Following approximately 27 years devoted to teaching American literature at the College English professor emeritus James Cox, died on Jan. 26 of complications from pneumonia at his home in Independence, Va., according to his daughter, Virginia Cox. He was 86 years old.
Cox, an expert in 19th-century American literature and "a great performer of the art of teaching," reshaped the English department at Dartmouth, according to professor Donald Pease.
Former English professor Louis Renza, who worked with Cox, said his role as a transformative figure at the College cannot be understated.
"He gave the College a certain kind of professional visibility that was really unusual in the field of American studies and literature at the time," Renza said.
Cox broke boundaries by combining his role as a professor with his status as a professional writer, Pease said. He believed firmly in the intersection between his teaching and his writing, and he considered his students' contributions key to his scholarship, according to Pease.
"Teaching animated his scholarship, and scholarship inspired his teaching," Pease said. "He was a larger-than-life presence that wrote about larger-than-life authors."
Because of his dynamic presence in the classroom, Cox amassed a following among much of the student body, according to Pease.
"He was a much sought-after lecturer and his classes were between 100 and 200 students every term he taught," he said. "In the 1960s in particular, his classes became a platform for coming to terms with the great political and philosophical movements of the time."
Cox became especially well-known for his book on Mark Twain, "The Fate of Humor," which brought a new type of biographical writing to the forefront, according to Renza.
"He broke new territory in regards to talking about and discussing Mark Twain his work, his literature and the kind of humor that could mean so many things," Renza said.
Cox's literary criticisms were ground-breaking because he emphasized incorporating contemporary writers into the American canon, according to Renza.
"He was always reaching for something new, always innovative," Renza said. "He had the kind of persona that you could call creative in the field of criticism."
Cox was also eager to serve as a resource for students outside the classroom, according to his family.
"He was so dedicated to his students, he always kept in touch with them and helped them in their careers," Virginia Cox said. "He was always giving of himself to help the success of others."
During his tenure at the College, Cox balanced work with raising his six children with Marguerite Cox, his wife of 63 years, in Norwich, Vt. In addition to his many commitments, he made sure to devote time to his family, according to Virginia Cox.
Cox served in the Navy during World War II as a Yeomen first class on the submarine Dragonet. Following the war, he earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Michigan, where he met his wife.
The family moved to Indiana, where Cox earned his doctorate and taught briefly as a professor of English at Indiana University, his wife said.
Throughout his life, Cox felt a deep connection to the land on which he lived, his daughter said. He and his wife maintained an elaborate garden and his children "tapped our own maple trees" growing up in Vermont, she said.
Following his retirement, Cox moved back to his family farm in Virginia.
"He did not want to go to a hospital nor to a nursing home, and so we are grateful that he had the good fortune of being home in the house built by his great-grandfather and to die on the land that he loved so much," she said.
Cox's academic honors included the Danforth Award for Teaching, the Avalon Professorship of Humanities at Dartmouth and the Jay B. Hubbell Medal for his accomplishments in American literature.
He is survived by his wife Marguerite and his six children and their spouses, Karen and Mark Sheets; Marian and Rick Cawley; Julia Cox; Ellen Cox and Tom Valtin; David and Sylvie Cox; and Virginia Cox and Bill Filler. He is also survived by 14 grandchildren, according to an obituary in The Roanoke Times.
