James K.

By many metrics, I grew up a reluctant reader—quite the origin story for an English teacher. Even though I consumed tons of media and was always hunched over a magazine or a newspaper, I never dug those readings for English class. Instead, I succeeded by tapping into my favorite fields and connecting to the material through a pathway. I drew on my love of professional wrestling to understand the power of foils, baseball to make sense of the shapes of narratives, and politics to grasp the art…