Sidney Homan’s lifelong love affair with theater began at age 5, and now, about 70 years later, he is being recognized for his scholarly contributions to the field.
On Wednesday, Homan, an English professor, was given UF’s Teacher-Scholar of the Year award.
Born in Philadelphia to a blue-collar working family, Homan thought he’d end up being a telephone installer like his father. But his love of Shakespeare pushed him to college. He attended Princeton University as an undergrad where he studied English. He continued studying English for his Ph.D., which he earned at Harvard University.
Shortly after finishing graduate school, Homan became an assistant professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. One night, while Homan and fellow theater-loving professors were wandering around, they came upon an abandoned railroad station. They rented it out for $100 a month, called it the Depot Theater and used it to stage productions. It was then Homan said he recognized the importance of practicing what he teaches.
He was once involved in a production of “Waiting for Godot,” which toured Florida prisons.
“The inmates really dug it,” he said. “It was cutting real close to their own lives. It took them to make me realize how practical the theater can be.”
He is also a widely published author with works focusing on topics ranging from Shakespeare to Hitler.
But Homan said he’d be the same person without the award.
“I’d still be very happy if I were working as a telephone installer,” he said. “It honestly blows my mind that I get paid to do this.”
Andrew Varan, a 19-year-old UF psychology and English sophomore, is a student in Homan’s Shakespeare: Doing It class. He said Homan sees his students as his equal — they call him Sid.
“A lot of professors aim to improve you as a person, but you’re just one out of 30 or one out of 150,” he said. “Sid is one of those rare professors that is as concerned about you as an individual as about you learning.”
[A version of this story ran on page 5 on 4/15/2014 under the headline "English prof, author earns UF’s Teacher-Scholar of the Year Award"]
