John Bush Jones
{{Short description|American writer and educator (1940–2019)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = John Bush Jones
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| birth_date = August 3, 1940
| birth_place = Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
| death_date = {{death date and age|2019|12|31|1940|8|3}}
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| education = Ph.D., Northwestern University
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| employer = Brandeis University
| occupation = Educator, Author, Theatre director and critic
}}
John Bush Jones (August 3, 1940 – December 31, 2019) was an American author, theatre director, critic, educator and scholar. He taught theatre for more than two decades at Brandeis University and wrote widely about musical theatre, publishing several books.{{Cite web|title=Sad News: John Bush Jones {{!}} Addresses and Letters to the Community {{!}} Office of the Provost {{!}} Brandeis University|url=https://www.brandeis.edu/provost/letters/2019-2020/1-13-20-john-bush-jones1.html|access-date=2020-11-02|website=www.brandeis.edu}}
Early life and education
Jones was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1940. He described himself as a child of the World War II home front, having just turned five, eleven days before the Surrender of Japan.Jones (2009), p. vi His experience influenced his writing career, and is reflected in his books.
{{Quote|text="my sensory memories great and small of my life on my own home front of Chicago's North Shore suburbs have remained a part if me ever since ... a formation of bombers passed low over my house, opened their bomb bay doors, and dropped thousands of colored handbills featuring the familiar logo of the Minute Man and the equally famous "'BUY WAR BONDS!"'|author=John Bush Jones|title=Victory: Magazine Advertising and the World War II Home Front|source=Preface}}
He received an undergraduate degree in Speech (Theatre), with Distinction, from Northwestern University in 1962. He earned his Ph.D. from Northwestern in 1970. Jones married Sandra Pirie Carson, whose family commissioned architect Louis Sullivan to design the Carson Pirie Scott & Co. store in downtown Chicago. They were married for 10 years before divorcing and had one son, Aaron Carson.{{Cite web|last=Cameron|first=Julia|title=True Midwest|url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1986-02-12-8601110564-story.html|access-date=2020-11-03|website=chicagotribune.com|date=12 February 1986 }}
Career
Jones reviewed drama for the Kansas City Star and taught English at the University of Kansas before joining the faculty at Brandeis University in 1978, in the Theater Arts Department. He received the 1995–1996 Louis Dembitz Brandeis Prize for Excellence in Teaching.{{Cite web|title=Brandeis Prize for Excellence in Teaching| url=https://www.brandeis.edu/arts-sciences/faculty/teaching-awards/brandeis-prize.html|access-date=2020-11-03|website=www.brandeis.edu}}
At Brandeis, Jones served on the organizing committee for many years of the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival. He directed numerous plays and musicals both at Brandeis and in professional theatre, including Ruddigore, Uncommon Women and Others and She Loves Me. He retired from Brandeis in 2001.[http://lts.brandeis.edu/research/archives-speccoll/findingguides/archives/faculty/jbjones.html "John Bush Jones Papers"], Brandeis University archives, accessed September 6, 2013[https://www.orlandosentinel.com/1986/12/19/professor-to-lecture-on-politics-of-musicals/ "Professor to Lecture on Politics of Musicals"], Orlando Sentinel, December 19, 1986, accessed September 6, 2013
Bibliography
= Books =
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=W. S. Gilbert: a Century of Scholarship and Commentary |date=1970 |publisher=New York University Press |isbn=978-0-8147-0464-6 |oclc=123923 }}
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Readings in Descriptive Bibliography |date=1974 |publisher=Kent State University Press |isbn=978-0-87338-153-6 |oclc=185542141 }}
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Our Musicals, Ourselves: A Social History of the American Musical Theatre |date=2011 |publisher=Brandeis University Press |isbn=978-1-61168-223-6 }}
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=The Songs that Fought the War: Popular Music and the Home Front, 1939-1945 |date=2006 |publisher=UPNE |isbn=978-1-58465-443-8 }}
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=All-Out for Victory!: Magazine Advertising and the World War II Home Front |date=2009 |publisher=UPNE |isbn=978-1-58465-833-7 }}
- {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Reinventing Dixie: Tin Pan Alley's Songs and the Creation of the Mythic South |date=2015 |publisher=LSU Press |isbn=978-0-8071-5944-6 |oclc=894313622 }}
=Articles=
- {{Cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Mr. Gilbert and Dr. Bowdler: a further note on Patience |date=1974 |oclc=757110190 }}
- {{cite journal |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=The Printing of 'The Grand Duke': Notes Toward a Gilbert Bibliography |journal=The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America |date=December 1967 |volume=61 |issue=4 |pages=335–342 |doi=10.1086/pbsa.61.4.24300954 |s2cid=163565866 |oclc=1186193239 }}
- {{cite journal |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Editing Victorian Playwrights: Some Problems, Priorities, and Principles |journal=Theatre Survey |date=May 1976 |volume=17 |issue=1 |pages=106–123 |doi=10.1017/S0040557400004245 |s2cid=162685333 }}
- {{Cite book |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=British printers on galley proofs: a chronological reconsideration |date=1976 |publisher=O.U.P. |location=London |oclc=931340734 }}
- {{cite journal |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=Victorian 'Readers' and Modern Editors: Attitudes and Accidentals Revisited |journal=The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America |date=March 1977 |volume=71 |issue=1 |pages=49–59 |doi=10.1086/pbsa.71.1.24302323 |s2cid=163772620 |oclc=1185493410 }}
- {{cite journal |id={{ProQuest|229998568}} |last1=Jones |first1=John Bush |title=From Melodrama to Tragedy: The Transformation of Sweeney Todd |journal=New England Theatre Journal |volume=2 |issue=1 |date=1991 |pages=85–97 }}
An archive of Jones' works is available at the Robert D. Farber University Archives and Special Collections Department, Brandeis University Libraries.
References
{{reflist}}
Sources
- {{Cite book|last=Jones|first=John Bush|title=Our Musicals, Ourselves: A Social History of the American Musical Theatre|year=2004|publisher=Brandeis University Press|isbn=978-1-61168-223-6}}
- {{Cite book|last=Jones|first=John Bush|title=All-Out for Victory!: Magazine Advertising and the World War II Home Front|year=2009|publisher=UPNE|isbn=978-1-58465-833-7}}
External links
- {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20140104072250/http://www.upne.com/author_mugs/jonesjohnbush_mug.jpg Photo of Jones]}}
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Category:American non-fiction writers
Category:American male journalists
Category:Educators from Chicago
Category:Northwestern University School of Communication alumni