Concealed behind the familiar face that students see at the chalkboard every day in English class may be an extraordinary writer.

“There are a lot of really good writers on campus … De Anza faculty members in the English department and possibly elsewhere,” said English teacher Randolph Splitter.

“I just want to make the students aware of that … perhaps it might be interesting for them to find out about it and try to get a hold of some of their writing and certainly take their creative writing and literary magazine classes too..

“If they’re interested they just might know that beyond being good teachers they are also good artists and good writers.”

One example is Splitter himself. In June of 1999 he published his second book, a novella called, “Body and Soul.”

Besides being a father, a teacher, chair of the English department and the faculty editor of “Bottomfish,” the De Anza literary magazine recently renamed, “Red Wheelbarrow,” Splitter found time to write this short novel compiled with a collection of short stories.

Juggling all of these activities makes Splitter seem uniquely qualified to explore the range of topics covered in his novella.

He describes the topics covered as, “multiple voices. [I] also try to capture what life is like in our society now. With many different kinds of people, different ethnic groups and cultural backgrounds … and [I] try to represent the American reality that includes all that.”

Splitter enjoys studying and writing about American literature and popular culture.

He says, “That’s part of what I try to do in my writing: make it dramatic, and personal, and emotional, and psychological and an interesting story. But at the same time to deal with … society and social issues, which I think has been somewhat neglected in modern American fiction.”

He is already working on another project, this time non-fiction.

Splitter talks about his new project saying, “I’m interested in dealing with … social issues. I think that a lot of writers can’t manage to deal with broader social issues.”

The new book will be an anthology concerning American stories of violence and aggression.

Splitter hopes De Anza students can relate to his novella’s depiction of lives rich with cultural and ethnic diversity.

He says, “I try to have different perspectives… different voices from the first person point of view … I don’t know whether students would be interested in that. I hope they would.”