This past Saturday, April 17, saw the (if I'm not mistaken) third incarnation of the Alternative Media Expo, sponsored by Leo McGovern and the good folks at Antigravity Magazine. Esconced in the urban vibe of the warehouse section of the Contemporary Arts Center in New Orleans' gallery district, the annual shindig highlights such homegrown, grassroots entrepreuneurial ventures as the New Orleans Craft Mafia, Defend New Orleans, Dirty Coast t-shirts and Crescent City Comics. Deep South Samizdat Books was, of course, honored to be in such esteemed company, and the day proved to be fun, inspiring and lucrative.
The organizers charge five dollars admission, which I admit I questioned the wisdom of originally. However, I have completely come around to the concept, as it seems to prime the pump for the festival of independent, noncorporate commerce that takes place, the collective thumbing of the nose to the Targets and Gaps and Old Navys that eternally threaten to turn us into just another Cincinnati or Dallas or Topeka. The interaction that subsequently takes place is not one of frenzied consumption, but one of appreciative engagement with artists, craftspeople, journalists, or in my case, a creative recycler of densely packed, interactive nuggets of intellectual, philosophical and spiritual wisdom known as books.
And the books you people were buying! Multiple copies of volumes by the erotic apostle D.H. Lawrence; quantum psychologist and cult novelist Robert Anton Wilson; modern mythmaker Neil Gaiman; transgressive science-fiction outlaw Samuel R. Delaney; Cold War-era Eastern European science fiction Solzhenitsyn Stanislaw Lem; Gothic Suburban Surrealist Shirley Jackson; militaristic crypto-libertarian Robert Heinlein; Noir Underbelly-of-the-American-
Century chronicler James Ellroy; the Mississippi Moonshine Modernist, William Faulkner; the creator of Conan, the spinner of sword and sorcery from central Texas, Robert E. Howard; the Florida sunshine and southern spice of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston; and the cyberpunk standard-bearer Bruce Sterling.
Now, I had the presence of mind to bring multiple copies of the aforementioned, but I would have been hardpressed to proclaim that they would outsell such counterculture mainstays as Vonnegut, Huxley, Rand, Camus, Hesse, etc. Heavy on the speculative fiction, with a smattering of classic modern lit, all embodying the ambiguous yet highly evocative gumbo of alternative media. Well done, my friends.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Monday, April 5, 2010
Urban Cowboy Mouth
Book reviewed:
Just Kids
by Patti Smith
Harper Collins Publishers, 2010
278 pages
Patti Smith's Just Kids is a passionate tribute to her dear friend (and one-time lover) the late Robert Mapplethorpe, and to the New York in which they came of age in the late 1960's and 1970's. Smith was just making a name for herself as a poet and rock journalist when she emerged from the CBGB's punk scene that spawned the Ramones and Talking Heads, among others, while Mapplethorpe developed an intense photographic style, much of it infused with gay and s/m themes, before dying of AIDS in 1989. The young, still-aspiring artists matured among the moveable feast of Beats and Punks, young turks and elders who were recreating the city and the world in their image.
Smith has made an idiosyncratic but iconic career as musician, writer and visual artist out of a romantic commitment to a pure distillation of art, idolizing and idealizing those she considers to have shared that utter commitment (Baudelaire, Genet, Bob Dylan, Keith Richards) or even been consumed by it as martyrs to artistic purity (Rimbaud, Jackson Pollock, Jim Morrison) Similar larger-than-life figures move in and out of the narrative, changing and evolving the culture around them as surely as Hemingway, Joyce, Picasson, Pound and Stein in 1920's Paris. Throughout, Smith maintains a certain Candide meets Forrest Gump innocence, resisting the drug use around her, professing surprise when Mapplethorpe's embrace of homosexuality becomes personal, rather than simply artistic and voyeuristic.
So many vivid portraits emerge, highly personal and unique, yet simultaneously timeless: Mapplethorpe embraces the transgressive New York world of Warhol, drag queens and bohemian socialites, but lies to his Catholic parents about him and Smith being married; Kris Kristofferson sings "Me and Bobby McGee" to Janis Joplin while Smith sits on the floor; Salvador Dali sees her with a stuffed crow and tells Smith she looks like a "gothic crow": she begins an intense affair with a drummer who introduces himself as Slim Shady, only to find out several days later that he is Off-Broadway playwriting sensation (and husband and father) Sam Shepard, who she collaborates with on the play Cowboy Mouth.
Harry Smith, Gregory Corso and Jim Carroll, (who appears in a similar, decadent saintly role in Kathleen Norris' 1970's in New York memoir The Virgin of Bennington), all dead now (if any of those names are unfamiliar to you, go to Google immediately, then come back. It's okay, we'll wait for you.... Take your time.... Okay, come on back now, you can return to that later.... come on, I'll loan you some books) are among the others who inspire Smith along the way, and are portrayed with much affection and respect. Each of the three were sporadically brilliant artists with emotionally trying personalities, as symbolic of their city at the time as anyone. As in Carroll's classic song, "People Who Died," Smith endows her time, her circle of friends and lovers, and her city, with a luminescent dignity which will make you search your bookshelves, cd racks and Netflix queue for the artifacts they left behind.
Just Kids
by Patti Smith
Harper Collins Publishers, 2010
278 pages
Patti Smith's Just Kids is a passionate tribute to her dear friend (and one-time lover) the late Robert Mapplethorpe, and to the New York in which they came of age in the late 1960's and 1970's. Smith was just making a name for herself as a poet and rock journalist when she emerged from the CBGB's punk scene that spawned the Ramones and Talking Heads, among others, while Mapplethorpe developed an intense photographic style, much of it infused with gay and s/m themes, before dying of AIDS in 1989. The young, still-aspiring artists matured among the moveable feast of Beats and Punks, young turks and elders who were recreating the city and the world in their image.
Smith has made an idiosyncratic but iconic career as musician, writer and visual artist out of a romantic commitment to a pure distillation of art, idolizing and idealizing those she considers to have shared that utter commitment (Baudelaire, Genet, Bob Dylan, Keith Richards) or even been consumed by it as martyrs to artistic purity (Rimbaud, Jackson Pollock, Jim Morrison) Similar larger-than-life figures move in and out of the narrative, changing and evolving the culture around them as surely as Hemingway, Joyce, Picasson, Pound and Stein in 1920's Paris. Throughout, Smith maintains a certain Candide meets Forrest Gump innocence, resisting the drug use around her, professing surprise when Mapplethorpe's embrace of homosexuality becomes personal, rather than simply artistic and voyeuristic.
So many vivid portraits emerge, highly personal and unique, yet simultaneously timeless: Mapplethorpe embraces the transgressive New York world of Warhol, drag queens and bohemian socialites, but lies to his Catholic parents about him and Smith being married; Kris Kristofferson sings "Me and Bobby McGee" to Janis Joplin while Smith sits on the floor; Salvador Dali sees her with a stuffed crow and tells Smith she looks like a "gothic crow": she begins an intense affair with a drummer who introduces himself as Slim Shady, only to find out several days later that he is Off-Broadway playwriting sensation (and husband and father) Sam Shepard, who she collaborates with on the play Cowboy Mouth.
Harry Smith, Gregory Corso and Jim Carroll, (who appears in a similar, decadent saintly role in Kathleen Norris' 1970's in New York memoir The Virgin of Bennington), all dead now (if any of those names are unfamiliar to you, go to Google immediately, then come back. It's okay, we'll wait for you.... Take your time.... Okay, come on back now, you can return to that later.... come on, I'll loan you some books) are among the others who inspire Smith along the way, and are portrayed with much affection and respect. Each of the three were sporadically brilliant artists with emotionally trying personalities, as symbolic of their city at the time as anyone. As in Carroll's classic song, "People Who Died," Smith endows her time, her circle of friends and lovers, and her city, with a luminescent dignity which will make you search your bookshelves, cd racks and Netflix queue for the artifacts they left behind.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Final Words of the Class Clown
Book reviewed:
Last Words, by George Carlin. Free Press, 2009. 294 pp.
It's been close to two years since we lost George Carlin, who, along with Richard Pryor, took the baton from the original generation of maverick stand-up comics (Lenny Bruce, Dick Gregory, Nichols and May, Mort Sahl) and proceeded to pass it to the tamer Letterman/Seinfeld generation (with force-of-nature exceptions like Bill Hicks and Dave Chapelle). Although he briefly had a sitcom on Fox and hosted Saturday Night Live and shined in occasional memorable cameos in movies (Dogma, for instance), Carlin's primary artistic canvas was the stage (and the comedy album), his brush the single microphone, and the pallette his intelligence, his skepticism, his disrespect for authority and groupthink, and his ever-present, acerbic wit.
Within days of the announcement of Carlin's death, one of the comedy channels on XM satellite radio, of which I have been a subscriber for many years now, played nothing but Carlin's routines for 48 hours straight. As my daughter will bitterly attest, with eyes rolling, I play the satellite radio constantly (although, curiously, I don't have it on right now; rather, I'm listening to a Sonny Landreth cd [enough with the navel-gazing already, Parker!]), so I was able to immerse myself in the all-you-can-think buffet of Carlin's genius, often listening to the same insights two, three, four times: stuff, the seven words, baseball and football, shell shock to post-traumatic stress disorder. From the sublime to the banal, and back again.
Last Words is a self-described "sortabiography," co-written with Tony Hendra, that fills in a lot of biographical details, and provides an intimate look at the inner workings of a comedic artist. Neither aspect disappoints. Carlin identifies himself as the product of a union between his alcoholic "shanty Irish" father and his "lace-curtain Irish" mother, with the obvious class differences implied by the terminology. New York in the 1940's and early 1950's is described with vivid affection, a vast playground accessible by subway (which Carlin started rising by himself at the age of seven), abounding with opportunities for adventure, pranks and petty theft.
Rather improbably, Carlin joined the Air Force, ending up stationed at Barksdale Air Force Base in Bossier City, Louisiana, "across the Red River from Shreveport, Louisiana, which, according to my friend Jose', was 'the fucking armpit of the fucking nation'" (p. 60). It also happens to be this blogger's hometown, and his portrait of mid-1950's life in that area, in the Air Force, is fascinating. He spent most of his time with black airmen (in the very segregated Deep South)(did I mention this was the 1950's?), relating one story of being arrested with a black friend and a white friend for no reason and ending up in the Bossier City jail, in segreagated but adjacent cells for the different races: "I had three joints in my sock and they hadn't searched us. So we smoked pot all night, in 1955, blacks and whites together, in the Bossier City jail. Blew the fucking smoke out the fucking window. That felt good!" (pp. 61-62). Okay, now let that sink in, because I believe we have the revolutionary importance of George Carlin in a nutshell in this one anecdote. Sure, he wasn't being attacked by police dogs or taking his life in his hands registering black voters in Mississippi. But the man was in jail, sharing a consciousness-altering and very illegal sacrament with men considered inferior by the local mores and institutions, and sharing it inside the underbelly of that white supremacist power structure. All this while serving in a branch of the United States military, in the thick of the Cold War and just two years removed from the Hot War (excuse me, police action) in Korea. And the man came out the other side, having served a crucial apprenticeship in radio and having survived two court-martials and various other disciplinary actions. By the way, he also was asked to leave 11 months early, with no repercussions.
What follows is a fairly conventional early comedy career for the time, with stand-up appearances at nightclubs leading to t.v. variety and talk shows, imbibing the innovations of Bruce and Sahl without fully embracing them, honing an act designed to please the Ed Sullivans and Merv Griffins and their legions of gray flannel-suited admirers. Eventually, after much soul-searching, he rejected those trappings and blazed his own trail, with classic comedy albums and HBO specials, hosting the very first episode of Saturday Night Live, and finally settling in as a best-selling author, despite multiple heart attacks, drug addiction and some financial miscues along the way.
There are occasional observations about other comedians and performers, but much more attention is given to the evolution of Carlin's art (a brief, rather mild dismissal of Billy Crystal is notable for its uniqueness in the narrative), with frank self-criticism where appropriate. All in all, a fascinating account of an individual who truly changed the culture around him, even when he was stuck in a jail cell in Bossier City, Louisiana in the mid-1950's.
Last Words, by George Carlin. Free Press, 2009. 294 pp.
It's been close to two years since we lost George Carlin, who, along with Richard Pryor, took the baton from the original generation of maverick stand-up comics (Lenny Bruce, Dick Gregory, Nichols and May, Mort Sahl) and proceeded to pass it to the tamer Letterman/Seinfeld generation (with force-of-nature exceptions like Bill Hicks and Dave Chapelle). Although he briefly had a sitcom on Fox and hosted Saturday Night Live and shined in occasional memorable cameos in movies (Dogma, for instance), Carlin's primary artistic canvas was the stage (and the comedy album), his brush the single microphone, and the pallette his intelligence, his skepticism, his disrespect for authority and groupthink, and his ever-present, acerbic wit.
Within days of the announcement of Carlin's death, one of the comedy channels on XM satellite radio, of which I have been a subscriber for many years now, played nothing but Carlin's routines for 48 hours straight. As my daughter will bitterly attest, with eyes rolling, I play the satellite radio constantly (although, curiously, I don't have it on right now; rather, I'm listening to a Sonny Landreth cd [enough with the navel-gazing already, Parker!]), so I was able to immerse myself in the all-you-can-think buffet of Carlin's genius, often listening to the same insights two, three, four times: stuff, the seven words, baseball and football, shell shock to post-traumatic stress disorder. From the sublime to the banal, and back again.
Last Words is a self-described "sortabiography," co-written with Tony Hendra, that fills in a lot of biographical details, and provides an intimate look at the inner workings of a comedic artist. Neither aspect disappoints. Carlin identifies himself as the product of a union between his alcoholic "shanty Irish" father and his "lace-curtain Irish" mother, with the obvious class differences implied by the terminology. New York in the 1940's and early 1950's is described with vivid affection, a vast playground accessible by subway (which Carlin started rising by himself at the age of seven), abounding with opportunities for adventure, pranks and petty theft.
Rather improbably, Carlin joined the Air Force, ending up stationed at Barksdale Air Force Base in Bossier City, Louisiana, "across the Red River from Shreveport, Louisiana, which, according to my friend Jose', was 'the fucking armpit of the fucking nation'" (p. 60). It also happens to be this blogger's hometown, and his portrait of mid-1950's life in that area, in the Air Force, is fascinating. He spent most of his time with black airmen (in the very segregated Deep South)(did I mention this was the 1950's?), relating one story of being arrested with a black friend and a white friend for no reason and ending up in the Bossier City jail, in segreagated but adjacent cells for the different races: "I had three joints in my sock and they hadn't searched us. So we smoked pot all night, in 1955, blacks and whites together, in the Bossier City jail. Blew the fucking smoke out the fucking window. That felt good!" (pp. 61-62). Okay, now let that sink in, because I believe we have the revolutionary importance of George Carlin in a nutshell in this one anecdote. Sure, he wasn't being attacked by police dogs or taking his life in his hands registering black voters in Mississippi. But the man was in jail, sharing a consciousness-altering and very illegal sacrament with men considered inferior by the local mores and institutions, and sharing it inside the underbelly of that white supremacist power structure. All this while serving in a branch of the United States military, in the thick of the Cold War and just two years removed from the Hot War (excuse me, police action) in Korea. And the man came out the other side, having served a crucial apprenticeship in radio and having survived two court-martials and various other disciplinary actions. By the way, he also was asked to leave 11 months early, with no repercussions.
What follows is a fairly conventional early comedy career for the time, with stand-up appearances at nightclubs leading to t.v. variety and talk shows, imbibing the innovations of Bruce and Sahl without fully embracing them, honing an act designed to please the Ed Sullivans and Merv Griffins and their legions of gray flannel-suited admirers. Eventually, after much soul-searching, he rejected those trappings and blazed his own trail, with classic comedy albums and HBO specials, hosting the very first episode of Saturday Night Live, and finally settling in as a best-selling author, despite multiple heart attacks, drug addiction and some financial miscues along the way.
There are occasional observations about other comedians and performers, but much more attention is given to the evolution of Carlin's art (a brief, rather mild dismissal of Billy Crystal is notable for its uniqueness in the narrative), with frank self-criticism where appropriate. All in all, a fascinating account of an individual who truly changed the culture around him, even when he was stuck in a jail cell in Bossier City, Louisiana in the mid-1950's.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Heartbreaking Works of Nightmare and Utopia
Books reviewed:
Eggers, Dave. Zeitoun. McSweeney's Books, 2009. 351 pp.
Solnit, Rebecca. A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. Viking, 2009. 353 pp.
I don't know about you, but the majority of my focused reading (not including the daily paper, homeschooling my daughter, in line at the post office, waiting at a red light ["Alright, already, I heard the horn the first time]) takes place late at night, after the rest of the family is asleep, between about nine and one 0'clock, depending on my level of fatigue from the day. If the book just doesn't hold my attention (like Dickens' Little Dorritt, which I dutifully, but unsuccessfully, tried to read for one of my book groups), I'm out, the book swaying back and forth in my hands until it drops onto my chest and wakes me up. But give me a riveting story of outrageous injustice perpretrated against an honorable, innocent individual or community by representatives of banal, sadistic, Kafkaesque institutions, and it's like crystal meth for the soul (there's my franchise right there: Crystal Meth for the Cat-Lover's Soul, Crystal Meth for the NASCAR Soul, Crystal Meth for the Auto-Erotic Asphyxiation Lover's Soul, you get the idea).
The two books reviewed here provide exactly that, coming from very different but occasionally overlapping perspectives. Zeitoun is Dave Egger's account of one man's nightmarish experience in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Abdulrahman Zeitoun is a Syrian immigrant, successful painting and building contractor, devout Muslim and loving husband and father who refused to leave New Orleans as Katrina bore down on the city. After several days spent rescuing neighbors and strangers, staying in touch with his wife Kathy, feeding abandoned dogs and exploring the submerged city by canoe, he and some acquaintances are imprisoned (not formally arrested or charged, mind you) by local police and National Guard and accused of Taliban/Al Quaida membership because of unusual but completely innocent circumstances. He then disappears for several days into a legal system that is utterly dysfunctional on its best days, while his wife and family members frantically try to find out what happened to him. It's an unbelievably infuriating story, told skillfully by a master storyteller who seems determined lately to use his considerable talents and resources (as publisher and editor as well as writer) to draw attention to monumental injustices through the prism of highly personal narratives.
Rebecca Solnit, on the other hand, examines the historical dynamics embodied by both Zeitoun and his persecutors. Analyzing such historical phenomena as the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, a 1917 ammunition explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia, earthquakes in Managua (1972) and Mexico City (1985), and 9-11, Solnit makes the case that, mass media myths to the contrary, disaster tends to bring out not just the best, but downright utopian tendencies in most people, often resulting in far-reaching, long-term social change for the affected society (Nicaragua's Bautista regime and Mexico's PRI party being two of those whose fall Solnit connects directly to the aforementioned earthquakes). As institutions break down, individuals and communities are forced to pool resources and wisdom, and often discover that, despite the tragic hardships which result from the disaster, there is a meaning to their lives that wasn't present previously.
Eggers, Dave. Zeitoun. McSweeney's Books, 2009. 351 pp.
Solnit, Rebecca. A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. Viking, 2009. 353 pp.
I don't know about you, but the majority of my focused reading (not including the daily paper, homeschooling my daughter, in line at the post office, waiting at a red light ["Alright, already, I heard the horn the first time]) takes place late at night, after the rest of the family is asleep, between about nine and one 0'clock, depending on my level of fatigue from the day. If the book just doesn't hold my attention (like Dickens' Little Dorritt, which I dutifully, but unsuccessfully, tried to read for one of my book groups), I'm out, the book swaying back and forth in my hands until it drops onto my chest and wakes me up. But give me a riveting story of outrageous injustice perpretrated against an honorable, innocent individual or community by representatives of banal, sadistic, Kafkaesque institutions, and it's like crystal meth for the soul (there's my franchise right there: Crystal Meth for the Cat-Lover's Soul, Crystal Meth for the NASCAR Soul, Crystal Meth for the Auto-Erotic Asphyxiation Lover's Soul, you get the idea).
The two books reviewed here provide exactly that, coming from very different but occasionally overlapping perspectives. Zeitoun is Dave Egger's account of one man's nightmarish experience in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Abdulrahman Zeitoun is a Syrian immigrant, successful painting and building contractor, devout Muslim and loving husband and father who refused to leave New Orleans as Katrina bore down on the city. After several days spent rescuing neighbors and strangers, staying in touch with his wife Kathy, feeding abandoned dogs and exploring the submerged city by canoe, he and some acquaintances are imprisoned (not formally arrested or charged, mind you) by local police and National Guard and accused of Taliban/Al Quaida membership because of unusual but completely innocent circumstances. He then disappears for several days into a legal system that is utterly dysfunctional on its best days, while his wife and family members frantically try to find out what happened to him. It's an unbelievably infuriating story, told skillfully by a master storyteller who seems determined lately to use his considerable talents and resources (as publisher and editor as well as writer) to draw attention to monumental injustices through the prism of highly personal narratives.
Rebecca Solnit, on the other hand, examines the historical dynamics embodied by both Zeitoun and his persecutors. Analyzing such historical phenomena as the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, a 1917 ammunition explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia, earthquakes in Managua (1972) and Mexico City (1985), and 9-11, Solnit makes the case that, mass media myths to the contrary, disaster tends to bring out not just the best, but downright utopian tendencies in most people, often resulting in far-reaching, long-term social change for the affected society (Nicaragua's Bautista regime and Mexico's PRI party being two of those whose fall Solnit connects directly to the aforementioned earthquakes). As institutions break down, individuals and communities are forced to pool resources and wisdom, and often discover that, despite the tragic hardships which result from the disaster, there is a meaning to their lives that wasn't present previously.
There are always countervaling forces, however, as New Orleanians are bitterly aware. The economic and political elites (at all levels, within and outside of the city), white-flight suburbanites, and police and military personnel are among those Solnit identifies as subsceptible to "elite panic," a condition which can render one incapable of the kind of critical thought necessary to discount rumors like those of babies being raped in the Superdome in the days following Hurricane Katrina: "Disaster sociologist Kathleen Tierney,... itemized its ingredients as 'fear of social disorder; fear of poor, minorities and immigrants; obsession with looting and property crime; willingness to resort to deadly force; and actions taken on the basis of rumor.' In other words, it is the few who behave badly and the many who rise to the occasion. And those few behave badly not because of facts but because of beliefs: they believe the rest of us are about to panic or become a mob or upend property relations, and in their fear they act out to prevent something that may only have existed in their imaginations. Thus the myth of malevolent disaster behavior becomes something of a self-fulfilling prophecy," (p.127).
One factor Solnit doesn't discuss is what seems to me the most obvious difference between Katrina and the other disasters cited. While an earthquake or tsunami or terrorist attack takes its victims by surprise, a potentially disastrous hurricane can be anticipated, in at least a meteorological manner, days before landfall. So while the populations of San Francisco and Managua and Mexico City (and now Port-au-Prince) were struck in their entirety (allowing for construction and location variations), those in New Orleans who bore the brunt of Katrina were mostly the poor, stuck in the city even if they would like to leave, or those, like Zeitoun, who chose to stay for various personal reasons. Does the shared direct experience of the former cities contribute to greater solidarity post-disaster? Are the class differences between those who stayed and those who left in New Orleans too entrenched to allow for the reform and revolution seen in other places? Will the historic connections between New Orleans and Haiti come into play in coming years?
Finally, as one who thinks the importance of popular culture is too easily discounted by most historians and political theorists, will the confluence of New Orleans' globally iconic musical culture and the Saints' victory in what is unarguably one of the most popular sports spectacles in the world have repercussions in the navigation of the post-Katrina political landscape? Time will tell if Who Dat Nation will truly become Utopia.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Zinn and the Art of Democracy Maintenance
Today has brought the unexpected news of the deaths of Howard Zinn, 87, and J.D. Salinger, 91. Neither death should be particularly surprising, given their ages, but, as very different quintessentially American icons of cultural and political upheaval, I think it is safe to say there is a true void in this country's soul that didn't exist a few days ago.
If I can leave a discussion of Salinger for later, I would like to concentrate on Zinn, the iconoclastic historian activist. Like Catch-22 author Joseph Heller and 1972 Democractic peace candidate for President George McGovern, he served on bombers during World War II (if Tom Brokaw wants to make his case just from these three, maybe we can talk greatest generation). Returning to his native Brooklyn, he worked in the shipyard before taking advantage of the G.I. Bill and starting college at 27 (I can't help contrasting Zinn's bio with the Keystone Conservatives facing federal charges after being accused of trying to tamper with Senator Mary Landrieu's phone system here in New Orleans. Probably seemed like a good idea at the frat house kegger.).
After earning his Ph.d. with a dissertation analyzing the congressional career of left-leaning Republican (no, it's not a misprint, my apologies for any computers whose hard drive is fried trying to process such a concept [but it's good practice for next week, when all those computers are going to have to process the Saints' victory in the Super Bowl. Who Dat!]) Fiorello LaGuardia, he settled into a teaching position at Spellman College, the historically Black women's institution in Atlanta, where his students included Alice Walker. He was fired from that position for his strong support of students' participation in the civil rights movement, and continued his academic career at Boston University.
Although Zinn was best known as an historian, with A People's History of the United States (now in at least its third edition) serving as an initial corrective to the conventional historical record for many. He was also very much directly involved in the tumult of the late 1960's. A diplomatic trip to North Vietnam with radical Catholic priest Dan Berrigan (there I go flouting the conventional wisdom again) resulted in the release of three American POW's in the midst of the Tet Offensive. And Daniel Ellsberg entrusted a copy of the secretly-copied Pentagon Papers (which showed a pattern of official deception on Vietnam policy stretching back to Truman) with Zinn, who (along with friend and colleague Noam Chomsky) edited and annotated it before its release to the New York Times in 1971. Alaska Senator Mike Gravel (a darkhorse candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008, despite a public record whose heroism dwarfed the others) then read it into the Congressional record in dramatic fashion, confirming for many the moral and constitutional disaster the war had become.
Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to see Howard Zinn live, though I came close. He spoke at Portland (Ore.) State University when we were living there, and my wife Sheila and I planned for attending. For some reason, we got a late start, and got there pretty close to the time it was scheduled to start. I didn't expect to have great seats, but expected the auditorium to accomodate what would certainly be a large crowd.
You have to remember that this was Portland, Oregon, where radical politics is both a way of life and a passionate spectator sport, and Zinn is right up there with with Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Ralph Nader, Gore Vidal, Cornel West, Slavoj Zizek and a handful of others in the stratosphere of living icons. However, Zinn's appearance was sponsored by the student history association, who apparently saw him in rather narrow academic terms, as a distinguished scholar of particular insight. So the hall they had reserved for the lecture was abysmally small, as they had drastically underestimated Zinn's appeal to the general public. So the doors were closed by the time we arrived (how many times has the fetus of the revolution been aborted in its conference room womb by that insidious, draconian representative of soul-destroying bureaucracy, the fire marshal?), with other stragglers engaged in passionate arguments with bewildered security personnel. It was just such a perfect microcosm of the age-old opportunity for deep democratic dialogue being stifled by ignorance and blind adherence to rules.
I don't remember what Sheila and I did instead, but that was pre-parenthood (not to mention pre-Netflix, Facebook, and blogspot), so we probably went out, spent our overflowing disposal income on a nice meal and drinks, and went home and made passionate love until dawn. Those were the days, weren't they?
If I can leave a discussion of Salinger for later, I would like to concentrate on Zinn, the iconoclastic historian activist. Like Catch-22 author Joseph Heller and 1972 Democractic peace candidate for President George McGovern, he served on bombers during World War II (if Tom Brokaw wants to make his case just from these three, maybe we can talk greatest generation). Returning to his native Brooklyn, he worked in the shipyard before taking advantage of the G.I. Bill and starting college at 27 (I can't help contrasting Zinn's bio with the Keystone Conservatives facing federal charges after being accused of trying to tamper with Senator Mary Landrieu's phone system here in New Orleans. Probably seemed like a good idea at the frat house kegger.).
After earning his Ph.d. with a dissertation analyzing the congressional career of left-leaning Republican (no, it's not a misprint, my apologies for any computers whose hard drive is fried trying to process such a concept [but it's good practice for next week, when all those computers are going to have to process the Saints' victory in the Super Bowl. Who Dat!]) Fiorello LaGuardia, he settled into a teaching position at Spellman College, the historically Black women's institution in Atlanta, where his students included Alice Walker. He was fired from that position for his strong support of students' participation in the civil rights movement, and continued his academic career at Boston University.
Although Zinn was best known as an historian, with A People's History of the United States (now in at least its third edition) serving as an initial corrective to the conventional historical record for many. He was also very much directly involved in the tumult of the late 1960's. A diplomatic trip to North Vietnam with radical Catholic priest Dan Berrigan (there I go flouting the conventional wisdom again) resulted in the release of three American POW's in the midst of the Tet Offensive. And Daniel Ellsberg entrusted a copy of the secretly-copied Pentagon Papers (which showed a pattern of official deception on Vietnam policy stretching back to Truman) with Zinn, who (along with friend and colleague Noam Chomsky) edited and annotated it before its release to the New York Times in 1971. Alaska Senator Mike Gravel (a darkhorse candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008, despite a public record whose heroism dwarfed the others) then read it into the Congressional record in dramatic fashion, confirming for many the moral and constitutional disaster the war had become.
Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to see Howard Zinn live, though I came close. He spoke at Portland (Ore.) State University when we were living there, and my wife Sheila and I planned for attending. For some reason, we got a late start, and got there pretty close to the time it was scheduled to start. I didn't expect to have great seats, but expected the auditorium to accomodate what would certainly be a large crowd.
You have to remember that this was Portland, Oregon, where radical politics is both a way of life and a passionate spectator sport, and Zinn is right up there with with Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Ralph Nader, Gore Vidal, Cornel West, Slavoj Zizek and a handful of others in the stratosphere of living icons. However, Zinn's appearance was sponsored by the student history association, who apparently saw him in rather narrow academic terms, as a distinguished scholar of particular insight. So the hall they had reserved for the lecture was abysmally small, as they had drastically underestimated Zinn's appeal to the general public. So the doors were closed by the time we arrived (how many times has the fetus of the revolution been aborted in its conference room womb by that insidious, draconian representative of soul-destroying bureaucracy, the fire marshal?), with other stragglers engaged in passionate arguments with bewildered security personnel. It was just such a perfect microcosm of the age-old opportunity for deep democratic dialogue being stifled by ignorance and blind adherence to rules.
I don't remember what Sheila and I did instead, but that was pre-parenthood (not to mention pre-Netflix, Facebook, and blogspot), so we probably went out, spent our overflowing disposal income on a nice meal and drinks, and went home and made passionate love until dawn. Those were the days, weren't they?
Thursday, January 21, 2010
2009 Wrapup (About Time, Huh?)
Like just about all of you out there, I'm sure, I have been very preoccupied with the situation in Haiti, particularly given the shameful role the United States government and military has played over the years in that country. I was even motivated by the ignorant musings of New York Times columnist David Brooks to write a letter to the editor of the Times-Picayune. They are considering it for publication, but, to be fair, many of my points were made more effectively by Tracy Kidder, author of Mountains Beyond Mountains, in a column published just yesterday. So I'll give it a couple of more days, and probably publish my letter here, with some additional clarification.
But while I've got you all here (both of you here? Anyone? Hello?), I would like to present, in all its glory, the final, expanded 2009 Greater New Orleans Market Bestseller List, followed by some intriguing statistical analysis. Those of you who have been following this blog regularly know that Kurt Vonnegut had a commanding lead for much of the year, only to have Walker Percy catch him late in the year. Well, the irrepressible Indianapolite (Indianapolian?) finally did prevail. The final tally:
1. Kurt Vonnegut
2. Walker Percy
3. Ray Bradbury
4. Aldous Huxley
5. Albert Camus
6. Robert Heinlein
7. (tie) Hermann Hesse
7. (tie) George Orwell
7. (tie) Ayn Rand
10. (tie) James Lee Burke
10. (tie) James Joyce
10. (tie) Henry Miller
10. (tie) J.D. Salinger
10. (tie) Star Trek
15. Edgar Rice Burroughs
16. (tie) Joseph Campell
16. (tie) William Faulkner
16. (tie) Ken Kesey
19. (tie) George Carlin
19. (tie) Philip K. Dick
19. (tie) Henry David Thoreau
19. (tie) John Kennedy Toole
19. (tie) Tennessee Williams
24. (tie) Edward Abbey
24. (tie) Joan Didion
24. (tie) Bob Dylan
24. (tie) Ernest Gaines
24. (tie) Jack Kerouac
24. (tie) Sylvia Plath
24. (tie) Eric Schlosser
24. (tie) John Steinbeck
24. (tie) Alan Watts
It's important to remember that this is the best, most precise instrument we have in these uncertain times for determining the most popular writers among the greater New Orleans reading public. Now let's crunch some numbers:
Percentage of primarily fiction writers: 72%
Percentage of non-American natives: 22%
Percentage of British writers: 9%
Percentage of non-British Europeans: 9%
Percentage of non-Americans/Europeans: 3%
Percentage of Louisiana writers: 16%
Percentage of Southern writers: 19%
Percentage of women writers: 9%
Percentage of African-American writers: 3%
Just a little food for thought. And remember, if you want your voice heard in 2010, you've got to come out to the open-air markets that contribute so much to our city's vibrant, independent commerce: the Freret Market (first Saturday of each month), Broad Flea (second Saturday), and Elysian Fleas (third Saturday). Ayn Rand and Walter Moseley are the early leaders. Feel the excitement. Be the excitement.
For those of you who prefer online commerce, many new volumes have been added to the inventory of Deep South Samizdat Books (amazon.com/shops/deepsouthsamizdatbooks). You can find titles by Albert Camus, Charles Darwin, Octavio Paz, Bill Moyers and Ira Levin, as well as biography of hard-boiled pulp master Jim Thompson. Of course, you can always reach me at mpbookfreak@hotmail.com if you want to bypass the behemoth. Until next time.
But while I've got you all here (both of you here? Anyone? Hello?), I would like to present, in all its glory, the final, expanded 2009 Greater New Orleans Market Bestseller List, followed by some intriguing statistical analysis. Those of you who have been following this blog regularly know that Kurt Vonnegut had a commanding lead for much of the year, only to have Walker Percy catch him late in the year. Well, the irrepressible Indianapolite (Indianapolian?) finally did prevail. The final tally:
1. Kurt Vonnegut
2. Walker Percy
3. Ray Bradbury
4. Aldous Huxley
5. Albert Camus
6. Robert Heinlein
7. (tie) Hermann Hesse
7. (tie) George Orwell
7. (tie) Ayn Rand
10. (tie) James Lee Burke
10. (tie) James Joyce
10. (tie) Henry Miller
10. (tie) J.D. Salinger
10. (tie) Star Trek
15. Edgar Rice Burroughs
16. (tie) Joseph Campell
16. (tie) William Faulkner
16. (tie) Ken Kesey
19. (tie) George Carlin
19. (tie) Philip K. Dick
19. (tie) Henry David Thoreau
19. (tie) John Kennedy Toole
19. (tie) Tennessee Williams
24. (tie) Edward Abbey
24. (tie) Joan Didion
24. (tie) Bob Dylan
24. (tie) Ernest Gaines
24. (tie) Jack Kerouac
24. (tie) Sylvia Plath
24. (tie) Eric Schlosser
24. (tie) John Steinbeck
24. (tie) Alan Watts
It's important to remember that this is the best, most precise instrument we have in these uncertain times for determining the most popular writers among the greater New Orleans reading public. Now let's crunch some numbers:
Percentage of primarily fiction writers: 72%
Percentage of non-American natives: 22%
Percentage of British writers: 9%
Percentage of non-British Europeans: 9%
Percentage of non-Americans/Europeans: 3%
Percentage of Louisiana writers: 16%
Percentage of Southern writers: 19%
Percentage of women writers: 9%
Percentage of African-American writers: 3%
Just a little food for thought. And remember, if you want your voice heard in 2010, you've got to come out to the open-air markets that contribute so much to our city's vibrant, independent commerce: the Freret Market (first Saturday of each month), Broad Flea (second Saturday), and Elysian Fleas (third Saturday). Ayn Rand and Walter Moseley are the early leaders. Feel the excitement. Be the excitement.
For those of you who prefer online commerce, many new volumes have been added to the inventory of Deep South Samizdat Books (amazon.com/shops/deepsouthsamizdatbooks). You can find titles by Albert Camus, Charles Darwin, Octavio Paz, Bill Moyers and Ira Levin, as well as biography of hard-boiled pulp master Jim Thompson. Of course, you can always reach me at mpbookfreak@hotmail.com if you want to bypass the behemoth. Until next time.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Bio of a Player
Robert Altman: The Oral Biography
by Mitchell Zuckoff
Alfred A. Knopf, 2009
As any discerning film buff knows, the 1970s were a Golden Age for American cinema, with classic works spilling out from auteurs like Scorcese (Mean Streets, Taxi Driver), Coppola (Godfather and Godfather II, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now), Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Being There) and Roman Polanski (Chinatown). Of course, any such list would be criminally incomplete without the inclusion of Robert Altman, whose turbulent, fiercely independent, multi-phased career included such highlights as M*A*S*H* (released in 1970), Nashville, The Player and Short Cuts, and included television (Bonanza, Combat), the pioneering cable miniseries Tanner 88, and A Prairie Home Companion, released just before his death at 81.
The maverick director is the subject of a recently-published "oral biography," a form uniquely suited to a subject who inspired such intense loyalty among colleagues. More so than maybe any modern director, Altman assembled a loose ensemble company of distinctive character actors, many of whom worked on several movies with Altman, usually performing their seminal roles with him: Rene Auberjonois, Keith Carradine, Bud Cort, Shelley Duvall, Michael Murphy, Lily Tomlin. All speak reverently of their time with Altman, whose reputation was as an enthusiastic ringmaster who encouraged improvisation and collaboration among his fellow artists, even those who other talented directors (such as Sam Peckinpaugh, in a contrast drawn by Altman protege' and television director Reza Badiyi) would bully in order to achieve their grand vision. Auberjonois, who is unfortunately probably best remembered for his role as the insufferable governor's aide in the mediocre Soap spinoff Benson (God, I know I've completely lost anyone under about 35 reading this), sums it up when talking his experience filming Brewster McCloud, a whcked-out movie starring Bud Cort as a teenage boy living clandestinely in the Houston Astrodome who has a dream of flying (and yes, it's a real movie, that's the kind of thing they did in the 70's):
It's a rare thing to get into a situation where you truly feel like a collaborator with the
director. He was so brilliant at knowing how it was all going to come together. He was so flex-
ible, and in my life the great directors I've worked with are always directors who know exact-
ly what they want but will change on a dime when they see what the actor brings to it. They
are supremely confident that they know what they want, but at the same time open to know-
ing what might be better. That's what Bob was (p. 204).
Although Altman embodied the independence that today's young directors go to the same handful of film schools and festivals to cultivate, he also got electrifying performances from many of the biggest stars of his day, some of whom appreciated his style more than others. Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland complained to the studio behind Altman's back about his lack of deference to their star power on the set of M*A*S*H*, while Warren Beatty chafed at his lack of control on McCabe and Mrs. Miller. But Robin Williams was born to play Popeye, and I think it can be argued that Tim Robbins took his craft to new levels with his collaborations with Altman.
The reader gets a detailed look at Altman's personal life, as well. Although he was married several times and a, frankly, neglectful father and stepfather many times over, there is little or no bitterness on the part of family members interviewed for the book (again, a contrast could be drawn with Sam Peckinpaugh, whose daughter I met briefly one time). His sons worked in the movie business in various capacities, including the amusing story of Michael Altman, at the age of 14, writing the lyrics of the song "Suicide is Painless," for M*A*S*H*. For those of you familiar only with the t.v. show, it may come as a surprise that there are actual lyrics. But Michael's arrangement gave him 50 percent of the royalties for the song. So the movie's a hit (probably the biggest of Altman's career), and there are those royalties. It's adapted for television, kept as the theme song, sans lyrics. The show is a hit, runs for 12 or 13 years, goes into syndication:
Anyway, after the series came out, I got another check for, like, twenty-six bucks. And
then the second check was like a hundred thirty dollars. And I'm going, "Oh, this is nice." And
And the next check was like tweny-six thousand dollars. And then it started, the whole thing
started with the royalties. I think I ended up making close to two million dollars. And Bob had
gotten paid seventy-five thousand dollars to direct the movie and no points, right? And it
made Fox Studios what it is, right? It was their biggest hit ever, you know. Then the tv show
and stuff like that. And Bob's just been livid about that for years (p. 179).
So there's the career of a maverick in a nutshell. His biggest box-office hit and first critical splash is associated in most people's minds with a t.v. series, and his then-teenage son ends up making more money off of it than he does. Read all about it, and then give Netflix the heads up, because I think a lot of us will be readjusting our queues afterwards. Let's see, I think I'll start with McCabe and Mrs. Miller, haven't seen that in years. But I've never seen Quintet, or Popeye, for that matter. And maybe I should give Images another chance. Gosford Park, oh and Kansas City was so good,.....
by Mitchell Zuckoff
Alfred A. Knopf, 2009
As any discerning film buff knows, the 1970s were a Golden Age for American cinema, with classic works spilling out from auteurs like Scorcese (Mean Streets, Taxi Driver), Coppola (Godfather and Godfather II, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now), Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Being There) and Roman Polanski (Chinatown). Of course, any such list would be criminally incomplete without the inclusion of Robert Altman, whose turbulent, fiercely independent, multi-phased career included such highlights as M*A*S*H* (released in 1970), Nashville, The Player and Short Cuts, and included television (Bonanza, Combat), the pioneering cable miniseries Tanner 88, and A Prairie Home Companion, released just before his death at 81.
The maverick director is the subject of a recently-published "oral biography," a form uniquely suited to a subject who inspired such intense loyalty among colleagues. More so than maybe any modern director, Altman assembled a loose ensemble company of distinctive character actors, many of whom worked on several movies with Altman, usually performing their seminal roles with him: Rene Auberjonois, Keith Carradine, Bud Cort, Shelley Duvall, Michael Murphy, Lily Tomlin. All speak reverently of their time with Altman, whose reputation was as an enthusiastic ringmaster who encouraged improvisation and collaboration among his fellow artists, even those who other talented directors (such as Sam Peckinpaugh, in a contrast drawn by Altman protege' and television director Reza Badiyi) would bully in order to achieve their grand vision. Auberjonois, who is unfortunately probably best remembered for his role as the insufferable governor's aide in the mediocre Soap spinoff Benson (God, I know I've completely lost anyone under about 35 reading this), sums it up when talking his experience filming Brewster McCloud, a whcked-out movie starring Bud Cort as a teenage boy living clandestinely in the Houston Astrodome who has a dream of flying (and yes, it's a real movie, that's the kind of thing they did in the 70's):
It's a rare thing to get into a situation where you truly feel like a collaborator with the
director. He was so brilliant at knowing how it was all going to come together. He was so flex-
ible, and in my life the great directors I've worked with are always directors who know exact-
ly what they want but will change on a dime when they see what the actor brings to it. They
are supremely confident that they know what they want, but at the same time open to know-
ing what might be better. That's what Bob was (p. 204).
Although Altman embodied the independence that today's young directors go to the same handful of film schools and festivals to cultivate, he also got electrifying performances from many of the biggest stars of his day, some of whom appreciated his style more than others. Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland complained to the studio behind Altman's back about his lack of deference to their star power on the set of M*A*S*H*, while Warren Beatty chafed at his lack of control on McCabe and Mrs. Miller. But Robin Williams was born to play Popeye, and I think it can be argued that Tim Robbins took his craft to new levels with his collaborations with Altman.
The reader gets a detailed look at Altman's personal life, as well. Although he was married several times and a, frankly, neglectful father and stepfather many times over, there is little or no bitterness on the part of family members interviewed for the book (again, a contrast could be drawn with Sam Peckinpaugh, whose daughter I met briefly one time). His sons worked in the movie business in various capacities, including the amusing story of Michael Altman, at the age of 14, writing the lyrics of the song "Suicide is Painless," for M*A*S*H*. For those of you familiar only with the t.v. show, it may come as a surprise that there are actual lyrics. But Michael's arrangement gave him 50 percent of the royalties for the song. So the movie's a hit (probably the biggest of Altman's career), and there are those royalties. It's adapted for television, kept as the theme song, sans lyrics. The show is a hit, runs for 12 or 13 years, goes into syndication:
Anyway, after the series came out, I got another check for, like, twenty-six bucks. And
then the second check was like a hundred thirty dollars. And I'm going, "Oh, this is nice." And
And the next check was like tweny-six thousand dollars. And then it started, the whole thing
started with the royalties. I think I ended up making close to two million dollars. And Bob had
gotten paid seventy-five thousand dollars to direct the movie and no points, right? And it
made Fox Studios what it is, right? It was their biggest hit ever, you know. Then the tv show
and stuff like that. And Bob's just been livid about that for years (p. 179).
So there's the career of a maverick in a nutshell. His biggest box-office hit and first critical splash is associated in most people's minds with a t.v. series, and his then-teenage son ends up making more money off of it than he does. Read all about it, and then give Netflix the heads up, because I think a lot of us will be readjusting our queues afterwards. Let's see, I think I'll start with McCabe and Mrs. Miller, haven't seen that in years. But I've never seen Quintet, or Popeye, for that matter. And maybe I should give Images another chance. Gosford Park, oh and Kansas City was so good,.....
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