C. J. Stevens

Clysle Julius (C.J.) Stevens (8 December 1927 – 9 December 2021 ) was a writer.

In 1998, the Portland Press Herald described him as "versatile and charismatic". Stevens also translated others' works into English from other languages, including Dutch and Flemish.

Biography

Early life

Stevens was born in Smithfield, Maine, the son of Earl Wade and Leonora May (Witham) Stevens.

As a young man he enlisted in the U.S. Army in February 1946 for the duration of the war, plus six months. Afterward, he earned a B.S. in 1953 from Teachers College of Connecticut (now known as Central Connecticut State University). By 1990, his poems and stories had also been published in 400 magazines, and more than 50 anthologies and texts. Each to His Own Ground (Juniper Press, 1976, ),

He also wrote the related book, Memoirs of a Maine Gold Hunter (John Wade, 2005, ), about panning for gold and searching for treasure.

He wrote additional non-fiction including: Maine Mining Adventures (Wade, 1994, ), The Buried Treasures of Maine (Wade, 1997, ), One Day with a Goat Herd (Wade, 1992, ), about goat herding,

Biographies Stevens wrote a series of biographies starting in the late 1980s. Two were biographies connected to a period in D. H. Lawrence's life in Cornwall Lawrence at Tregerthen (D. H. Lawrence) (Whitston Pub. Co., 1988, ), The Cornish Nightmare (D. H. Lawrence in Cornwall) (Whitston Pub. Co., 1996, ), about D.H. Lawrence and the war years.

In 2000 Stevens published a biography of the American writer Erskine Caldwell, Storyteller: A Life of Erskine Caldwell (John Wade, 2000, ), and in 2004 a biography of English primitive artist Bryan Pearce. The Miracle of Bryan Pearce (John Wade, 2004, ), about a brain-damaged boy named Bryan Pearce who became a nationally acclaimed artist. Thirty-One New Poets (Schreiber (editor), Hill & Wang Pub, 1968, ), Waterland: A Gathering from Holland (Holmgangers Press, 1977, translator from the Dutch), Stevens lived overseas for five years, two of those in the Netherlands, moving approximately every six months to countries including Ireland, England, Portugal, and Malta.

His interest in images led him to become a poet and a writer. It also led to a second career in painting, and along with his writing, he compiles a photographer's portfolio. Photographs of his paintings may be seen at this photography site. His biographies and other non-fiction are unusual, in that in all cases he had access to either the subject or to someone intimate with the subject–a wife, friend, lover, or mother.