Owen Brown, MA
Artistic Director and CEO,
Bread & Wine Theatre Company
Owen Brown (M. A.) is the artistic director and CEO of Bread & Wine Theatre Company in St. Louis. He is involved theatre as a playwright, a director, a producer, & an actor as well as contributing scholarly publications to the Thornton Wilder Journal. As a director, Owen’s recent work includes First Person Shooter which won drama of the year in the St. Louis Fringe Festival in 2025, Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the Murder, Thornton Wilder’s The Long Christmas Dinner, and Babette’s Feast. Plays written by Owen include The Time of My Life, Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the Murder, and Injured? CALL! Shows Owen has produced recently include The Time of My Life, Bread & Wine’s first Christmas Short Play Festival, and Babette’s Feast. Owen wrote the first ever comparative analysis of Wilder’s playscript and libretto of The Long Christmas Dinner “Time, Death, and the Bayards,” which is being published in the sixth volume of the Thornton Wilder Journal. Two contributions from Owen have been accepted into the first issue of the seventh volume of the Thornton Wilder Journal, the publication of which is forthcoming. Owen graduated in 2019 from California Baptist University (CBU) as the top student in his graduating class. At CBU, Owen was greatly inspired by his professor, Dr. Scott Key, in his love of literature, philosophy, and theatre as well as goodness, truth, and beauty. He received his master’s from Covenant Theological Seminary in 2025. Owen has also written his own Vacation Bible School Curriculum and is in the process of developing it towards publishing.
Scott B. Key, PhD
VP for Academic Initiatives,
C.S. Lewis Study Center
Professor Emeritus, Philosopher, Minister, Author
Dr. Key earned his B.A. in Political Science from the University of New Mexico, and a Master’s of Divinity and Ph.D. in Philosophy from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Concurrent with his academic career, and throughout his life, he has served in a pastoral capacity in each of the communities in which he has resided. As Professor of Philosophy in the School of Christian Ministries at California Baptist University (CBU), Scott helped establish and run the CBU Honors Program, and, previously, the 4-year Great Works Bachelor’s Degree Program. In addition, Scott is one of the founding faculty of the seven-year program entitled, Seminar on Faith and the Academic Professions (SOFAP), strategically designed to assist the 35-40 new tenure-track faculty each year to think deeply and carefully about their teaching, research, and service from the perspective of the Christian worldview. He has taught courses in Philosophy, History, Political Science, English, Psychology, Christian Studies, and Humanities. His research areas include the history of philosophy, 20th Century Philosophy, Aesthetics, Ethics, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.
In addition to leading seminars and fulfilling speaking engagements for the C.S. Lewis Study Center, Dr. Key has made academic presentations for such groups as the Society of Christian Philosophers, the Society of Christianity and Literature, and the Evangelical Philosophical Society. His publications include the following chapter contributions: “Metaphors of Meaning: The Dance of Truth and Imagination in That Hideous Strength” in Contemporary Perspectives on C.S. Lewis’ The Abolition of Man, (Mosteller & Anacker, eds., 2017) and “The Moral Aesthetic of Perelandra” in C.S. Lewis and the Arts: Creativity in the Shadowlands” (Miller, ed., 2013). His current research manuscript in preparation is entitled, “Truth in the Balance: A Literary and Philosophical Analysis of the Gospel of Mark.”
Lincoln Konkle, PhD
Professor of English, The College of New Jersey
Co-editor, Thornton Wilder Journal
Member of the Board of Directors, Thornton Wilder Society
Lincoln Konkle is Professor of English at The College of New Jersey where he teaches courses in dramatic literature. He has published articles in scholarly journals and books on Thornton Wilder, Edward Albee, Tennessee Williams, and others. He is the author of Thornton Wilder and The Puritan Narrative Tradition, co-editor of the Thornton Wilder Journal, co-editor of Thornton Wilder: New Perspectives, co-editor of Edward Albee as a Theatrical and Dramatic Innovator, and co-editor of Stephen Vincent Benet: Essays on His Life and Work. He serves on the boards of the Thornton Wilder Society and Edward Albee Society.