Dr. John Hatcher

John S. Hatcher, Ph.D. - Professor Emeritus of English literature - University of South Florida jhatcher@usf.edu John S. Hatcher received his B.A. and M.A. degrees from Vanderbilt University and his Ph.D. from the University of Georgia. He is Professor Emeritus in English literature at the University of South Florida in Tampa where he served as Director of Graduate Studies in English and where he specialized in teaching medieval literature and creative writing. Dr. Hatcher has published poetry in a variety of national and international poetry journals and literary periodicals. A collection of his poetry, A Sense of History, was published in 1990. His historical novel, Ali's Dream, was published in 1980 and a revised edition of the work was published in 1998. This work was translated in to German as Faris Traum in 1999 and is also being translated in Dutch. A second novel, Conversations, was published in 1988. In 2002 he published The Poetry of Táhirh, the translation into English from Arabic and Persian of the poetry of a 19th century Persian poetess, with co-author Amrolláh Hemmat. In 2004 he and Amrolláh Hemmat published Reunion with the Beloved: Poetry and Martyrdom. Hatcher and Hemmat have completed work on Adam's Wish: The Unknown Poems of Táhirih. Hatcher and Hemmat are also well into a third and final work on Táhirih's poetry, The Day of Resurrection. Professor Hatcher's other scholarly and creative work spans a variety of fields. He has published numerous scholarly articles, monographs and chapters in books edited by others. His work From the Auroral Darkness: The Life and Poetry of Robert E. Hayden was published in 1984 and received praise in such periodicals as Choice and Black American Literature Forum. His comparative study of theodicy The Purpose of Physical Reality: The Kingdom of Names, published originally in 1987, is now in its fourth printing and was reviewed in the prestigious Encyclopédie Philosophique Universelle Vol III, a dictionary of the world philosophical works published by the Presses Universitairs de France. Dr. Hatcher's sequel to that work, The Arc of Ascent, was published in 1994 and Close Connections: The Bridge Between Spiritual and Physical Reality in 2005. The Purpose of Physical Reality was revised and published in the fall of 2005. In 2006 his two books The Purpose of Physical Reality and Close Connections were two of the nine books nominated by ForeWord magazine as best book of the year in the field of philosophy for the year 2005. His most recent philosophical study The Ascent of Society: The Social Imperative in Personal Salvation was published in fall of 2007. The Law of Love Enshrined: Selected Essays by John Hatcher and William Hatcher was published in 1996 and has been translated in Spanish in Barcelona under the title La Lógica de Las Leyes Espirtuales: El Porqué de las Creencias. Professor Hatcher's work The Ocean of His Words: A Reader's Guide to the Art of Bahá'u'lláh, an application of literary critical theory to Bahá'í scripture, was published in 1997, and a revised edition was published in 2003. His work The Divine Art of Revelation was published in 1998. Professor Hatcher has written over a hundred poems and articles which have appeared throughout the world in refereed literary journals. He has also been invited to speak at such distinguished institutions as the University of Michigan, McGill University in Canada, at the University of Maryland, at Emory University, and at Oxford University. In 2006 he was awarded the highest accolade for work in Bahá'í Studies, the Hasan Balyuzi Lectureship at the 29th annual meeting of the North American Association for Studies on the Bahá'í Faith. He has served on the Executive Board of the Association for Bahá'í Studies and as associate editor of the Journal of Bahá'í Studies. In addition to having published over twenty-three books of his own, Professor Hatcher has published chapters and articles in a number of college texts. He has written chapters on the Bahá'í Faith in Encounters with Eternity (1986), The Encyclopedia of Death (1989), How Different Religions View Death & Afterlife (1991, 1998), Life Death and Immortality: The Journey of the Soul (1994), Religious Dimensions of Child and Family Life (1996), Scripture and Revelation (1997), and Where Art and Faith Converge (2008). Professor Hatcher's most recent books are Understanding Death: The Most Important Event of Your Life. published in the fall of 2009, and The Face of God Among Us: How God Educates Humankind, published in spring of 2010. In the spring of 2010, The Quickening: The Unpublished Poems of Tahirh, co-authored with Amrollah Hemmat, who are presently working on a translation of the poems by Baha'ullah. Author John Hatcher has four children and seven grandchildren, and lives on a small farm in Plant City, Florida, with His wife and co-worker, Lucia C. Hatcher.