Bill Plott
I was born in Washington, D.C., in 1948, the son of a career officer in the Air Force—asking me where I’m from is not a simple question, as I grew up in D.C., West Point, the Haut Marne, Bucks County, the U.P. of Michigan, Oklahoma City, and Honolulu. I graduated from Beloit College in 1970, and did graduate work at Middlebury, Tulane, and the Harvard Graduate School of Education. I live in Natick, Massachusetts, with my wife of forty-three years this February, Judy Adams Plott.
I retired in 2010 after teaching English and Drama for thirty-seven years at Lincoln-Sudbury RHS in Massachusetts, teaching with my wife, Judy Plott. We were also the directors of the LSB Players for twenty seasons, and were involved in some ninety productions over the years. One specialty was a large annual Shakespeare production, something for which Lincoln-Sudbury was known during our tenure. Judy and I are currently the Drama Editors for the online journal, The Courtship of Wind.
My friend Chuck Schwager and I formed POCKET PRODUCTIONS six years ago; to date we’ve staged a production of “Krapp’s Last Tape” & “Rockaby,” a staged reading of “A Waste of Shame,” and a zoom production of Havel’s “Largo Desolato” during the pandemic. I’ve had two other staged readings of my plays—Ibsen’s Bastards at a Provincetown festival, and A Waste of Shame in Fitchburg. Two years ago, the online journal, whimperbang, published my one-act play, “Airmen.”
I wrote constantly during my teaching career, amassing several unfinished and even a few finished manuscripts. Since retiring, I’ve finished five plays, one novel, and a handful of short stories. I should add, to date the publishing world is apparently unimpressed by my efforts, but this in no way discourages me.
My wife and I read, among other subjects, contemporary fiction, plays, and poetry in translation, from anywhere in the world. We go to the theater locally and in London, subscribe to the Boston Symphony Orchestra, belong to the MFA Boston, the Gardner Museum, the National Gallery in London, and now the Rejksmuseum in Amsterdam in anticipation of a trip this spring. We travel as often as our budget and bodily decrepitude allow, especially to the U.K. and Italy—we did teach courses in Shakespeare and what Ghandi called a good idea: Western Civilization. So yes, we are walking Euro-centric antiques; still, we try our best to have active and open minds.
