Author
Literary Scholar, Lecturer, public reader;
Teacher, educational consultant, word crafter.

                            ...Celebrating the written word

BOOKS BY ZOLBROD INCLUDE

Battle Songs: A Story of the Korean War in Four Movements iUniverse, 2007
Four young men from the farm country and coal fields of Western Pennsylvania are drafted to fight in Korea in the early 1950’s, taking with them a legacy of conflict and violence that prevails to this day. Told from four different perspectives, this novel contrasts the horrors of the battlefield with accounts of mid-twentieth-century life in an overlooked part of America—a world far different on the surface from the one young people know in today’s strife-torn opening years of the twenty-first century. At the same time, it evokes lingering questions about how combat on distant shores can interface with individual lives at home. iUniverse: New York, Lincoln, Shanghai. Order at iUniverse.com or through Amazon.com.

“...the author treats this well-trod theme with sensitivity and intelligence, writing in subdued, crisp, poetic prose.” —Kirkus Discoveries, Neilsen Business Media

Weaving a World: Textiles and the Navajo Way of Seeing, with Roseann S. Willink
Museum of New Mexico Press, 1997
Working with Navajo elders and studying museum examples, the authors approach timeless Navajo rugs and blankets as a careful reader would a work of literature, attentive for clues that offer context and reveal meaning within the framework of a vibrant tradition.

“The authors let Navajos speak for themselves, explaining how their rugs and blankets are related to their culture and mythology. Navajo unity with the earth and their harmony in life is shown in the symbols found in rugs, specifically in 70 illustrated here. Listening to Rugs is a good introduction to the beauty and worth, both spiritual and artistic, of Navajo Weaving.” —Library Journal

Reading the Voice: Native American Oral Poetry on the Written Page
University of Utah Press, 1995
Drawing on years of experience with Seneca and Navajo singers and storytellers, Paul Zolbrod offers an introductory framework for appreciating what can be called America’s first literature, and for reevaluating the Western literary heritage. He considers this work a tentative first step in reconciling mainstream America with the deep poetic roots of an unwritten aboriginal past, and perhaps even with the deeper roots of the Western World’s own poetic traditions.

“…Zolbrod’s study of Native American poetry is a welcome contribution to the field of Native American studies, due to his refreshingly new approach and his assertions that Native American oral works are as valid and valuable as Beowulf and the works of Homer.” —Michele Kloppenburg, American Culture Association

“This is first-rate scholarship with practical application for any discussion of literature and verbal expression. It is essential reading for anyone who has tried to find the oral voice behind the printed page.” Choice: Outstanding Academic Books, 1998

Diné bahane: The Navajo Creation Story University of New Mexico Press, 1984
The most complete version of the Navajo creation story to appear in English, this book attempts to render the power and delicacy of the oral storytelling performance on the page.

“A brilliant rendering of a folk epic into a fascinating and highly literate work of art—a tapestry of exceptional events recounted in vivid, stong and highly atmospheric language, a language, to use a phrase of the late John Gardner, that is at once ancient and ultramodern.” —New York Times