This Goodly Land

Rodney Jones (February 11, 1950–present)

Alabama Connections

• Hartselle, Morgan County: birthplace
• Falkville, Morgan County: childhood residence
• Tuscaloosa, Tuscaloosa County: education

Selected Works

• Jones, Rodney. The Story They Told Us of Light: Poems. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1980.
• Jones, Rodney. Transparent Gestures. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989.
• Jones, Rodney. Things That Happen Once: New Poems. Boston: Hougton Mifflin, 1996.
• Jones, Rodney. Elegy for the Southern Drawl. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1999.
• Jones, Rodney. Kingdom of the Instant. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.
• Jones, Rodney. Salvation Blues: One Hundred Poems, 1985-2005. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.

Literary Awards

• Peter I. B. Lavan Youngers Poets Award, Academy of American Poets, 1986
• Jean Stein Prize in Poetry, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, 1989
• National Book Critics Circle Award, Poetry, 1989, for Transparent Gestures
• Hanes Award for Poetry, Fellowship of Southern Writers, 2001
• Harper Lee Award for Alabama’s Distinguished Writer, 2003, Alabama Writers’ Forum and Alabama Writers Symposium

Biographical Information

Rodney Jones grew up on a farm in northern Alabama, in an area so rural that electricity wasn’t available until the 1950s. He started writing poems in high school, then began publishing them in literary magazines when he was in college. In 1972, Jones sold three poems to The Atlantic Monthly. His first book, Going Ahead Looking Back, was published in 1977.

Jones graduated from the University of Alabama in 1971 with a BA in English. In 1973, he earned an MFA from University of North Carolina at Greensboro. He was a public school teacher from 1974 to 1978, then was Writer-in-Residence at Virginia Intermont College, 1978 to 1984. He joined the English department at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale in 1984. In addition to his many literary awards, he also received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1985 and a fellowship from the National Endowment of the Arts in 1986.

Interests and Themes

Rodney Jones draws on the oral storytelling tradition of his childhood to create poems that are accessible to ordinary readers. His poems recreate and reflect the South of the past from the perspective of the present. He has said that his poems arise from curiosity and exploration.

For More Information

Please check your local library for these materials. If items are not available locally, your librarian can help you borrow them through the InterLibrary Loan program. Your librarian can also help you find other information about this author.

There may be more information available through the databases in the Alabama Virtual Library. If you are an Alabama citizen, AVL can be used at your public library or school library media center. You can also get a username and password from your librarian to use AVL at home.

Reference Book Chapters and Encyclopedia Entries

• Caton, Bill. "Rodney Jones: It's the Immersion"; Fighting Words: Words on Writing from 21 of the Heart of Dixie's Best Contemporary Authors. Montgomery: Black Belt Press, . 62-71.
• Jones, Rodney. "A Half Mile of Road in North Alabama"; The Remembered Gate: Memoirs by Alabama Writers. Ed. Jay Lamar and Jeanie Thompson. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, . 168-181.

Reference Web Sites

• "Rodney Jones". Blackbird: An Online Journal of Literature and the Arts. 2006. Virginia Commonwealth University Department of English and New Virginia Review, Inc. http://www.blackbird.vcu.edu/v5n1/nonfiction/jones_r/index.htm.

Photo by G. Jones; courtesy of Houghton Mifflin.

Last updated on May 21, 2009.