Perry Lentz was born in Anniston, Alabama in 1943. He attended preparatory school at Indian Springs School, in Helena, Alabama. Married to Jane Anderson (Lake Erie College '65) in 1965, he has two daughters, Robin (Kenyon '88) and Emily (Bowdoin '92), and six grandchildren. Lentz came to the Kenyon faculty in 1969. He has served as Department Chair, and as Director of the Exeter Program, which he helped establish in 1974. He has published three novels, The Falling Hills (1967, reissued 1994), It Must Be Now the Kingdom Coming (1973), and Perish From the Earth (2008), and several articles, concentrating in recent years upon the history of Kenyon College. He has held a number of positions in faculty and collegiate governance, and has chaired a number of the College's hiring searches, including for its Provost, and, twice, for its Athletic Director. He has always been interested in history as well as in English, and especially in the relationship between the two: an interest especially evident in his 2006 non-fiction book, Private Fleming at Chancellorsville: The Red Badge of Courage in the Civil War.

Areas of Expertise

American literature, Southern literature, historical fiction

Education

Ph.D. Vanderbilt
A.B. Kenyon '64

Selected Publications

Perish from the Earth (2008).

Private Fleming at Chancellorsville: The Red Badge of Courage in the Civil War (2006).

"Kenyon College: From the Kenyon of the Bishops to the Kenyon of the Presidents," Cradles of Conscience: Ohio's Independent Colleges and Universities, eds. Oliver, Hodges, and O'Donnell (2003).

"'Gracious Was That Sentence': Meditations on Grace and Change," the Baccalaureate Address, Kenyon College, May 2003 (Kenyon publication).

Courses Taught

ENGL 101Y-102Y Literature and Language
ENGL 379Y-380Y American Literature
ENGL 329Y-330Y The Epic