Additional information
by James A. Autry (Author)
MISSISSIPPI is a collection of 77 poems from James A. Autry's Nights Under A Tin Roof and Life After Mississippi. The author, a former U.S. Air Force pilot, newspaper reporter, national magazine editor and Fortune 500 executive, returns to his Mississippi roots to examine the forces which shaped him. Autry's narrative verse focuses on the rhythms of rural southern life, an odyssey of country funerals, weddings, church revivals, family reunions, and courtships drawn from a unique American heritage....The landscape of Autry's memories is familiar to anyone who has heard the voice of the whippoorwill or the baying of hounds in the night or who has savored the smell of fresh-turned earth.(The Atlanta Journal) Autry writes of farm life, of revival meetings and teenage romance, of weddings and reunions and funerals, in vivid, sensuous detail. His sure hand moves with gentleness through his material. (The Richmond News Leader)
Author Biography
James A. Autry, a former Fortune 500 executive, is the author of fourteen books, a poet and consultant whose work has had a significant influence on leadership thinking. His book, Love and Profit, The Art of Caring Leadership, a collection of essays and poetry, won the Johnson, Smith & Knisely Award as the book which had the most impact on executive thinking in 1992. Autry's writings have appeared in many anthologies and magazines. In 1991 the Kentucky Poetry Review published a special James A. Autry issue. He is a founder of the Des Moines National Poetry Festival. He was one of the poets featured on Bill Moyers' special series, "The Power of the Word." In 1998 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award for Service to the Humanities from Iowa Humanities Board and Foundation. He was also the founding chair of the Claremont Graduate University's Humanities Center Board of Visitors.Autry was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Mississippi and was elected to the Alumni Hall of Fame. He fulfilled his military service as a jet fighter pilot in Europe during the cold war and rose to the rank of Major in the Iowa Air National Guard. Before taking early retirement in 1991 to pursue a writing career, Autry was Senior Vice President and President of the Meredith Group, at the time a 500-million-dollar magazine publishing operation with over 900 employees. Autry lives in Des Moines, Iowa, with his wife Sally Pederson, the former Lieutenant Governor of Iowa.
