About John Dennis Anderson's performances
- Literature comes to life in the performances and scholarship of John Dennis Anderson, an accomplished oral interpreter who presents biographical performances of America’s greatest authors. As a Professor Emeritus at Emerson College, Anderson has taught and continues to publish in the academic field of performance studies and serves as a consultant on living history performance.
- Since 1994, Anderson has been developing and presenting living history (or Chautauqua) performances as the authors Henry James, William Faulkner, Robert Frost, Washington Irving, Ernest Hemingway, Louis Bromfield, Henry Beston, and Lynn Riggs. These performances consist of lectures in character followed by answering questions first in character and then out. He has performed in over a dozen states, in venues from the Boston Athenaeum to the Seattle Public Library. These performances combine scholarly and creative elements that showcase a tradition of oral performance of literature and speech communication that harkens back to the Lyceum and Chautauqua movements of the nineteenth century.
About Me
Background
John Dennis Anderson, a native of Waco, Texas, is Professor Emeritus at Emerson College in Boston. With a Ph.D. in communication from the University of Texas at Austin, he taught communication and performance studies at Emerson for 27 years.
Anderson is available for performances (and to consult in developing humanities programs) for cultural and educational organizations. His lively, engaging performances are entertaining as well as scholarly and informative.
EMAIL contact
Creative Scholarly Work
Literary Performer
Anderson’s literary performances are interactive solo presentations in the persona of major authors. He presents a biographical and literary talk in character as a writer such as Henry James, William Faulkner, or Robert Frost and then answers questions from the audience first in character and then out of character as a scholar. The performances are adapted to specific themes, venues, and occasions.
In character, Anderson tells stories based as much as possible on documented sources such as interviews, letters, recorded question-and-answer sessions, and biographies. His artistic goal is to create both an illusion of authenticity as well as a playful interactive game with the audience that encourages them to interact with him as the character. The monologue serves to establish a foundation of credibility from which the performance takes flight in the Q&A.
Characters:
Ernest Hemingway
Robert Frost
Henry James
Christopher Isherwood
Louis Bromfield
Henry Beston
Lynn Riggs
Playwright
Anderson's plays explore literary subjects based on extensive research. They include works on the writers Edith Wharton and Louis Bromfield, Christopher Isherwood, and Madison Cooper.
Actor
Scholar
Literary performances by John Dennis Anderson
Images of Anderson as Henry James, Louis Bromfield, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Robert Frost, and Christopher Isherwood
A Gallery of Performances in Plays and readings
Jarice Hanson and John Dennis Anderson as Jo and Edward Hopper in Debra Weiss' "Remembering Good Harbor Beach" at the Provincetown Public Library, 2023
John Dennis Anderson as Amy and Scott Cunningham at Valentina in Harvey Fierstein's Casa Valentina at the Provincetown Theater, 2023
John Dennis Anderson as Ernest Hemingway, Colorado West Chautauqua, Grand Junction, CO, 2023
John Dennis Anderson as Tom Wingfield in Tennessee Wiliams's The Glass Menagerie, Provincetown Tennessee Williams Festival, 2024 (Photo credit: Eyva Fotografi)
Andrew Clemons and John Dennis Anderson in Moises Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project's The Laramie Project, Provincetown Theater, 2018.
"All of the actors give affecting performances, with John Dennis Anderson having the most moving speeches and delivering them brilliantly." Cape Cod Times
John Dennis Anderson as Charles Dickens in Frederick Busch's The Mutual Friend, Kennesaw State University, 2013