and publication for teachers to serve our English Education program.
Education
Ph.D., Kent State University, English, 2015
Kenneth R. Pringle Dissertation Fellow
M.A., Montana State University, English, 2010
B.A., summa cum laude, Montana State University, English literature, 2008
professional Appointments
Assistant Professor, English, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, 2016-present
Director & Publisher, Cornerstone Press, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, 2016-present
Postdoctoral Fellow, English, Mercyhurst University, 2015-2016
publications
Book
The Preface: American Authorship in the Twentieth Century. Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2021.
Edited Books
Associate Editor. The Letters of Ernest Hemingway (1934-1936). Edited by Sandra Spanier, Verna Kale, and Miriam Mandel. Cambridge University Press, forthcoming 2022.
Editing the Harlem Renaissance. Edited by Joshua M. Murray and Ross K. Tangedal. Clemson University Press, forthcoming 2021.
The Wisconsin Idea. By Charles McCarthy. 1912. Edited by Ross K. Tangedal and Jeff Snowbarger. Cornerstone Press, xxx, 304 pp.
Foreign Born. By John Herrmann. Edited by Ross K. Tangedal. Hastings College Press, xxviii, 290 pp.
Journal Articles (refereed)
“Bonnie Jo Campbell (1962–): A Descriptive Bibliography.” The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, forthcoming 2021.
“Fertile and Quiescent: Midwestern Memory in Bonnie Jo Campbell’s ‘Winter Life.’” MidAmerica, vol. 47, forthcoming 2020.
“I’m Inclined to Believe: Editing Uncertainty in the Ending(s) to Nella Larsen’s Passing.” South Atlantic Review, vol. 84, nos. 2–3, 2019, pp. 205–223.
“Alone and Alone: Defense, Justification, and Apology in Fitzgerald’s Late Prefaces.” F. Scott Fitzgerald Review, vol. 15, 2017, pp. 51–71.
“Breaking Forelegs: Hemingway’s Early Prefaces.” Hemingway Review, vol. 37, no. 1, 2017, pp. 65–82.
“Nothing is Left but the Sky: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Booth Tarkington, and Midwestern Influence.” Midwestern Miscellany, vol. 45, no. 2, 2017, pp. 12–25.
“Refusing the Serious: Authorial Resistance in Ring Lardner’s Prefaces for Scribner’s.” Authorship, vol. 5, no. 2, 2016, 1–11.
“‘At Last Everyone Had Something to Talk About’: Gloria’s War in Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and Damned.” Midwestern Miscellany, vol. 44, 2016, pp. 68–81.
“My Own Personal Public: Fitzgerald’s Table of Contents in Tales of the Jazz Age.” F. Scott Fitzgerald Review, vol. 13, 2015, pp. 130–145.
“Excuse the Preface: Hemingway’s Introductions for Other Writers.” Hemingway Review, vol. 34, no. 2, 2015, pp. 72–90.
“Designed to Amuse: Hemingway’s The Torrents of Spring and Intertextual Comedy.” MidAmerica, vol. 41, 2014, pp. 11–22.
“This Storm is What We Call Progress: Whitman, Kushner, and Transnational Crisis.” The Quint: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly from the North, vol. 5, no.1, 2012, pp. 74–88.
Book Chapters (refereed)
“‘My business awhile is with different trees’: Composition and Intention in Robert Frost’s New Hampshire.” Approaches to Teaching the Poetry of Robert Frost, edited by Sean Heuston. Modern Language Association of America, forthcoming 2021.
“Clad in the Beautiful Dress One Expects: Editing and Curating the Harlem Renaissance Text.” Editing the Harlem Renaissance, edited by Joshua M. Murray and Ross K. Tangedal. Clemson University Press, forthcoming 2021.
“Buffalo, New York (1904–1905).” F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Composite Biography, edited by David A. Rennie and Niklas Salmose. University of Minnesota Press, forthcoming 2021.
“Ernest Hemingway.” Handbook of the American Short Story, edited by Erik Redling and Oliver Scheiding. De Gruyter, forthcoming 2020.
“Hemingway’s Experts: Teaching Race in Death in the Afternoon and Green Hills of Africa.” Teaching Hemingway and Race, edited by Gary Edward Holcomb. Kent State University Press, 2018, pp. 29–40.
“That Time in Chicago: Midwestern Memory in Nella Larsen’s Passing.” A Scattering Time: How Modernism Met Midwestern Culture, edited by Sara Kosiba. Hastings College Press, 2018, pp. 17–31.
“A Few Practical Things: Death in the Afternoon and Hemingway’s Natural Pedagogy.” Teaching Hemingway and the Natural World, edited by Kevin Maier. Kent State University Press, 2018, pp. 178–191.
Review Essay
“The Hells of War.” Rev. of War Isn’t the Only Hell: A New Reading of American World War I Literature, by Keith Gandal; Points of Honor by Thomas Boyd, edited by Steven Trout. F. Scott Fitzgerald Review, vol. 16, 2018, pp. 265–72.
editorial experience
Essays Editor, Scholarly Editing (2019–present)
Contributing Editor, Hemingway Letters Project, Pennsylvania State University (2018–present)
Guest Editor (w/ Andy Oler), Midwestern Miscellany [Bonnie Jo Campbell; forthcoming 2020]
Volume Advisor, Twentieth Century Literary Criticism (2019–present)
Guest Editor, Midwestern Miscellany, vol. 45, no. 2, 2017 [F. Scott Fitzgerald]
recent fellowships, grants, & Awards
L & S Enhancement Grant ($1,150), College of Letters and Science, UWSP, 2020
University Scholar Award ($1,000), UWSP, 2019
Lewis-Reynolds-Smith Founders Fellowship ($1,000), Ernest Hemingway Society, 2019
L & S Enhancement Grant ($2,600), College of Letters and Science, UWSP, 2019
Summer Publishing Fellowship ($12,000), College of Letters and Science, UWSP, 2018
Nominee, University Scholar Award, UWSP, 2018
New Faculty Research Grant ($3,000), College of Letters and Science, UWSP, 2017
courses taught (UWSP)
Advanced Freshman English
Book and Publication Design
Book History
Creative Nonfiction
Editing and Publishing
Editorial Process: Theory and Practice
Freshman English
Intermediate Composition
The Profession of Authorship
Senior Honors Project: Product
Senior Honors Project: Research
Small Press Management
Sophomore English
Writing Internship