Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, December 4, 1994 TAG: 9412060003
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: CHRIS COLSTON SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES & WORLD-NEWS
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
As a poet.
``I taught criticism of the poem,'' said Bowker, who spent six years as an English professor at Tech. ``But I approached it all wrong. Instead of having my students write poetry, I had them analyze it. It was like directing my tennis players to only watch films of Wimbledon instead of going out and hitting balls.''
Bowker, who grew up in rural Alexandria, Neb. - population 430 - always had a fondness for words, but poetry was a mystery to him.
He played football, basketball and ran track (there were no tennis courts in Alexandria) but never thought of writing poems. "I guess it didn't seem manly to the pursuits of a Nebraska farmboy," he said.
Bowker earned an undergraduate degree at Nebraska State, a master's degree at the University of Wyoming, and his doctorate at the University of Rhode Island, all of them in English.
He came to Blacksburg in 1974 and became eligible for tenure six years later. But first he had to publish a book of critical analysis. "I had already written a 200-page analysis of John Updike and I knew it wasn't anything special," Bowker said. "I didn't want to spend two or three years in a library pumping out something that didn't need to be written. And, besides, I wanted to play tennis."
He was told he couldn't write short stories on his own terms, he said, so he left.
Bowker became manager of Tech's indoor tennis facility, then took over as head coach of the women's tennis team in 1981.
"It was one of the best things that ever happened to me," he said. "As an academic, I had a very sheltered life. Athletics put me in contact with the real world. I had to come to grips with winning or losing. There were no gray areas."
He coached Tech's women through 1984, then for the next two years, he played competitive tennis and was one of the most talented players in his age group. Yet he could never capture a championship and became frustrated.
"It must be psychological," said his wife, Jeanette. So Bowker sought help from books, one of them by his psychotherapist, Karen Horney, and it helped.
He learned to confront his fears "and it was like an unfolding," he said. "I was able to open myself up."
Bowker's game flourished. He was ranked No. 1 in singles competition in both the Mid-Atlantic Tennis Sectional and the Virginia State Association and captured several state and regional championships. Then, in 1986, he became head coach of the Hokies' men's tennis team. Now in his eighth year, he's compiled an impressive 104-39 record.
Looser and more serene, Bowker was now reading literature "for the right reasons - growth and understanding - instead of the way it used to be when I was trying to figure out 'What am I going to say about this to my class?'"
One night, about 11, he was thinking about one of his tennis players who was experiencing romantic problems. Bowker began writing. "When I had finished, I looked up at the clock," he said. "It was 5 a.m."
He named the piece "The Intellectual" and showed it to friends. "I didn't think it was very good," he said. "I thought it was just imitative of stuff I had read."
But the poem was well-received. "I had fun writing it and people liked it," he said. "So I kept writing. I always had a lot of stories in my head and I started retelling them as narrative poetry."
Updike said, "Every man has the truth of at least one voice." And Bowker, who's sweeping gray mane and bouncy manner belie his 58 years, is living testimony.
Now he can't be stopped, even by a heart attack he suffered two years ago. While recuperating in the hospital he was able to write five or six poems because he had so much time.
Time he needs, because he often writes as many as 15 drafts for a single piece. "I always thought poets had some secret society where they had all the answers and gave them to us cryptically," he said. "But after writing poems, I found it's 10 percent inspiration and 90 percent sweat."
Don't get the idea Bowker's work is some transcendental, self-indulgent therapy. He's had four pieces published in the last two months by Cheetah Press in San Antonio, Texas, Treasure House Press in Washington, D.C., and locally in ArtBeat Magazine. And he recently won the New River Community College Senior Citizen Poetry Contest for 1994.
"That turned me inside out," he said. "It was the first time Jeanette thought I was semilegitimate."
Bowker says his poetry has had a huge impact on his life - bigger than the heart attack from which he has fully recovered.
"When I started writing poetry, I felt like I joined the human race," he said. "It's given me a whole new view of life.
"You know, everybody has a public life and a private life, with your family. But there's another life I never knew about. It's your interior life. I didn't know I had an interior life until I started writing."
Chris Colston edits the Hokie Huddler for Virginia Tech.
by CNB