Professor Profile: Chris D’Addario

By Nate Storey

What is your specialty?
Early Modern Literature and British Renaissance Literature.

Where did you go to college and what was your major?
Dartmouth College for undergrad and I majored in English. Then I went to Washington University.

Was teaching your first choice and how did you decide to teach?
Yeah, when I decided to major in English, I had it in the back of my mind. Didn’t definitively decide then. I was inspired by a teacher in high school.

Why did you choose to teach here at Gettysburg?
I liked the small liberal arts environment as an undergrad, and I had come from teaching at a big state school. I like the close interaction with students. I like that I can see students outside of classes and get to know them. It’s much more personal.

Was Literature of the Exile your idea for the freshman seminar? How did you come to that topic?
In my research, I’ve explored the literature of exile in the 17th century. I think it’s important to think about the effects exile has on one’s existence, the traumatic experience and importantly individuals and their reactions. I’ve tried to emphasize not just the abstract “everyone was forced to pack up and leave home,” but the effects the experience has on individuals, so memoirs, not just broad politics. Books often give you a departure from broad categorization.

What is your favorite book? At least within the syllabus for Literature of the Exile seminar?
Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald, at least right now. It’s been on my mind a lot lately, I guess because it’s the next book we’ll read in class. It’s difficult. No paragraph breaks. It’s a meditation on memory and a haunting past. It reminds me a little of Gettysburg. In my interview here, I related my research to the battle. On the battlefield you try to recreate the ghosts and with the buildings here, it’s really a meditation on the past. I also like Blow-Up by Julio Cortazar. It’s completely different. It has fun stories and strange magical worlds. There’s one scene in which a character throws up rabbits.

What do you do with your time outside of class?
I spend most of my time with my new daughter [six months old]; as much as I can at least. I come from a musical family, so I play guitar, though not as much lately.

What kind of music do you play?
I play mostly folk or bluegrass. My brother is in the industry so he gives me a lot of that kind of thing. Lately, I’ve been into a lot of old time-y music from the 1920′s. A lot of Dave Grisman, too. Some Carter Family music as well.

Do you have any advice for students?
Keep your mind open to different perspectives. People have the tendency to try and remain comfortable. In my mind, liberal arts education is about putting oneself in others’ shoes in a disinterested way so that even if you disagree, you can understand why the other person feels the way they do. That works for anyone, not just English students, but is especially important in something like Literature of the Exile, when you’re reading about people’s personal lives.