Alex Vernon teaches post-1900 American literature, some film, and writing. He is the author of:
- two memoirs,
most succinctly bred
(2006) and
The Eyes of Orion: Five Tank Lieutenants in the Persian Gulf War
(1999; Army Historical Foundation Distinguished Book Award);
- three books of literary criticism/history,
Soldiers Once and Still: Ernest Hemingway, James Salter, and Tim O'Brien
(2004);
Hemingway's Second War: Bearing Witness to the Spanish Civil War
(2011); and
Reading Hemingway's
For Whom the Bell Tolls
; Glossary and Commentary
(spring 2024);
- the cultural study
On Tarzan
(2008);
- and four edited collections,
Arms and the Self: War, the Military, and Autobiographical Writing
(2005);
Approaches to Teaching the Works of Tim O'Brien
(2010);
Critical Insights: War
(2012); and
Teaching Hemingway and War
(2016).
He received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (NEH) for 2020-2021 to work on
Peace is a Shy Thing: The Life and Art of Tim O'Brien
. Other ongoing projects include co-editing
The Letters of Ernest Hemingway Volume Seven, 1936-1939
(2025), and
The Spanish Earth by Ernest Hemingway and Joris Ivens: The Definitive Photobook Edition
(2025).
From 2017-2019, he led a local program for veterans as well as the general public, funded by the NEH's "Dialogue on the Experience of War" program. He wrote the memorial poem at the Young-Wise Memorial Stadium & Plaza on campus and consulted on the Ken Burns and Lynn Novick film
Hemingway
(Florentine/PBS, 2021).