Major Works
- Open Field, Understory: New and Selected (1997)
- The Light as They Found It: Poems (1990)
- Said There Was Somebody Talking to Him through the Air Conditioner (1985) (Limited edition of 100 copies)
- Let Not Your Hart (1974)
- Water Tables (1974)
Biography of James Seay
Poet James Edward Seay, III, was born January 1, 1939, in Panola County, Mississippi. He received his B.A. from the University of Mississippi in 1964 and his M.A. from the University of Virginia in 1966. He taught English and creative writing at a number of colleges, among them Virginia Military Institute, the University of Alabama and Vanderbilt in an eight- year period. In 1974 he was hired by the University of North Carolina to teach writing. From 1987-1997 he served as director of the Creative Writing Program at UNC-CH.
Seay’s publications include four collections of poetry Open Field, Understory: New and Selected Poems, two limited editions of poetry, and a documentary film In the Blood, co-written with director George Butler. His poetry has been selected for inclusion in some thirty anthologies. He also has published essays in general-interest magazines such as Esquire and in literary journals such as Antaeus. Seay’s essay, One Corner of Yoknapatawpha appeared in the Fall 2014 issue of the Oxford American.
His honors include an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a Bowman and Gordon Gray Professorship (1996-1999) for excellence in undergraduate teaching, the North Carolina Literary and Historical Association’s Roanoke-Chowan Award, and an award in literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters
He is now retired and is a Professor Emeritus at UNC-CH. Seay was married for a time to novelist Lee Smith, and they have two sons.
Related Websites
- Seay’s curriculum vita online at UNC
- Amazon has list of poems and review of Open Field, Understory
- Nine poems by Seay
- Interview with Seay by J. F. Goossen in the Tuscaloosa News, 1969
- Thacher Mountain radio hour with James Seay, 2014
- Poem by Seay in Southern Culture, 2003
- The New Encyclopedia of Southeren Culture: Vol. 90: Literature
- Southern Writers” A New Biographical Dictionary, pp.358, 359
- Read Seay’s essay ISSUE 86: One Corner of Yoknapatawpha in Oxford American