John Richard Nold

The Counterfeit Madonna John Richard Nold

"My lifelong passion has been for great literature, great music, great art including
sculpture and architecture, and great philosophy.
I had some talented English teachers in high school and at the junior college in St.
Joseph, MO.; also at Kansas University in Lawrence, KS., with extra credits from
the University of Missouri- Columbia and University of Missouri- Kansas City.
This led to my embarking on a teaching vocation myself. I taught on several
levels and I should have been able to use the experience to my benefit. Instead I
had a breakdown that took me a while to recover from. While I was floundering
my way out of this dilemma, I was hired by the City of Kansas City, MO. for a
clerical position and was assigned to their Municipal Farm (a still flourishing
prison farm) which eventually evolved into the Municipal Correctional Institution.
I intended and expected that this would be a temporary expedient for me. I
ended up staying for thirty years, mostly as a records officer at the prison.
I?ve never written about those years, but that may yet occur provided time
allows. During those thirty years I was able to partake of the City?s rich cultural
life and I read, read, read and also continued to write all through that period.
Here is a novelette from an earlier period of my life before most of these latter
things happened. Eventually I broadened my horizon to include an interest
in German literature. Currently I?m working at translating some works from
German literature and currently I?m developing and honing my translation skills,
hoping to make a contribution to the literary challenge of being a translator."