A Poet’s Sketch of His Biography

Dean Nichols was born on the Yakima Indian Reservation in Washington in 1919, although his Indian forebears lived in northern Maine. A licensed tugboat captain and purser, he has worked as a port manager, an electrical and civil engineer, an air-traffic controller, a boat officer for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and a marine-traffic officer for the Alaska Marine Highway. He followed in his father's footsteps to become a tugboat captain in the Pacific Northwest. He has studied the social and natural sciences, humanities, and business administration at Anchorage Community College.

In this sensitive collection of poetry and prose, the essence of the writer's life is revealed. This is not a biography based on dates and events. Chronology is here measured by a man's inner growth, by the things he holds most dear. We are told of the attitudes, ideals, hopes, and dreams that make Dean Nichols unique and lend depth and power to his poetry. Drawing upon personal experience, as all poets must, Mr. Nichols admits us into a world that is enveloped with love. We feel it in tender notes to a friend, in brief phrases expressing his awe of nature and love of God, in lines that illumine his deepest feelings for his family, and in images that reflect his deepest understanding and most soaring aspirations. Many of the pieces in 'A Poet's Sketch of His Biography' are devoted to the author's beloved Alaska - the people, the harsh and beautiful land, and the sense of raw power and urgency in this pioneer state. He writes of the fishermen of Cordova, of the FAA air-controllers working a vast area of wilderness, of the warmth of home, of love. In his previous book, Dean Nichols told us that he would invite no one to share the mainland of his life; rather, he shared with us a few islands of his experience - a glimpse of an untraveled world. That his world has grown since he wrote those words is happily apparent in 'A Poet's Sketch of His Biography'.