Robert Hamblin reflects on SEMO English career at lecture

More than 100 friends, students and colleagues were in attendance Tuesday night to hear Dr. Robert Hamblin speak at the third annual Dr. Robert W. Hamblin Lecture on the campus of Southeast Missouri State University.

Hamblin, a professor of English, delivered this year's lecture, "Ramblin' Hamblin: Stories (Told and Untold) from 48 Years at SEMO."

Hamblin was introduced by Dr. Dale Haskell, his colleague in Southeast's Department of English.

"If the English Department at Southeast had a Hall of Fame, Bob Hamblin would go in on the first ballot," Haskell said during his introduction. "The Cardinals have Stan Musial to admire. We have Bob Hamblin."

Hamblin told the gathering he would "begin at the beginning," a reference to the start of his teaching career at Southeast in 1965.

"I almost settled on Murray State University," he said. "But I had one more interview. My wife Kay and I had never been to Cape Girardeau before, and we became attracted to its many hills and inclines."

Hamblin said he was interviewed by Dr. Mark Scully, then president of Southeast.

"He was quite intimidating," Hamblin said. "He asked me three questions: was I married, did I go to church and if I drank or not. I answered yes to the first two questions and no to the last, and Scully offered me a position teaching English."

Hamblin also discussed bringing L.D. Brodsky's collection of the works of William Faulkner to Southeast.

"I met L.D. Brodsky in 1978," he said. "The question was what he was going to do with his Faulkner collection."

Now housed in the Rare Book Room of the university's Kent Library, the Brodsky-Faulkner Collection is one of the four largest collections of Faulkner material in the world, including more than 2,000 pages of manuscript materials. Hamblin became director of the Center for Faulkner Studies in 1989.

Hamblin's expertise on Faulkner also led to an invitation by Oprah Winfrey to lead an online discussion of Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying" for her "Summer of Oprah" in 2005.

"Faulkner was an experimental artist," Hamblin said. "'As I Lay Dying' is an experimental tour-de-force."

Hamblin said the Center for Faulkner Studies attracts visitors from around the world. Changlei Li, a doctoral candidate from China, worked on his dissertation in the center.

"He's now one of three Faulkner experts in China," Hamblin said.

Hamblin also spoke about his books dealing with sports, or "jock lit," as he termed it. He also read selected passages from his book of poems, "Crossroads: Poems of a Mississippi Childhood," and from his latest work, "Dust and Light: Poems after Pierre Teilhard de Chardin."

Hamblin finished the lecture by paying tribute to his wife Kay.

"She's been my main partner," he said. "We've never regretted our decision to stay in Cape. I don't know where it might've gone better."

Before the speech, Hamblin said he plans to retire in August or December of this year.

klewis@semissourian.com

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