Providence writer Joel Harris began writing about his adopted son, Stephen Neil Cohen, long before he lost him.
Stephen was in Nicaragua teaching high school history in 1999 when he drowned trying to save a friend’s dog. He was 31.
Stephen studied at the Rhode Island College of Education, Wesleyan University, and attended Lincoln-Sudbury High School in Sudbury, Mass. His father, Harris, 88, is a freelance writer and former owner of a Providence-based scrap metal business. He’s been writing a book about the life and death of his son, “Searching for Steve,” over the last two decades. It was published by Apprentice House Press at Loyola University Maryland last summer.
The 280-page book is broken up into eight parts, and weaves in Harris’s narration with Stephen’s journal entries from when he was on a two-year contract teaching Advanced Placement American and European history at the American Nicaraguan School in Managua. The book also includes previously published essays Harris has written and rewritten, and includes a chapter of condolence letters from the students Stephen taught in Nicaragua.
Harris said writing the book, his first to be published, was a catharsis for coping with grief. It also was a lesson in patience, persistence, and publishing.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
What inspired you to write a book about Stephen’s life and tragic death?
When he was 2 or 3 years old, he was such an enormously interesting child, and I began writing about him. That was back in 1972, so it’s more like 50 years that he’s been part of my so-called literary life. I wrote a story about Stephen as this interesting, lovable, beautiful child. That story was accepted by Transatlantic Review. It was called “Anemones” because I would liken my son to a sea creature — a very delicate sea anemone.
I wrote stories about him and they began to get published. A short story called “Jesus in Singapore,” which became a chapter in “Searching for Steve,” was published in Northwest Review.
So it absolutely had been bugging me through his whole life that I wanted to tell the story of this miraculous gift that somebody gave to me.
Stephen’s journal entries are dispersed throughout the book. Describe what it was like compiling these and weaving them into your narration.
I assembled all of his work that he had left on his computer in our cellar here in Providence. I assembled all of his writings, which included a lot of journals, and I tried to integrate my writing with his writing to create an interesting narrative.
It took me literally up until about six or seven years ago to finally integrate the stories in a way that I felt ready to send out.
Did Stephen always keep a journal throughout his life?
No, he didn’t always keep a journal. But when he got into Rhode Island College of Education, I said, “Keep a journal of your experiences,” because he would tell me about the dramas and the kids and the conflicts with the teachers and administration. And he was very interesting with his attitudes towards education.
I always loved talking with him. We would have the most interesting conversations. What was going on in his mind was very interesting to me, so I asked him to keep a journal, which he did. Thank goodness. It gave me a way in.
Talk about the process of publishing the book.
The story was first accepted by a small publisher in Los Angeles back around 2018, but we couldn’t agree on a contract. I walked away from that deal on a friendly basis, and then I rewrote the book. This time, I had it edited before I sent it out again by a wonderful guy named Wyn Cooper, who lives up in Vermont. I wanted to have it edited by a real professional.
Six months later, I reorganized the book again. With the help of Stephen’s roommate, a guy named Stephen Power, who graduated with him at Wesleyan, and, as it turned out, was working for an editing firm. He gave a fairly major revision to me, and he picked the title, “Searching for Steve.” After that, I sent it back to Wyn Cooper to do one final polish.
The first person I sent it out to after that was Kevin Atticks, the director of Apprentice House Press who teaches a course at Loyola in Maryland in media, writing, and novel production. They involve the class, and published 25 books last year. Mine was one of the 25.
It took me literally years to get a book published by a really nice group of people. And I’m so thrilled with how they put it together. They designed the format and the cover. The lady that painted the cover is 91 years old. She called my wife yesterday. We’re personal friends. I sort of championed her and this portrait, which is on our third floor, to have the Press design a cover around it.
The student at Loyola in charge of designing the book designed the cover. She turned it into kind of a museum with Stephen at different stages in his life.
Where was Stephen adopted from? Did you ever learn who his biological parents were?
He was adopted from a Boston agency. I tried to find out. That was one of the impetuses to wanting to write about him. I wanted to go apologize to his biological parents and say, “Listen, I have to tell you this tragic thing, but I knew him for 31 years and he was a wonderful child and a gift from you.” I thought I might have known who the father was, but I’m not sure that’s the case. I had no clue about his mother. The adoption records were legally sealed from view, available only to the adopted.
How did Stephen end up becoming a teacher in Nicaragua?
They loved him in Pawtucket. They loved him in Central Falls. But he couldn’t get a full-time teaching job back in that particular time. [The school systems] were focusing on disadvantaged kids, and secondarily cutting music and art out of the curricula and concentrating on math and chemistry, which he didn’t really want to teach. He loved Nicaragua and he wanted to continue to teach there.
Did you find writing this book cathartic?
Extremely so. That’s Aristotle’s old theme. A good story should be cathartic, and if a writer can recreate that emotion in the reader, then you’ve accomplished your objective, because you’ve allowed somebody to share and go through that experience without having to suffer the real agony of it.
I want to bring Stephen to life for other people, not just for me, because he had something to share with everybody in the world.
Do you have any future writing projects coming up?
I’m compiling a book of Stephen’s essays, which I just finished an introduction for. The essays I think are a wonderful view into his thinking about the climate, about teaching, what kids need. I mean, the issues he was writing about for graduate school, so much is unchanged. The book, I think, should have a life for itself. I put an introduction together that links the two books, because they’re so connected.
Brittany Bowker can be reached at brittany.bowker@globe.com. Follow her @brittbowker and also on Instagram @brittbowker.