The Writing Life

2006-10-29T20:35:00.000-08:00

Check out the new home for this blog
I've started posting at the new home for this blog, which I'm calling The Writing Life II. All posts go there starting November 1. These last few days, I'll be posting at both locations. The new interface is more user-friendly and presumably will be more stable as well. I believe all the Blogger stuff goes to the new interface eventually, so I might as well begin now. Onward.

2006-10-29T18:34:00.000-08:00

The New Interface
I've been playing with the new publishing interface in beta development since Google purchased Blogger. I like it. I think I'm switching to it soon.

2006-10-29T13:22:00.000-08:00

Growing pains
Since Google purchased Blogger, changes have been introduced and my current problem publishing may be a consequence of this. A new "beta" blog format is in the works, and I might have to switch to it. Because I added some "plus" features, this isn't automatically done -- seems like we're penalized for using the top elements of the old format! At any rate, the present situation is driving me nuts. This morning it's been taking me dozens of tries to publish.

2006-10-29T12:18:00.000-08:00

Is it fixed?
I ask the question with trepidation ... somehow, on about the 40th try, I was able to publish. A hassle if I have to do this each time.

2006-10-29T11:49:00.000-08:00

What a mess
Suddenly my posts at Blogger won't publish ... get them saved but not published to be seen. Not sure what to do and support is slow. Ah, me.

2006-10-29T10:01:00.000-08:00

Prodigy
It's mind-boggling to me that a teenager could have written the poem below. My brother, Bill Deemer, also was something of a poet-prodigy. He was a teenager when he published in the prestigious Poetry Magazine. He was a teenager when Andrew Hoyem published his first book at San Francisco's (then) Auerhahn Press. One of the poems in this first collection also blew me away. Beginning (not sure of line breaks), "secretes the edge by which is known the insides insides insides exterior and line of flesh between them both," the poem goes on to conclude about an act of sexual intercourse, "the edge is solid solid solid neuter material." Well, I surely wasn't having such insights when I was a teenager ha ha! My teenage passion was mathematics, especially number theory, and I did publish in a math journal as a teenager. Definitely not as sexy as being a poet.

2006-10-29T08:49:00.000-08:00

Published today in 1933 (Dylan Thomas was 19)
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.
And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose
My youth is bent by the same wintry fever.

The force that drives the water through the rocks
Drives my red blood; that dries the mouthing streams
Turns mine to wax.
And I am dumb to mouth unto my veins
How at the mountain spring the same mouth sucks.

The hand that whirls the water in the pool
Stirs the quicksand; that ropes the blowing wind
Hauls my shroud sail.
And I am dumb to tell the hanging man
How my clay is made the hangman's lime.

The lips of time leech to the fountain head;
Love drips and gathers, but the fallen blood
Shall calm her sores.
And I am dumb to tell a weather's wind
How time has ticked a heaven round the stars.

And I am dumb to tell the lover's tomb
How at my sheet goes the same crooked worm.

--Dylan Thomas (age 19 when this was published)

Story at Today In Literature.

2006-10-29T06:34:00.000-08:00

New cycle
Turning back the clock, as we did last night, always suggests the beginning of winter to me, even though we're not there yet. When I come out of class, it's very dark. A new cycle begins.

2006-10-29T06:24:00.000-08:00

New libretto
Dug out my notes on a new libretto last night and went over them. This will be a challenging project, to say the least, given the sprawling magnitude of the source material. This was adapted to "a dramatic review" in the 1950s but only last night have I been able to locate a copy, this is a London bookstore. I ordered it, might suggest a story strategy I've missed. I have my own take on the material, of course. The first decision, a process started last night, is which of the dozen or so major characters to use. I want to cut the number by half at least. Other important aspects of the source material I have no idea how to put on stage but I assume I'll figure it out -- or maybe adapt a technique from the stage review if they solved a problem that stumps me. The first issue for me is casting, to make this as easy to produce as possible. My strength, first, will be to construct the story and then writing the libretto itself. But there were experimental literary elements in the source that I definitely want to duplicate on stage somehow. I'm glad to be excited about this project again. It's going to take some time to do, and time isn't exactly a given with me, so it's definitely time to start this in earnest.

Onward!

2006-10-28T22:01:00.000-07:00

60s-70s music
No doubt I've already mentioned this but if you have occasion to listen to music when you're at the computer, check out Music of the Vietnam Era, long playlists of just about everything you can think of. Not sure if it's legal but there it is. Highly used by yours truly.

2006-10-28T18:34:00.000-07:00

120 days until...

2006-10-28T18:05:00.000-07:00

Beavers & nutria, or why Corvallis is having a party tonight
Walking the dog late this afternoon in one of the area's many sprawling parks, we encountered a nutria along the lake. Not that we knew what it was -- but a knowledgeable local informed us. To us it looked like a cross between a beaver and a possum.

Which seemed appropriate because I'd just watched the Beavers refuse to play possum against the USC Trojans, hanging on to win 33-31 in a huge upset (after giving up a 33-10 lead with a tad over a quarter to go). A major college football upset! In fact, the last time Oregon State defeated USC I was a graduate student in nearby Eugene. In 1967, in the infamous Mud Bowl, O.J. Simpson's Trojans lost 3-0. Dee "the Great Pumpkin" Andros was the Beaver coach. A grand victory that even rival Ducks could celebrate. As well as the victory today.

It would be fun to be in Corvallis tonight. It's a great small college town, much more so than Eugene is after all its recent growth. Corvallis today has the feel that Eugene had in the sixties. I never knew squat about Corvallis until a few years ago when their community theater did a play of mine, and I spent some time there. I'd go to Corvallis any time. I love the town.

2006-10-28T06:42:00.000-07:00

Shuffling the deck
Doing a little mental housekeeping, I realize I have over-extended myself, which is a bad habit of mine. Too many projects going on at once and in the wrong priority. Now that Sally is back in gear, it is front burner but right behind it I'm now leapfrogging the new libretto. This one will be a ton of work, and I'm not close to being ready to write since there's so much research still to do. I best get started on it if I expect to do this, and I'm thinking of it as a major work -- if I can actually pull it off. So much to figure out yet. But it's not going to figure itself out so I have to jump right in and start the dirty work.

Two impossible upsets I'd love to see in college football today: Navy over Notre Dame and Portland State over Oregon. Boy was the world series boring and a comedy of errors.

2006-10-27T20:24:00.000-07:00

Chasing the writer's tail
Seems like I spent the entire afternoon on various writerly chores, errands and grunt work. Trips to the supply store, the post office. Stuffing envelopes, licking stamps. Keeping the books for tax purposes later. Glad the weekend is ahead and expecting to get some writing done.

2006-10-27T17:28:00.000-07:00

Many birthdays ago
Of all affection known to man or beast;
of all the ways we relate each to each,
to talk, embrace and cry, and try to teach
the other who we are: the very feast
of love, without which at the very least
would life be insecure and at such risk
that death might well win out; the soft kiss
of love the mother gives her child, her breast
the suckled nourishment of all s/he knows -
this is love that cannot be more pure.
Male lovers in their quest of love bestow
romance as often illness as its cure.
Love is not the sting of Cupid's darts;
Love is the most womanly of arts.

2006-10-27T02:40:00.000-07:00

Faust
Letter from the Portland Opera:

FAUST MOVES INTO THE THEATER

In 'production' language, last night was" Faust's" 'run-through'. It's a
pivotal event in a production's journey from concept to stage. The
moment, after weeks and weeks of rehearsals, rehearsals in the morning,
rehearsals in the afternoon, and rehearsals in the evening, after all
those weeks, the moment to run it completely through without a stop. It's
the first real look at what we've got. And, if last night's run-through
was any indication, we've got something very special for you with this
"Faust".

There's a powerful raw quality about a run-through. A rehearsal hall is
not a particularly spectacular place, at least compared to an actual
performance. There's no special lighting. No full costumes. No
orchestra. No sets. Instead, a mighty pianist, a few props, set pieces
that fit in the room, a shawl to hint at the costumes. The director and
production team sit at a table, taking notes. People cluster around the
door. A few others are seated in the corner. The General Director has
squeezed in behind the production table. Perched high above it all, the
conductor.

And the cast.

When Maureen O'Flynn mounted the platform in the final scene-as Marguerite
she's bereft, broken, and about to be hung-and joined Bulent Bezduz
(Faust) and Mark Doss (Mephistopheles) in one of the most powerful trios
in all of opera, the rehearsal world stopped. Pens at the production
table froze. No one moved. People outside in the hall gathered at the
door to listen. And when the 50-strong chorus builds, their voices
gathering steadily into the most majestic of all choruses, Marguerite (and
each of every one of us) was transported instantly to heaven.

When the invisible curtain dropped, in that moment in which you'd expect
an explosion of applause, there was instead awestruck silence. And, if
you looked closely around the room, a tear or two as well. And only then,
seemingly minutes later, riotous applause for the cast and chorus from a
very special audience-their colleagues.

Slowly, the "real" world returned. Notebooks, laptops, coffee cups all
gathered up and people dispersed into the night.

We move now into the Keller Auditorium, where we'll put the remaining
pieces together, the final polish. The sets, costumes, props. Tech the
lighting. And have everything ready for you when we open the season on
November 4. But you'll have to bring the hankies.

2006-10-27T02:04:00.000-07:00

After the dance
What a delightful birthday yesterday! Better than I recall in years. I usually have pretty low-key birthdays -- and this one was as well, no big party or anything, but I had an unusual number of surprises.

The day ended with a good scene workshop in class. We workshopped about six or seven scenes, and the writers and students learned much. They could see and hear the improvements after we took out the chain saw and made the scenes more efficient and dramatic.

Then to dinner. I was able to enjoy myself without overdoing it, so I didn't feel bloated afterwards. Oysters on the half shell, baked mussels, seafood salad, spicy octopus, bbq chicken, all variety of sushi, a fantastic caesar salad, all variety of small desserts including pecan pie and green tea soft ice cream ... a birthday feast. And I learned I don't have to wait for birthdays for a free meal at Todai! They now offer free lunches to seniors every Wednesday if accompanied by a paying customer. I wonder how many seniors stand outside and try to hitchhike in with someone? Or say, I'll give you five bucks if I can be your lunch guest?

I crashed early, which is what has me up early. I'll grab a couple more zzz's, of course, before the day begins in earnest. I often sleep in two three- or four-hour shifts.

I'm very excited about writing on Sally yesterday. I think I'll start the next chapter, perhaps even finish it (they are all short), before my piano lessons today. I also have some marketing chores I want to do this afternoon. No class work to bring home with me, so my weekend is free for my own stuff.

It was great hearing Lynne sing happy birthday to me. She jazzed it up. If I were her manager, which I'm not, I'd have her sing more simply and not show off her voice so much. She belongs to the histrionics school of jazz while I belong to the simplicity school. Just like my tastes in writing -- I usually abhor overwriting (there are important exceptions for bona fide stylists, like James Agee and Faulkner). I seem to like my art stark and essential for the most part. But it's the thought that counts, and I loved hearing from her. She's coming to Mahagonny with us. (It's a good wife who lets you bring an ex-girlfriend along ha ha.)

Time for a tad of grunt work, then back to bed.

2006-10-26T16:09:00.000-07:00

More Weill/Brecht video
Compliments of the nurse.

2006-10-26T15:54:00.000-07:00

Birthday dinner
Our birthday dinner tradition is to go to Todai, a Japanese buffet that offers a freebie on your birthday. It's a huge place with huge selections, and it's hard not to pig out. Fortunately we never go there except on one of our birthdays (our regular buffet pigout place is Chinese at about 1/3 the cost).

So, a couple hours of workshopping scenes in class and I'll be ready to pig out.

2006-10-26T15:45:00.000-07:00

Office hours celebration
I wrote a new chapter on Sally in my office today! It's been a while. Maybe I can get back on track now. I know what's coming in the next chapter. One foot after the other and all that. This middle section may be the trickiest because it all takes place at a small college on Maryland's Eastern Shore in 1968 when the marriage falls apart. Pacing this right is critical. Well, I've taken the first step at last. Onward. (A new chapter is my birthday present to myself.)

2006-10-26T10:47:00.000-07:00

About dying
I believe in quality of life over quantity of life. In practical terms, if I get the big C or some other disease, I may not do treatment if I think the cure is worse than the disease, which is exactly what it was in every single case I've seen a dear friend suffer through. Moreover, I think I've lived long enough and considerably longer than I expected to or anyone would have predicted during my wild youth. I've been living what Raymond Carver called "gravy" for some time now.

I'm not suicidal but I also rather embrace the saying (from Bob Dylan?), "Life's a nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there." I think the world has gotten worse, not better, in my lifetime, and I have no particular desire to see things get worse still. So when it's time, it's time, and I feel no urgency in trying to squeeze in an extra year or two. I do have a number of projects I want to finish. I want to die with my boots on.

Now whatever happens is luck of the draw, and what frightens me most is that I've been having a string of good luck regarding health, which I hope doesn't foreshadow bad luck to come (in this zero-sum universe of ours). I'm not against taking matters into my own hands, so to speak, if context demands it. Naturally I hope it doesn't come to this.

My wife thinks all this is morbid pessimism. I don't. I regard it as existential optimism. Existential optimism, the belief that I control my own destiny as long as I'm alert to my own deterioration when it happens. I'd like to outlive my dad, who made it to 74 (the oldest in our clan). (When my mom was my age, she'd been dead for five years.)

I'm a content fellow. I love my routine, my days, my situation. I love my age. I miss a lot but I have a lot left.

I see certain literary advantages to dying, not enough to hasten the prospect but enough to think it's not totally a bad thing. Directors love dead playwrights. They get to mess with the work any way they want.

One thing though: I wish I'd find out the truth about Roswell before I go ...

2006-10-26T08:43:00.000-07:00

About aging
A key to graceful aging, I think, is being lucky with regard to health. The worst thing that's happened to my body lately is my bridge falling out, which was no biggie. Sure, I have aches and pains but they're no biggie either. Knock on my wooden head.

Another is to be happy with your generation, happy with when you were born, and I am totally ecstatic with mine! How could I not be? I was not raised on television! I was an early teenager during the birth of rock and roll! I did my military service between two wars! I can remember when "literary novel" was not a pejorative term!

In other words, I am happy being 67 and don't need to be younger. I only feel old occasionally in context. For example, Dick's #2 son called me yesterday to wish me happy birthday (he can remember because our birthdays are close ha ha). He's been struggling with booze all his life but is three months sober. I think of him as still going on 19. He is 46! When you regard "a kid" and he's 46, well, that makes you feel old.

As I was writing this, my dear friend Lynne (the singer songwriter) in L.A. called to sing me Happy Birthday. 2nd of the morning, my wife being the first. Also surprise electronic birthday cards and messages awaiting me from several people. We're off to a good start!

I was going to treat myself to a birthday breakfast but remembered our birthday dinner, so I'd better eat lightly until then ha ha.

Sketch hasn't given me his birthday licking yet. Time to take care of that.

2006-10-26T05:17:00.000-07:00

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19* 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28* 29* 30* 31* 32 33 34 35 36 37 38* 39 40 41 42 43 44* 45* 46* 47 48* 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58* 59 60 61 62 63* 64 65* 66 ...

67

19, first publication, Mathematics Magazine (a number theory problem)
28, first writing award, Haycox Short Story Prize
29, first story published, "The Scrapbook" in Northwest Review
30, first play produced, "Above the Fire," award-winner, University of Missouri
31, MFA, Playwriting, University of Oregon, Shubert Playwriting Fellow
38, first performance of "Ramblin': the songs and stories of Woody Guthrie"
44, first theatre residency, Playwright-in-residence, New Rose Theatre
45, first book published, Christmas at the Juniper Tavern
45, first TV production, Christmas at the Juniper Tavern, ACE award
46, first screenplay optioned, "Ruby's Tune" (based on my play "Waitresses")
48, first school residency, Distinguished-Writer-in-Residence, The Catlin Gabel School
58, begin teaching screenwriting at Portland State University
63, first opera libretto, "Dark Mission" (for John Nugent)
65, begin Oregon Literary Review

2006-10-25T21:38:00.000-07:00

Weill/Brecht Music Video
Check it out at Nurse Fusion.

2006-10-25T16:25:00.000-07:00

Sketch's friend getting anxious for the party

2006-10-25T10:15:00.000-07:00

Tortured artists
The list is long. One of them is Richard Brautigan, the subject of Today In Literature. On this day in 1984 his body was found, a suicide. I remember learning this in a bar and toasting him. Not ten years later a doctor would corner me and ask how much I wanted to live. A lot, it turns out. I cleaned up my act -- or at least the most bodily destructive part of it. I don't toast suicidal writers in bars any more. I do it in coffee shops.

2006-10-25T09:47:00.000-07:00

Birthday countdown...

2006-10-25T09:03:00.000-07:00

Unexpected stroke
No sooner do I mention them, then I get one. A professor at the Univ. of Mary Washington in Virginia is using my play Sad Laughter (or online here) in her course "Cold Case: Mystery and History in the Theatre". Well, it surely is a mystery whether or not Moliere married his own daughter! How nice she selected my play as one of her texts. It's also a favorite of mine, which doubles the stroke. This makes my day and will make reading midterms much less of a chore since I'll be grinning.

Thursday will be fun in class: workshopping scenes. I cast them, we give staged readings, then we constructively tear them apart and put them back together. High participation.

Good news on two consecutive days. What is the world coming to?

2006-10-25T03:46:00.000-07:00

Calling the wrong friend
On the wire:

Oregon woman given DUI while picking up friend arrested for same

The Associated Press

LINCOLN CITY, Ore. - When Amy Parks was arrested for drunken driving on Friday night, she called a friend to come pick her up at the Lincoln City Police Department.

But the friend, Louanna Foster, didn't make it there as planned.

Instead of showing up in her Ford Taurus, Foster, 43, arrived in police custody after being arrested for drunken driving about two miles from the location where Parks, 48, was arrested.

After both Lincoln City women submitted breath tests, they were released to a sober driver, police said.

2006-10-24T14:37:00.000-07:00

Park-n-ride
It's always an adventure at the Barbur Transit Center where I catch a bus to the university. I seem to get the last parking space! Maybe once a term I won't find the last parking space but usually I do. Makes the afternoon interesting.

2006-10-24T12:22:00.000-07:00

A morning surprise
A few weeks ago I rec'd an email from a high school girl, a senior. For a senior requirement, she needed a mentor in a chosen profession, and she'd chosen playwriting. I volunteered to give her feedback on her senior project.

This morning I rec'd a one-act play from her. I was blown away. Although wrongly formatted and filled with other technical errors, this girl has a real gift for writing for the stage. Fully realized characters, great dialogue, lots of contrasts and conflict in a family story ... it was better than much of the university writing I see. What a delightful surprise.

2006-10-24T07:33:00.000-07:00

The Love of Long Ago
After we finished our first opera together, Dark Mission, John Nugent and I decided to do a chamber opera, which would be easier to produce. I selected a short story by Guy de Maupassant and wrote the libretto The Love of Long Ago. This was quite a while ago.

Imagine my surprise then to read John's blog this morning and learn that the chamber opera is alive! He has been musically stuck and now is un-stuck. He has a very interesting discussion of the breakthrough.

This inspires me to return to a new libretto, another adaptation, which I've barely begun. He still has Varmints to finish, too. Maybe I'll have something for him by the time he's done.

I really enjoy working with John. I love his music. However, it's frustrating that he has to work for a living instead of composing for a living because it makes progress slow on our projects. As I have said so many times, work is the curse of the artistic class.

Teaching day. A few papers to read this morning but I should have time to do a few other things before class. Want to get back to Sally.

Great news, John, if you're reading this! Look forward to hearing it.

2006-10-23T14:20:00.000-07:00

Birthday, Xmas, etc.
I let my wife off the hook. She doesn't have to give me a birthday present this week, nor a Christmas present for that matter. Our trip to LA for the opera is so spendy, we can call it all of these things. Who needs presents when you get to see Mahagonny?

But we are doing our traditional birthday dinner after my class Thursday. We usually do this twice a year, on each of our birthdays, but H's last was her 70th so we did something bigger. At any rate, a wonderful Japanese buffet downtown offers 2-fers if one party has a birthday. I look forward to it!

One of those days when I piddle away time. I seem to be doing a lot of that lately. Am I still a writer ha ha? Well, an editor anyway, I did do some grunt editing work this morning. And I practiced the piano. Jingle Bells! Imagine playing this at my age! Our first song with two hands so it isn't all that easy. Been practicing some left hand boogie woogie riffs, too, which isn't part of the class ha ha.

2006-10-23T10:57:00.000-07:00

The Almanac Singers

Strokes
We all need strokes and probably most of us don't get as many as we need. There are two kinds of strokes: the expected and the surprise. When we do a good job and know it, we expect a certain amount of positive commentary. Sometimes, of course, we get the opposite, as in a bad theater review. We expect strokes from friends and family who support us.

But the best strokes, I think, come unexpectedly. I don't get fan mail often but when I do, I love it. Somebody reads something that really moves him and lets me know.

A while back I was at a gathering at Mt. Hood Community College and ran into one of the members of General Strike, a folk group that does union songs. I'd engaged them to perform with me a Labor Day tribute to the Wobblies at the Unitarian Church a few years back. During our conversation, I mentioned how much I liked working with them on that gig -- and she surprised me by saying that the highlight of the performance for her was my rendition of The Miner's Lifeguard. What a nice unexpected stroke!

This happens to be my favorite union song, which I learned on the classic album of union songs by The Almanac Singers. I suppose I'll remember the lyrics till the day I die. Five years ago, in LA for a friend's 70th birthday party, we picked up guitars at night and played together as we used to in the 60s. One of his showcase songs was the hymn from which the tune to the union song was taken, so after he did his lyrics, I began the union lyrics. It was a great moment, all of us singing together like in the old days. Through the 60s we got together most weekends for singing potlucks and partying.

Another stroke moment I'll never forget happened at blackout of my early play Country Northwestern. "This play has balls!" somebody spontaneously shouted. How can you not love a compliment like that?

I get fewer strokes than I used to but I don't think I need them as much. Not that they aren't nice when I get them. But my writing is really in the margins compared to where it used to be. I appreciate any kind word that drifts my way.

I also like to return the favor. I'm big on letting young talented writers know how talented they are: Julie Mae Madsen and Dan Trujillo most recently. Writers need to know folks care about what they are doing. This is what is wrong with "development" in Hollywood and in theater now: the vision of the artist plays second fiddle to other demands. I was so damn fortunate in the 1980s to be playwright-in-residence at two different companies that let me do whatever the hell I wanted to do -- and then produced it. That's what it should be about. You don't see that open-ended support of artists as much as you used to. Part of the emergence of Homo Consumerus dancing to the Corporate Music. I'm glad I'm an old fart and not a young artist starting out. I used to think the Internet would level the playing field but I see the corporations are taking it over. Homo Consumerus marches on.

Give an artist a stroke today. S/he will appreciate it.

2006-10-23T08:08:00.000-07:00

Old publishers never die
JB, publisher of the Oregon Fever anthology I edited, wants to meet about "a new project." He has a very hard sell. The former was a project close to my heart, which is the only reason I did it. Certainly not for the little money I've made from it. So I doubt if he has a project of interest to me but I'm willing to visit and listen to what he has to say.

2006-10-22T19:37:00.000-07:00

126 days until...

2006-10-22T13:07:00.000-07:00

Painters v. writers
Watching H get ready for her Nov. 3rd opening (Janovec Gallery, SE Milwaukee at Holgate), I'm reminded of how much expense and labor artists/painters have that writers don't, i.e. buying paints, brushes, canvas, wood, building frames, priming and painting same, stretching canvas, all sorts of chores that must happen before the actual "art" begins. It's as if writers had to make their own paper (in the old days) or build their own computers before they begin to write. It's easier to be a poor writer than a poor visual artist, I think. Writers have a small investment to buy necessary tools for their craft -- a tablet and pencil can do in a pinch.

If you're in Pdx, come by the gallery at 6pm on Nov. 3rd on your way to CoHo to see Trujillo's play.

2006-10-22T08:43:00.000-07:00

Future and past
If former students and young writers who've recently crossed my path provide a link to the future, weak or strong as the case may be, I also just received a link to the past: an email from Marilyn Krysl (home page). I long have considered Marilyn to be one of the better short story writers in the country, as evidenced by her collections Honey, You've Been Dealt A Winning Hand, Westmoreland and Me and How to Accommodate Men. I met Marilyn in the late 60s when we were both grad students. She went on to the University of Colorado, where she taught for years, later headed the creative writing department, and from which she recently retired. We recently reconnected and I sent her a copy of my Oregon Book Award finalist Seven Plays, which she began reading.

She had this to say about reading my plays: "it's as though you're in the room
and we've been talking for hours, and you--the youness of you--is in the air,
redolent." I like that she sees my presence in my work -- and I can guess which characters most bring me to mind ha ha! Here is a drunken playwright talking to his audience during a "talk back":

"One more thing, and I'll shut up. Sure, we want answers. But what's to be done out there? Kierkegaard said that there are two ways: to suffer; or to be a professor of the fact that someone else suffers. In my humble opinion, we've got too many fucking professors. Sorry for the f-word, lady." (from The Half-Life Conspiracy)

Or the Moliere speech quoted a few days ago. Or a country singer saying, "You don't earn a goddamn thing in the music business, Red. You either kiss ass or you don't kiss ass." Or a dying old man:

"You get to be my age, you look back for what went wrong. What happened to the traditional American values? You used to go out and work hard for what you wanted. You used to get married for life.

"Well, I fault ourselves. I fault the kind of parents we became. We tried to save our kids from going through all the hardships we went through, and that was a mistake. We had the experience of standing in soup lines during the Great Depression, of being bombed by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor — you don't forget experiences like that. They become rooted in the fabric of your being. Because those experiences are clear, they are without ambiguity.

"When a foreign country makes a surprise attack and sinks your navy, you don't get lost in rhetoric about whether war is right or wrong — you roll up your sleeves and get to work. You do what has to be done to defend your country. Everybody pitches in and works together as one big American family.

"Maybe you have to suffer to learn these things, and when parents of my generation started protecting their children from going through the hard times that we went through, we ended up doing them a disservice. We spoiled them, is what it amounts to. We gave them the idea you could get what you wanted without working for it, that the world was some kind of play thing for their personal and selfish amusement. Our children never learned how to pitch in and work together, all they looked out for is number one.

"When's the last time you heard of a marriage staying together for the sake of the children? Something like that is unthinkable today. Community and family values have gone down the drain." (from Famililly)

Or the closing chorus to my libretto based on Varmints:

We only went
Where greed will go
We only sought
What greed will seek
Since greed is good
We’ve done no wrong

We are the dead
Who did no wrong
We are the dead
Who did no wrong.

If you write inside-out, the writing that matters most in my book, your voice and values come out of the mouths and hearts of some of your characters. And if someone knows you well, she can read your words and feel your presence in the room.

The greater challenge, of course, is to bring to life the characters with whom you disagree. I might disagree with some of the thoughts above, for example. I'll never tell which.

2006-10-22T07:42:00.000-07:00

Former students in Hollywood
I also heard from two former students this week, both of whom bit the bullet and went to Hollywood to try and crack the film industry, in part taking my advice to go where the action is.

B. is probably the most persistent student I've ever had. Everything is against her. She's a woman in her 50s. She has no money; indeed, as my student she was homeless, living in her car. She wants to write sitcoms, an inbred profession.

So she went to Hollywood, where I presume she still was living in her car. She's been there 18 months now, a huge accomplishment! Moreover, she's made some progress: she sent me an email from the Austin Film Festival, where she was representing a prodco. She's been an extra in movies, got some gofer jobs, gotten her spec script read -- and one producer has taken her under his arm, "a sweetheart" she calls him. She's hanging in like Gunga Din (as Jerry Lee Lewis liked to say). An amazing story, really.

The other student, N., was about to enter grad school. He came by for advice. Should he go to Hollywood instead? I told him I thought it was easier to go to Hollywood now and grad school later than the other way around. So he went. He had the script to a snowboarding movie that he'd written in my class.

The other day he sent me this link at YouTube. The trailer to his movie! No details, just the teaser. Is it thus in production or was this shot as part of a dog-and-pony show? But there it is, his story in a thirty-second teaser. Far out.

2006-10-22T03:51:00.000-07:00

Trujillo II
A fitful night, thinking of Trujillo's play. Not the worst way to leave the theater.

T. tells his story in three acts. In the first (set in Tigard, 1991), six kids are exploring an attic in which they have no business being. The kids are played by adult actors, and this device is what immediately engages our attention, the theatricality of it. A power structure among the kids emerges, at the bottom a retarded girl and her caretaker brother. There's much fun and cleverness in the scene -- until the kids discover a pistol, which may be loaded. Instantly the mood becomes one of menace. Menace increases with the caretaker's turn with the gun because he uses it as a kind of revenge for earlier humiliation, the first to point it at another, the first to make threats. But as kids do, their attention finally drifts elsewhere. They abandon the attic, leaving behind the retarded girl, who starts screaming. Blackout.

In act two, we visit the parents of these children on the deck of the same house in simultaneous action. It's a winning conceit, and the actors superbly transform themselves into new bodies and attitudes. Here there are two central issues: an argument between sisters over a family organ, and a mother's fear that her child is not normal because she wants to be a scientist rather than play with dolls. If the theme of act one is Menace, here it is Adult Agenda, each of the adults with a selfish focus that has more to do with their own needs than the needs of their child or children. The mother of the caretaker and retarded girl drinks too much and is interested only in retaining a new boyfriend. Her sister wants the organ, ready for a garage sale, in order for her daughter to study music and "further her career" -- and she doesn't want to have to pay for it. These are the parents who scream at umpires at little league games, using their kids to fulfill their own dreams and values. Suddenly, up in the attic, a gunshot. Blackout.

And intermission. When we return, it's five years later. We move from Menace and Agenda to Tension. The caretaker boy, now a teenager, is returning home from five years in a facility for shooting his sister. But was his failure literally shooting her or leaving her alone so she could find the gun and shoot herself? It's not precisely clear (though he does say he shot her). Or is the fault his mother's boyfriend (now husband?), whose unloaded gun it was and in an open box to boot? The primary tension here is between mother and son -- can she forgive him? While the first two acts have many moments of humor, albeit dark, here the drama is taut and serious throughout as a family struggles to reinvent itself after tragedy. There is no resolution. The closing image is of the teenager's pain and guilt. A powerful curtain.

Is this play finished and complete? I ask the question because often my own plays were not at their premieres. In an extreme case, I rewrote each week of the opening run, resulting in six different plays in six weeks. In two other cases, I made major revisions during revivals. Sometimes I think plays are not finished but abandoned.

As much as I like T.'s play, I have one concern about it: in the last act, only four of the actors appear. What would happen if the entire story were told with these four actors? We would lose the thread of the mother's concern that her daughter won't play with dolls. We lose the kid in the attic who wants to study whales when she grows up. Does the play sink with these losses? Perhaps not. Perhaps, too, it opens up space to explore the one area about which I want to know more: the relationship of the adult sisters. A great strength of this text is that it's driven by subtext rather than explanation. Yet, issues around the family organ are suggested that might be explored. The third act of this play is so strong, so tense, so engaging, that tighter, smaller acts before it might benefit the whole. Indeed, why not structure the story as a two-act play with two scenes in a tightened first act? Perhaps this has nothing to do with T.'s sense of where he is going with this play. It's easy to change a play into the one you want to see. But I'm not sure the two characters missing from act three contribute urgent action to the central thread of the story here. So if T. does continue to develop this material, I'd suggest considering a two-act, four-character play.

Of course, what will probably happen is that this will go on to win awards just as it is!

If you are in the Portland area, do me a favor. Go to the CoHo Productions website and buy tickets to this play. It runs until November 18. Companies like this, plays like this, deserve your support and bring more vibrant health to a theater community than an expensive rerun of West Side Story or some such.

In the next issue of Oregon Literary Review I'm publishing two full-length plays by Charles F. (OyamO) Gordon, a NY-based playwright who has premiered over two dozen plays there, who is presently playwright-in-residence at the University of Michigan. Included is an interview, in which OyamO has much to say about the contemporary theater scene. I asked him to speak to how theater has changed during his career.

In terms of developmental processes the theatre has changed drastically in a deleterious sense. A former student of mine, for example, emailed me to announce that she was at last getting a play produced after countless readings, rewritings, developmental workshops, etc. The problem is that everyone wants to help you write the play through a coercive process: "If we like how the play is progressing in accordance with our enforced dramaturgical concerns, we might consider producing it." Their concerns often have nothing to do with the writer's vision, but rather are more concerned with the perceived needs or prejudices of the patrons of that particular theatre or of their literary staff.

I remember participating in a reading in Madison, Wisconsin, in which Gretchen Cryer also participated. Gretchen is a talented, proven theatre creator, highly respected. She and I exchanged a few thoughts about the interminable development process to which theatres subject us. She complained about the never ending rewrites that are done to satisfy one theatre after another who each want to replace your vision with their concerns. They always have "problems" with what you've labored over. They "don't buy" some technique or character motivation or dramatic action, etc.
...
Playwrights need to rebel, create their own spaces and challenge the American theatre. At one time the Off-Broadway and regional movements represented rebellion and then eventually they conformed to traditional mainstream expectations to assure their financial survival. Off-Off-Broadway is promising enough for now and NYC's downtown theatre movement offers some fearless fare, but the overwhelming feelings among the creative artists of the theatre are frustration, disgust, rage, despair and perplexity. The theatre is now a corporate entity that produces and promotes palatable consumer products of a 1984ish nature, stuff that "big brother" will approve of or, at least, not feel threatened by.

Playwrights need to develop ways to circumvent the restrictions of the culture police.

CoHo is not producing safe, "corporate" theater. Trujillo's new play can keep you awake at night. What in hell else does a community want from its theater artists? Support these people!

2006-10-21T22:54:00.000-07:00

Dan Trujillo
If you see this playwright's name under the title of a play, get a ticket and go see it. I'm just back from the premiere of his Jingle Spree, a three-act play in which adult actors play young kids and their parents (and, in one case, also a teenager), in a journey through the shadows of childhood and parenting. Trujillo has written this about the play: "My play is the etching of the physical and psychic disturbances of childhood, as experienced by adults. The kids are played by adults, in part, based on that concept." I want to say more about it but not now -- I want to think about what I saw. It's that kind of play, which is a compliment. It's also a compliment to say this play would lose its essence if turned into a film. Theatricality is at its very core. This was a powerful night of theater.

It also was a night that showed Portland at its best and worst. Best because here was a strong play by a playwright born and raised here (but now, wisely, living in New York), given a strong production by local actors and technicians, at a theater dedicated to new work. The play received and deserved a strong review. And yet the house was small. Portland can get so smug and self-congratulatory about its artistic life, but here it fails to give strong support to work that greatly deserves it. Why? Because audiences here are still sheep. And the right dogs haven't shooed them toward this production.

I'll have more to say about the play tomorrow. If you're in Portland, or near, go see this play.

Dan Trujillo's website.

2006-10-21T14:13:00.000-07:00

Marketing tools
Just as the Hollywood Creative Directory is the bible of marketing for the screenwriter, for the playwright it's Dramatists Sourcebook, the new edition of which is just out. Although "retired" as a playwright, I swear, I may send out a few query letters regarding several plays I have high regard for, see if I can drum up additional interest than they've already had. Only costs a postage stamp. Well, two (SASE).

2006-10-21T13:00:00.000-07:00

Books & plays
This morning I wrote and sent off my latest book review to Creative Screenwriting magazine. This is my last outside-in writing gig, I suppose, which I maintain because it's a convenient way to keep up with the screenwriting books getting published, an obvious advantage for a teacher.

Tonight we go to a play as guests of the playwright. The play sounds good and I'm looking forward to it.

UCLA is holding its own against Notre Dame so far. Go, Bruins!

2006-10-21T10:05:00.000-07:00

Breakfast and...
Of the zillions of things I miss since Dick and Ger passed away, high on the list is losing an early morning breakfast companion. Either of these guys was ready at the drop of a hat to go out for breakfast at six or seven, eight at the latest, in the morning. By the time everybody else I know is ready for breakfast, it's after ten -- which is to say, almost lunch time. Consequently I go out alone these days -- or with my wife, which usually means having breakfast for an early lunch.

Having breakfast at Nobby's this morning, where at least I had the company of M., the waitress who's been serving me there for 20-odd years, I reflected on what seems to be a changing rhythm in my life. This is no small thing to notice. I've been more or less at the same rhythm for half a century, a rhythm that puts writing, the writing I deem personally important, at the center of everything in an admittedly obsessive way. Interestingly enough, I was most miserable when most successfully making my living writing because the writing I was doing was outside-in, not inside-out. Any fool who can write a sentence can write outside-in. Few successfully write inside-out because to start inside means embracing the struggle to turn personal demons into art, or as close to art as you can get. Much more than language skills are involved.

This summer was the first time I noticed myself working less obsessively. Some of this is aging -- I simply don't have the physical stamina to write as I used to when younger, to put in as many hours. But some of it might be something else, which frightens me. I may be flirting with resignation. (I recall my brother saying he hadn't retired from being a poet, he's resigned). Giving up the quest to be as good as I can be at my art. What would I do if I stopped writing? The first things that occur to me aren't pleasant.

But then ... maybe I'd practice the piano more. Maybe I'd focus on editing the review. Maybe I'd focus on a new kind of writing (for me) that was less demanding, shorter things requiring less time commitment, less ambitious things (poetry comes to mind -- the focused moment rather than the expansive narrative of a long series of moments.)

But something seems to be changing in body and mind.

2006-10-21T07:16:00.000-07:00

Anybody need any money?
I play the lottery now and again but the most I've ever won is $25. Imagine my shock, surprise and delight then when I looked at my email this morning and discovered I had won three lotteries on the same day! To wit:

You have been approve f or the star prize of US $787:000:00
ONLINE WEB LOTTERY WINNINGS OF $880,000.00
You have therefore
been approved to legally claim a total sum of $6,000,000 (Six Million United
States Dollars)

That adds up to $7,667,000! Now what in the world am I going to do with so much money?

2006-10-21T06:55:00.000-07:00

Wichita sit-in
A number of years ago, it must have been the late 1980s, a theater in Greensboro, N.C., did my play Christmas at the Juniper Tavern and had enough money to fly me out for the opening. They scheduled some visits at local colleges, and I was able to stay a few days. So they asked if there were any sights I wanted to see.

I did some research and decided there were three things I wanted to see in Greensboro, in order:

the basketball court where the NCAA "March Madness" often took place (this was easy since the theater was in the same huge complex)
the memorial to O. Henry
the memorial where the first sit-in took place

I got to see all three. However, I learned on NPR this morning that the first sit-in actually did not occur in Greensboro but two years earlier in Wichita, Kansas. For a variety of reasons, Greensboro became more famous but now belatedly the true first sit-in is getting its due.

The Greensboro production, by the way, was memorable for a startling reason: the actor playing the Swami was dying of cancer. He had an understudy. Whether the actor or understudy played a scene was determined by the actor, who would evaluate his strength, and this was done scene-by-scene each night. So both actors usually appeared in the role during any given production. The actor died just before the run ended, and the understudy finished up alone. What makes this especially mind-boggling is that the swami has many speeches about the "illusion" of death, the eastern v. the western view. What an experience for everyone involved.

2006-10-20T19:48:00.000-07:00

And writers get big bucks for this...
On the wire:

By Gene Johnson

The Associated Press

SEATTLE — When Washington state announced its new tourism slogan — "SayWA" — last spring, Pike Place Market vendor Kenny Telesco was willing to give it a chance.

He practiced saying it with "jazz hands" and asked tourists to "SayWA" as they posed for photos. But he's not sure he can stomach Seattle's new tourism slogan, unveiled today in 18-foot-tall letters atop the Space Needle: "metronatural."

"How do you use that in a sentence?" Telesco asked. "'Welcome to Metronatural.' ... It's an airport where you can buy organic bananas."

Others suggested "metronatural" evoked an urban nudist camp, and started speculating about whether it would last longer than the widely panned "SayWA," which the state dropped recently because it failed to catch on.

Homo Consumerus marches on!

2006-10-20T19:16:00.000-07:00

Barbara Dane
I used to see Barbara Dane at the Ash Grove in LA. She had burst onto the scene in the 50s, impressing jazz critic Leonard Feather so much he wrote about her in Playboy:

"Bessie Smith in Stereo" said jazz critic Leonard Feather in Playboy when Barbara Dane burst onto the scene in the late '50s. Time said of her: "The voice is pure, rich...rare as a 20 karat diamond." To Ebony, she seemed "startlingly blonde, especially when that powerful dusky alto voice begins to moan of trouble, two-timing men and freedom...with stubborn determination, enthusiasm and a basic love for the underdog (she is) making a name for herself...aided and abetted by some of the oldest names in jazz who helped give birth to the blues..." The seven-page Ebony article--their first feature story about a white woman (Nov., l959)-- was filled with photos of Dane working with Memphis Slim, Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, Clara Ward, Mama Yancey, Little Brother Montgomery and others. (Continue bio)

My favorite album had her singing with a Dixieland jazz band. "A voice like this hasn't been recorded since Bessie Smith," hyped the liner notes.

Dane's problem was that she was what was called a "commie symp" back then. Moreover, she put her beliefs into action, including participating in a communist youth movement thing in Yugoslavia. Activity like that got her virtually blacklisted. She disappeared almost as quickly as she had arrived.

Consequently I always am running into people who have never heard of Barbara Dane. They may love people she sang with, like Jesse Fuller or Memphis Slim or Lightnin' Hopkins -- but they never heard of Barbara Dane.

Today she has her own website and is singing hither and yon again. I'd like to see her make it to Portland or Eugene.

2006-10-20T15:41:00.000-07:00

Autumn at home
Good piano class. Afterwards, off to get flu shots. Then a nap. I'm still exhausted from yesterday.

Catch up time again on the review this weekend, plus get some writing and reading done.

One of my screenwriting students will miss next week. Going with parents on an 11 days cruise to Mexico. Poor baby.

Oh yes ... interesting note in paper about the Oregon Book Awards. The three creative nonfiction favorites, based on sales and reviews, including new books by Craig Lesley and Ivan Doig, were shut out by judge Jonathan Yardley of the Washington Post. All the local critics are shocked. My earlier point -- these affairs are about judges more than writers -- made well here.

2006-10-20T10:21:00.000-07:00

Dorothy Parker
Ah, Parker! From her review of a book called Happiness: [the book is] "second only to a rubber duck as the ideal bathtub companion. It may be held in the hand without causing muscular fatigue or nerve strain, it may be neatly balanced back of the faucets, and it may be read through before the water has cooled. And if it slips down the drain pipe, all right, it slips down the drain pipe."

My dramatic celebration of Dorothy Parker.

2006-10-20T08:42:00.000-07:00

Today's
haiku from Haiku Nurse

2006-10-20T08:18:00.000-07:00

TGIF
First decision of the day: to make breakfast or go out. See if H has time before she leaves, if so, I'll make it here for us. After that, practice the piano. Then read until lessons. Friday is recovery day after a long session like yesterday. I'm getting too old for this.

2006-10-19T21:02:00.000-07:00

Home sweet home
Nothing like coming home after a long exhaustive day to find comfort food waiting for you. Chicken, mashed potatoes, peas. Then Sketch jumps on your lap with his new bone to join you for dinner. Life can be sweet.

Piano lessons tomorrow! Progress, slowly but surely.

2006-10-19T14:32:00.000-07:00

Sally, part two
A steady stream of students ... during small breaks I've been brainstorming part two of the novel with myself, scribbling notes about what needs to happen and in what order, to end up where I want to be at the end of this section. Many of the events are autobiographical but the order has become very different for the sake of the drama. An interesting process to observe while you're doing it.

2006-10-19T10:25:00.000-07:00

One's best work
Asked what his favorite among his plays was, Edward Albee replied, "The one I'm working on. Why would I write otherwise?"

He makes a good point. Writers strive for some kind of perfection, and they always fail. But they begin again, thinking this time they'll get it right. They don't. They write again.

Perhaps a more interesting question is, Other than what you're working on now, what is your favorite work? It may not be the last thing the writer wrote. For example, at my digital archive I list Author's Picks, which is the work I'm most proud of. Some of it was written quite a few years ago; some recently.

The terrifying moment for a writer, I think, is if s/he realizes all the best work has been done. I continue to think my best work is ahead of me but for the first time in my life I feel a certain insecurity about this, a crisis of faith, if you will. Maybe I'm close to being done. Maybe it's going to be over sooner than I think.

Not a pleasant contemplation.

2006-10-19T09:01:00.000-07:00

A voice of one's own
When is it time for a young writer to divorce his or her mentor, which is to say, to stop listening to advice and trust one's own literary instincts? Some make the break too soon because of arrogance and fragile egos; others too late because of insecurity. A mentor can be like a security blanket. But a mentor also can become an obstacle to finding one's own voice and way of doing things.

Good mentors encourage the divorce -- we've been there.

I came to writing relatively late in life and entered grad school late as well. I was 27 when I first entered grad school as a PhD candidate. 29 when I returned as an MFA candidate. In each instance, I had published before I arrived. Indeed, the first thing the head of the English Dept. ever said to me, at a gathering to welcome new PhD candidates, was "So nice to see your piece in The New Republic this week, Mr. Deemer!" Well, with a start like that, no place to go but down, right? I added considerable melodrama to the initial descent. Then recovered and returned -- and by then, two years later, I was publishing stories in literary magazines, including a Roll of Honor selection in Best American Short Stories. So in grad school, my teachers treated me like a colleague rather than a student. I was publishing more often than some of my teachers were.

My mentor came earlier, Bob Trevor, my first lit teacher after the Army, the one who encouraged me to write. He became a lifelong friend.

When I began teaching writing workshops, I was shocked to learn that there are workshop groupies. One elderly lady followed me around the northwest, taking my workshop over and over. She needed to quit taking workshops and start writing.

I think mentors can give confidence to young writers, give writerly advice about marketing, business and career matters, point out craft strengths and weaknesses in the work -- but not much else. I think mentors also should encourage independence. Writing is a solitary profession. While it can be gratifying to be a mentor, and flattering as well, one can't let himself become a crutch for the young talent. Talent must be let go to find its own way. You still provide a cheering section but you also must turn the talent loose. Off you go, good luck! I think you can do it!

I think most young writers realize all this. You stay with a mentor for as long as it's helpful and no longer. You bite the bullet. You become your own best/worst critic. You begin the writing life.

2006-10-19T07:39:00.000-07:00

Conferences
To the office dark and early on a rainy windy morning, joining the hordes of commuters. How nice to miss them most of the time! I've managed to escape through almost all my life the great American institution of commuting to work, this by having mostly my own hours, working at home on "projects" rather than jobs, or by going to work (usually teaching) at odd hours. I haven't done the commuting life routine.

Only a scattering of students before noon, then it's nonestop. Brought work to do during the breaks.

Heard from OyamO -- he's delighted to be in the review, which is great to hear. With two full-length plays no less. I'm excited about it. He's working on the interview questions I posed. I also found audio from him, some remarks he made to a writing class about the artist in academia. Another fine issue in the works.

2006-10-18T18:14:00.000-07:00

Great news!
Julie Mae Madsen, the young writer whose work I admire, just got accepted into the MFA program at Pacific University, beginning in January, 2007. Now that's a step in the right direction. (Coincidentally, a former screenwriting student also begins her MFA program at Pacific in the new year. Two to root for!)

2006-10-18T17:51:00.000-07:00

Work is the curse of the writing class
High on my long list of blessings (#1 being that I'm still alive, a bet no sane man would have taken twenty-odd years ago) is the fact that I haven't had to work 9-5 for the man in a couple decades now. As a bachelor I survived on various combinations of income from writing, teaching, grants, and an occasion part-time job. My last "full time" regular job was Managing Editor of Oregon Business Magazine. I got to write all day. Whoopee. Trouble was, I didn't do my writing (plays) when I got home at night. When I received a fat literary award, enough to survive for a few months on, I gave notice immediately, having faith I'd figure out something before the award money ran out. I did. I haven't had a 9-5er since.

I've also had some close calls! One of the closest was about ten years ago. I was teaching a couple Comp classes and hating it. Then I rec'd an offer I couldn't turn down, to start a screenwriting program at Portland State University. What a blessing! It's been a dream job, and I assume it will be my last "job." What would I be doing if I hadn't gotten the offer? No idea. Dead, maybe. Homeless. Who the hell knows? I don't think I'd be selling cars.

The toughest existence I had was about eight years surviving as a freelance journalist. Man, talk about hard work! It wasn't the writing but the marketing, keeping the gigs lined up so the paychecks would keep on coming. It could give you ulcers. The greatest existence was a period in the 1980s when I was on a real roll getting grants. I existed on grants alone for five or six years. The life was fantastic.

Presently life is good, too, from the employment angle. We're a two-income (mostly retired) family, which helps greatly. The trouble with my life now is that I outlived the males who matter most to me. Every single one of them. It's amazing. Twenty-odd years ago, a betting man would have said I would be the first to go. But then I was the first to get cornered by a doctor ha ha. I listened to the advice. And here we are.

Young writers need to figure out how to survive and write at the same time. It's not an easy thing to do.

2006-10-18T15:25:00.000-07:00

OyamO
Yes, I'm publishing two full-length plays in the winter/spring issue, both highly theatrical political theater pieces, not the kind of play for your local community stage ha ha. I'm delighted to be publishing them. This, in fact, is what makes being the editor of the review so gratifying. The two great joys here: discovering new talent (Julie Mae Madsen, for example) and being able to publish established writers you admire (OyamO). The new issue is shaping up to be another fine one. OLR is one of the better projects I've created.

2006-10-18T14:29:00.000-07:00

Bewilderment
The Pledge, the fine film directed by Sean Penn and starring Jack Nicholson, based on a novel by Durrenmatt, begins and ends with a haunting image: Nicholson, a retired detective who'd become obsessed with capturing a pedophile, unshaven, drunk, haggard, muttering to himself because he thinks he's failed to set a trap for him (ironic since he'd succeeded but the pedophile had died in a car accident on the way to it -- yet the trap was set at great cost), a man lost and alone. I think it's where many of us could end up with a slight shove, pushing us over the edge. The image is so haunting because it's so possible. Bewilderment and loss are as much a part of aging as a sense of accomplishment and personal satisfaction. Indeed, I'm bewildered more often than I like to admit. (Who wants a bewildered mentor ha ha?) The zero-sum universe.

2006-10-18T14:20:00.000-07:00

"Something's Happening Here!"...
... is the title of Harriet's next art exhibit. Her opening (paintings) is Friday, Nov. 3, 6-9pm, at Janovec Gallery, 4504 SE Milwaukee at Holgate (parking across street). If you're in the neighborhood, come on by.

2006-10-18T13:20:00.000-07:00

Need any help?
A few years back a grad student of mine needed some extra credits, and so she became my "research assistant." What a joy it was to have one! I sent her out to do the messy searching for obscure details that I often need to add verisimilitude to a scene. At the moment, for example, for the new "wild west" project I'm doing, I need to know something about gangsters in Chicago in the 1890s. I looked around the net but couldn't find what I needed, so I reserved several histories of Chicago at the library, which I just picked up. Hopefully one of them will have what I need.

I'm always having to find out obscure things like that. A few weeks back, thus, when JM asked if she could help me on anything, it was tempting to say Yes indeed! and send her off to the library. But I hesitated -- just long enough to ask myself, Why in hell is this young writer asking to help me when she should be helping herself? Because, in typical young writer fashion, she's scared shitless and avoiding the inevitable reality of "put up or shut up," either be a writer or not, but if you are, then goddamn it, do things that most help your writing career. So I scolded her instead of saying yes ha ha. And she's writing a novel that isn't one to dash off in three days.

But research assistants are cool. Wish I had one again.

Pulling into the library, I encountered a dark cat that was a dead ringer for Mahalia, one of the cats in the family I shared with "Sally." Sally who has disowned all that past. How can people pretend the past doesn't exist? Sure, bad things can erase good things, especially in the short run, but shouldn't we outgrow grudges and be able to look back and appreciate good things that happened with someone, even if the relationship changed? How can Sally hear the Beatles Sgt Pepper album and not remember it in context, which happened to be a context with me there? Do you stop listening to the Beatles because you hate your ex? Do you pretend you never made discoveries together? Sally, as it turns out, was the first important editor in my writing career, so I can't deny that, no matter what came later. I mean, what's the deal? Does she blame me for not becoming a lesbian sooner than she did ha ha? "People are more interesting than anybody," ma always said, and man was she right about that. Sally is much more interesting than Sketch, my dog -- and Sketch is pretty damn interesting!

Little flashes of the past happen all the time -- I see a cat that reminds me of Mahalia. I hear a song by Canned Heat and remember when I first heard it, and guess who was there. You can't escape the past. Embrace it. Embrace the good times and chalk the bad ones up to experience. Good if you learned something from them.

These are the themes in Sally's novel, of course. A challenge to work them all out. But I think I have a good start -- and I'm a clever little devil ha ha by using a play within a novel to layer interpretations of what is truth and what is fact and what is art. And have none of it show because that stuff is boring as hell.

Well, well and my, my. Onward.

2006-10-18T12:45:00.000-07:00

Mahagonny in Portland
I forgot to mention this. When I ran into the prez of the opera guild and told her I was going to LA to see Mahagonny, she confided that she'd been trying to produce it here for years. What she needs is one million dollars. When and if she raises it, it's the one project she really wants to do. Listening, O Knight of Nike, you jock-centered one-track-mind, you.

2006-10-18T12:02:00.000-07:00

Chekhov's The Seagull
As noted in Today In Literature, the premier of this play was a gigantic flop. As writers do, Chekhov hung in with it despite initial depression about the failure. The public finally warmed up to the play.

When I was shopping for a classic play to expand into hyperdrama, The Seagull came quickly to mind. "Uncle, what we need is a new kind of theater," says Treplev in the play. "A theater with new theatrical forms!" Well, if hyperdrama wasn't a new theatrical form, I didn't know what was. I used my background as a Russian linguist in the Army Security Agency to translate the play so I could own the translation and do with it what I wanted. (More about the background to the Chekhov hyperdrama.)

The result was The Seagull Hyperdrama, which may be the major work of my career. It is practically unproducible, of course, but it exists online, as a CD-ROM, and a bit awkwardly as a
paperback book.

The hyperdrama gets decent access online (over 1300 unique visitors in 2006 so far), which is where it belongs since navigation through hypertext is the norm there. I'd love for a very eccentric producer to stumble across it -- and produce it. Fat chance but it's always nice to dream.

2006-10-18T06:22:00.000-07:00

Room to wiggle
A surprisingly light load of student work to ready today, which is good since tomorrow is conference day, a long day of one-on-ones with my students. I should have wiggle room today in which to do writerly things. I want to give one more look at the first part of Sally before calling it "a workable draft" and moving on the part two. Some other grunt work to do as well.

Running into JB yesterday was disturbing as well as nice (nice to know he's still alive) -- it seems like such a waste of his talent. At the same time, what he does is his business. He's minding his own business and hurting no one but himself (if that). Maybe he's turned homelessness into an art form. Maybe he's prideful and stupid. He was full of his usual energy and wit when we talked. He didn't seem "down and out," just scruffy and disheveled.

A new habit of my day is checking out what the Haiku Nurse has to say each morning. During the week, she seems to post between 630 and 7 a.m. Once or twice a week the haiku will really hit me. I like the discipline of her routine.

2006-10-17T21:26:00.000-07:00

The mysterious JB
At the bus stop after class I ran into a man I'll call JB. He must be in his mid to late 40s. I've known him over twenty years. He was a techie at the New Rose Theatre when I was resident playwright there in the early 1980s. Later JB was a bartender/cook at Nobby's when the tavern was my home away from home. His fifty cent tacos for Monday Night Football became legendary. JB is bright, articulate, well read, witty, entertaining, with an encyclopedic knowledge of certain areas of theater, film and sports history.

The event that turned JB's life around is something I've heard in various spins but the broad outline of the story goes this way. Something happened to a leg and he needed surgery. The good news, he had health insurance from Nobby's (most small businesses, especially taverns, don't provide it). Nobby's owner offered a leave of absence and his old job back. No problem. Except there was a problem. JB wouldn't have the surgery. For reasons no one understood, he would not do anything for his problem. What he did is quit his job. The owner pleaded for him to change his mind. JB ran out of money and became homeless. The owner still offered him his old job back. JB remained homeless. Now, a decade later, he is still homeless.

He's not taking drugs or drinking. He's as charming and articulate as ever. I seem to run into him about once a year. Tonight he had two buddies with him, introduced as "the poet" and "the baseball scholar." They were all on a bench in the bus mall, listening to the play-offs on a portable radio. All shaggy and unkempt, well, homeless, with large bags of their possessions. JB had a walking aid, as he did a year or so ago when I saw him last.

Why does a man decide to become homeless and stay homeless? This appears to be the case. With winter coming on, through all those past winters. The mysterious JB.

2006-10-17T14:52:00.000-07:00

Editing chores
I'm very close to accepting two full-length plays by OyamO for the winter/spring review. I've been a fan of his work for a long time, and this would make the issue special indeed. Also he's consented to an interview.

Otherwise, here I am in the small windowless office I not only call home but home sweet home. A little time to kill before class but don't feel like doing anything constructive.

2006-10-17T11:28:00.000-07:00

Sign of the times
POV from our driveway.

2006-10-17T09:53:00.000-07:00

Best Men's Stage Monologues of 1996
I edited my post about Moliere below to include the closing monologue in my play about him, which was anthologized in the volume above.

2006-10-17T08:47:00.000-07:00

Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park
It was the summer of hmm ... late 60s or early 70s. I could find out by finding "Travels with Ruby," an article I wrote for Northwest Magazine about our summer-long camping trip across the country and back. At any rate, on the beginning leg we were driving across the Nevada desert when we saw a sign for an Ichthyosaur monument and park. A dirt road. Why not? We left the paved highway and continued across the desert.

Less than an hour later, buildings! We were in a ghost town, it turns out, an old mining town. But there was a building hosting a bar and cafe, and it was open. The bartender's name was Stella, which is why I used this name for the bartender in my play Christmas at the Juniper Tavern. Ends up there was a landing strip behind the building so corporate guys and professional ladies could fly in now and again for wild parties on the desert. But now the place was deserted, and we spent a lot of time with Stella, delighting in her stories. Later we found a nearby campsite and put up our blue tent. We ended up staying there, drinking beer with Stella, longer than we expected. It was a summer when we had nowhere to go and no time to be there. Lovely.

I remembered this because H reminded me we have a Saturday night play to see as guests of the playwright. The same play above inspired him twenty plus years ago and he is gracious about remembering the inspiration all this time later. Some idiot once asked me if I took the name Stella from Streetcar but it was the bartender's name at a wonderful whorehouse out in the middle of the Nevada desert, next to the big prehistoric fish bones. I've always liked that image.

More info.

2006-10-17T07:51:00.000-07:00

Auditions on film
The Met auditions Sunday got me thinking about two of my favorite movies, both hidden gems, both highly recommended, both using musical auditions as an important plot point in their stories:

The Basileus Quartet, 1984. This Italian movie is hard to get but worth the effort. Great premise. A string quartet of old men is on their retirement tour when one of them dies of a heart attack. Instead of canceling, they audition for a replacement for the first violin -- and take on a young stud of a player, whose off-stage activity changes all their lives. Delightful movie!
Running On Empty, 1988. Also a great premise: a radical couple from the 60s has been on the run, raising two sons while living underground. Now one is a teenager and a piano prodigy, having learned from his mother, who gave up a scholarship to Juilliard for her political activity. A powerful story about how love sometimes means letting go.

These two movies are right up there with Amadeus and Diva as the best stories with classical music backdrops. If you missed them, go find them.

2006-10-17T06:59:00.000-07:00

Morning writing
The great thing about being a morning writer is that you get your most important work out of the way before you do anything else, which makes the rest of the day downhill. If you do more writing, great -- but at least you've done something before you have to face the ordinary tasks of the day. You don't have to go through the day wondering if you'll find time to write. You take care of business from the get go and move on.

2006-10-17T06:44:00.000-07:00

Sally in the Blue Tent
Hallelujah, I wrote a chapter on Sally this morning. Feels like the last chapter of part one. I wrote a poem about similar themes and am thinking of using it in the novel, something the protagonist (who is a playwright) writes. We'll see. At any rate, feels good to be back at it.

2006-10-17T06:17:00.000-07:00

Busy week
Thursday is my first conference day, ten hours at school. Today isn't so bad, just a bit of prep and the rest of the morning my own. Onward.

2006-10-16T19:23:00.000-07:00

The grocery experience
Among the many fine stories in The Ballad of Ramblin' Jack, the excellent documentary by Elliott's daughter, a great one is a friend describing going to a grocery store with Jack. He wanders aimlessly around, reading labels randomly, without plan, goal or purpose to his wanderings. After an hour, he might have one item to purchase: Thai peanut sauce because he heard it was pretty good.

I'm not quite that bad but I dig wandering the aisles without plan. Just back from this very trip. It's a great people watching opportunity, for starters. Like when riding public transportation, folks are unguarded and great objects for observation. Writers can find lots to use later ha ha.

2006-10-16T18:00:00.000-07:00

Sam Harris
Harris is the most important and challenging social-political-philosophical thinker to come to my attention since Norman O. Brown. He has written two books:

The End of Faith
- "a brave, pugilistic attempt to demolish the walls that currently insulate religious people from criticism" -- The Independent (UK)
Letter to a Christian Nation
- "fearlessly describes a moral and intellectual emergency precipitated by religious fantasies." -- Janna Levin, professor of astronomy and physics at Columbia University

Whether you agree or disagree with Harris, every thinking person must deal with his challenging assertions.

Here is The Truthdig Interview with Sam Harris.

Letter to a Christian Nation, Harris' new book, is slim and accessible. Everyone -- especially Christians -- should read it.

Background reading: Epistemology (from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

2006-10-16T13:29:00.000-07:00

Option
Just rec'd and signed a contract giving Never A Dull Moment Productions another year on their long option of my screenplay Earthly Desires. May the force be with them. It doesn't seem to be with me ha ha.

2006-10-16T12:45:00.000-07:00

Fickle fame
Running into the prez of the opera guild yesterday, who's the same women who signed my checks for Chateau de Mort, reminded me of what a hugely successful project that extravagant hyperdrama was. In Seattle, an arts publication called it the second most significant cultural event for its year in the entire Northwest! (First was a Seattle appearance by Barishnykov.) That's great press. Twenty years later it's Charles who? This is a very, very, very old story that many, many artists can relate to. You enjoy the fame while you can and thereafter bite your tongue and try to be polite in public. Unless, of course, you are a mad man like Bukowski or someone ha ha. Then you really raise hell.

2006-10-16T12:25:00.000-07:00

Old men as clowns
Absolutely no one knew more about the comic potential of old men, especially when playing opposite young women on stage, than Moliere. What is amazing to me is that so often he played the old man, usually cuckolded, and his wife the young woman. He had the artist's ability to turn personal tragedy and pain into dramatic comedy on stage.

This is the premise of my stage play Sad Laughter and the subsequent screenplay of the same name. First commissioned by the New Rose Theatre, and successfully produced under the title The Comedian In Spite Of Himself, this three-act version of Moliere's story was a critical and financial success -- except that I didn't like it much. The artistic director, who did, let me keep rewriting through the entire run, much to the chagrin of the cast, and so there were six different versions of the play produced, a different one each week! An astounding opportunity for a playwright.

What bothered me was that the story I wanted to tell, about Moliere and his young wife who was possibly his daughter, got buried in a subplot. I wanted to bring it stage center. My contract said the New Rose got a cut of subsequent royalties for five years, so I buried the play that long, not marketing it. Then I took it out, changed the three-act structure to two-act, and moved the personal story forward. I loved the result, though no one was in a rush to do it. I finally directed a college production myself. A scene and monologue from the play have been anthologized respectively in Best Stage Scenes of 1996 and Best Men's Stage Monologues of 1996. The monologue, which ends the play, is probably the best one I've ever written:

MOLIERE: Shed no tears! You rot in one grave as another;
If you don't believe that, don't ever have a mother.
The luck that gets us all got me—
Though I'm better off than most, you must agree.
Consider this: though I am dust, you're glad to pay
Right through the nose to see my plays!
Without me, Montfleury's just a name;
Because of me, he has a kind of fame.
The Archbishop of Paris is no concern of yours
Except for me — I give him the notoriety he deserves.
In other words, why shed a tear for me?
My plays live on until eternity!
Oh, I know — in your age the time is getting short,
Everywhere there's war, famine, a great environmental wart.
Yet you insist your own age is unique:
"Never has civilization reached such a peak!"
But I question this wisdom found on TV and in "Forbes,"
Though maybe that's presumptuous, coming from a corpse.
Still, I don't see our times as different, I confess,
Since in your age, as in mine, it's all a mess.
Though you've reached the moon, discovered strange galactic gasses,
Three hundred years later, the world's still full of asses!

(LA GRANGE enters.)

LA GRANGE: So we hope we've moved you and given you a little fun; In truth,—
MOLIERE & LA GRANGE: — there's not a damn thing new beneath the sun.

(MUSIC FANFARE AND CURTAIN CALL: THE PLAY IS OVER.)

Then I converted the play to a screenplay, right after the success of Shakespeare In Love. My agent at the time thought it was the best screenplay he'd ever handled, which if you know anything about Hollywood is close to a kiss of death (i.e. the agent handling Dead Poets Society: "This is the best thing you've ever written. I don't think I can sell it." -- the two sentences that say more about the industry than any two sentences I know. High compliments often mean it's too literary or high-brow.). Actually I later had a couple close calls with it, and I still market it. Eventually someone is going to put Moliere's incredible story on film, and they might as well use my script. Both the screenplay and the stageplay have been published (see previous link), so my rights on my particular take are well protected. I am proud of both play and screenplay, and my late friend Ger thought it was my very best work. But then he was a classically trained actor, which the stage play at least requires.

In both scripts, I also put into Moliere's mouth words from my own heart:

I often play the cuckold on stage, don't I? So maybe I'm just practicing. That's what we live for, isn't it? Perfecting our parts? Fine-tuning our roles? I know I haven't given you much attention lately. I mean, you're right, our life is a rehearsal. My life is a dress rehearsal for a play. Even now, as I hear myself talking, I wonder where I'll be putting this, in what future scene in what future play I'll be standing before someone like you, perhaps before you yourself, the actress, and I'll be the actor, and we'll be talking — in some play, some day — much as we are talking here now. Because that's what my life seems to be, a dress rehearsal for a play. Which, strictly speaking, doesn't really make my life much of a life at all, does it?

Hence my memoir is entitled Dress Rehearsals.
Amen.

2006-10-16T08:55:00.000-07:00

Your life is your own best material
I tell my students this all the time. This, of course, is the disadvantage of being young -- you have less life to draw upon. And, conversely, the advantage of being old! It's nice that aging has some advantages since the disadvantages are so obvious.

For example, I'm in a personal moment now in which I recognize the emotional parameters that in much younger days would have led to considerable obsession, behaviors and actions the total of which would be negative in the end, even if positive for a while. It's like getting into the right space for the wrong reasons. Or is it the wrong space for the right reasons? At any rate, older and presumably wiser, I'm not taking the bait, I'm not buying into the self-inflicted hallucination, and I'm not becoming the protagonist in my own life's melodrama. Instead I'm sublimating it -- the emotions, the possible behaviors -- thinking instead about a story in my upcoming collection of related stories, Nails In My Coffin, and what is brewing is a dark but very comic tale of how ridiculous an old man can be if he puts blinders on. Ala Faulkner's experience mentioned earlier. I think this story will be a hell of a lot of fun, compared to all the misery a more literal response would create. (This is what Norman O. Brown means when he writes that modern war is war perverted -- and the problem is not in the war but in the perversion. The perversion is being literal. To get rid of the perversion is to become metaphoric.)

What is fascinating to me, however, is how tempting the old pattern is. I thought I had outlived all that kind of emotional turmoil. Apparently not. But it's encouraging to be able to look at it as if from afar, rather than to run with it. I don't need journeys like that any more ha ha.

2006-10-16T03:04:00.000-07:00

Sleep
I seem to sleep in four-hour cycles. Having crashed early, I was near the end of one when rain pounding the roof woke me. Got up and did some teacherly things, now ready to return. Monday and Tuesday morning look like clear days for me, not much more to attend to in my teaching hat. Wednesday is always my big day for reading student work.

Still amazed at the talent at auditions yesterday. 20 year-olds too often get a bad press. I admire the hell out of young artists of any discipline who take their art seriously. It's so easy to "talk" being an artist, so much harder to do something about it. As a writing teacher, other than my day-to-day stuff in the classroom and university environment, I love those opportunities when I can boot a talented young writer in the butt and propel them in a direction in which they start taking themselves seriously. The good ones are always better than they think but often not as disciplined as they should be. Many just give up. Discipline, nurturing one's own talent, is hard work that requires patience and dedication. When I see this happening, I can be a great rooting section and now and again maybe help a writer avoid a pitfall. It's part of giving back.

2006-10-15T20:04:00.000-07:00

Something to cheer about
At one point, the m.c. at the opera auditions said, "Gives you a little faith in humanity, doesn't it?" Indeed. 18 singers in their 20s (13 women, 5 men), all talented, all on stage only as a result of extraordinary dedication to their art, training, studying, practicing -- quite impressive. These were the Oregon District auditions, winners to go to Seattle for regionals, from there to NY for semis and finals.

Each singer sang two pieces/arias. One of their choice from a list of five they provided, then one chosen by the three judges (national judges, not biased local ones like at Oregon football games ha ha). A long afternoon, therefore -- five hours.

Though all were talented, a few clearly stood out. Of the four going to Seattle, I would have picked three of them. I agreed with the "audience's choice" winner (also on to Seattle). Those who stood out, it seems to me, were "bigger" than those who didn't. In voice, in stage presence, in attitude -- often even in body size. (Surely opera is one of the few fields where a huge woman or man can use size to advantage.)
About 7 or 8 of the 18 blew me away -- they sounded as good to me as what I hear at professional opera companies, though of course my ear isn't trained. It will be fun to see if any of them go on to NY.

While we were waiting for the judges to reach a decision, the very talented accompanist entertained us with a medley of Tom Lehrer songs.

Also, at intermission, I ran into the woman who signed my checks for my first big playwriting commission over 20 years ago, the hyperdrama in the Pittock Mansion, Chateau de Mort. She is now President of the Opera Guild and said she wanted to talk to me about "a small project." Not sure I'd be interested but I'll listen to what she has to say and perhaps offer.

A great afternoon! The five hours actually flew by. Faith in humanity and all that.

2006-10-15T10:06:00.000-07:00

Haiku
A good one today at
Haiku Nurse! Check it out.

2006-10-15T08:27:00.000-07:00

Auditions for the Met
Opera auditions this afternoon at PSU, and we're going to cheer on our regional singers. Should be fun, a good thing to do on a gray rainy day in the northwest.

I notice I have piles of books everywhere, very behind on reading and research for various projects. Time to sift through all that stuff. And to get back on my writing track.

2006-10-14T14:57:00.000-07:00

Slowing down
I think I've finally reached the age where I'm slowing down. I've been a focused, obsessive, constant writer for forty years now. When I didn't get in a good day's writing, I got angry at myself and did twice as much writing the next day. Now I can go for a day or even a few, get nothing done, and not really give a damn. My archive is large enough ha ha. Not that I'm stopping. It's the way I think, which is why I'm never "there" but "here," in the interior. I'm just more slow and casual about doing it lately.

Also, I get a lot of kicks now by helping talented young writers. By "talented" I mean they already have the necessary things that nobody can teach them. I can help them with craft, especially with storytelling strategy craft, which in my experience is the great weakness of beginning writers. Most don't even know what a storytelling strategy is. So if I can help a few talented young writers improve their storytelling skills, I'm delighted. You start by getting them to make it conscious.

In other words, I haven't got squat done today, after my morning of good intentions. I still may do something before the day is out besides watch football and invent errands to run, but maybe not. I'm sure it doesn't matter.

2006-10-14T10:06:00.000-07:00

Beginning screenwriters in a buyer's market
Rec'd an email from a beginning screenwriter. She had placed her first script on InkTip, got an offer to buy it, hired an attorney, and rejected the producer's offer. She wrote because she's having second thoughts. She wrote her script using my course Screenwright as her guide.

Yes, I think she made a great mistake. Here's why.

The offer was fair. It was $7500 at signing and $10,000 at production, plus full screenwriting credit. Beginning screenwriters can expect to be paid about 1% of the budget -- so the producer is budgeting this at around 1.75 million, $17,500 for the writer, which seems right in the ballpark for a small indie company.

It is a buyer's market. Overwhelmingly so. This producer will have absolutely no trouble finding another script. I guarantee it. On the other hand, the writer puts this script back in the market at the starting gate where the odds are that she will not get another offer. The vast majority of good scripts get no offers at all in today's overly crowded marketplace. This was an opportunity -- especially with a first script -- and I think the screenwriter should have taken it. If the film went to screen and did well, she'd make up in opening doors and opportunities what she apparently thinks she lost in money. But the offer was very fair for a movie budgeted around 2 million.

This may be the delusions of grandeur syndrome embraced by many beginning writers. They think their work is more special than it is. They don't realize how many good writers are out there. More bad ones, of course, but the marketplace is so damn crowded, even if only 10% of the writers are worth a shit, there're tens of thousands of them.

I think this was a lost opportunity, ego trumping an understanding of the real marketplace.

2006-10-14T08:37:00.000-07:00

Guy talk
Had a late start this morning for some reason. Maybe it's the fog outside. At any rate, went out to grab a cup of coffee and found a table full of guys wearing Oregon hats and sweatshirts. They were getting ready for the drive to Eugene to see "the big game" with UCLA. One alma mater against the other, I never know which to root for. Usually UCLA. Probably UCLA today, too, the triumph of childhood over adulthood once again. We jabbered football while I waited for my coffee. We agreed USC can be beat and Washington is on the road back. I didn't bring up the controversial Oklahoma game or the uniforms because I was outnumbered ha ha.

The game starts at 12:30. Until then, I'll get some work in. Not sure what. Probably waste time for a bit and something will fall into place. Onward.

2006-10-13T20:57:00.000-07:00

Pre-writing
Brooding and brooding and ...

2006-10-13T14:58:00.000-07:00

Ross Island
In the habits of my day, I seldom have to cross the Ross Island Bridge. But now, each Friday, I cross it to go to my piano lessons -- and so I gaze over the railing at the island and remember the summer I had a very special love affair with Ross Island.

In the late 1980s I lived in a small studio apartment downtown. I had cheap rent and a delightful part-time job where I could work more or less how many and what hours I liked. If I needed money, I worked; if not, not. I was translating Chekhov's The Seagull to use later in a hyperdrama, translating it because I wanted to own it.

One very hot summer I wanted to cool off. I bought a raft. I ended up using it so often I kept it inflated in my studio, even though it took up much of my room. Almost daily, in early afternoon, I would carry the inflated raft on my head from my studio at 4th and Alder to the marina near the Hawthorne Bridge. Talk about people doing double-takes! I'd put in at the marina, row out to Ross Island, and spend the afternoon there reading or sipping wine or just sunbathing. Now and again I took a lady friend, but mostly I went alone. I didn't do this on the weekends because the river was too crowded then.

I loved rowing out to the island! It became a highlight of my day -- work in the morning, for myself or at my job, then row out to the island in the afternoon.

On one very hot day, as I was waiting with my raft for the light to change, a yuppy in a sportscar with the top down pulled over and offered me $100 for the raft on the spot, even waving a bill at me. No thanks. My raft wasn't for sale.

Only once did I get in trouble. A wind came up, blowing a strong current against me, and I'm not sure I would have made it back without help. A passing boat towed me in.

I always wanted to take a lady out for the night and have a sex orgy on the island but it never happened. Didn't know the right girls, I guess.

When I cross the bridge today, I conger up fond memories of my Ross Island summer.

2006-10-13T09:31:00.000-07:00

TGIF
I wear two hats, writer and teacher, and Friday is the day I take off the latter and put on the former. It's also piano day. It's also the day before Saturday when I like to vege out and watch a college football game or two. So Friday is very cool.

This weekend I need to get back into the Sally novel -- but also continue this other one I started, which is the opposite in tone from Sally, light and entertaining and satiric, where Sally is dark and heavier. The new one is set in the Old West and I have a 13-year old boy narrator and it's a coming of age story set against a famous event in Western history, using the actual famous characters -- in the tradition of LITTLE BIG MAN and even RAGTIME. Fun. The challenge, and main fun, will be creating the voice of the narrator. Sally, in contrast, is working much better now that I've removed the narrator. I'm in no rush to finish either ... novels are long journeys and the key is always to keep on truckin'. KEEP ON TRUCKIN'. You need a full draft before you can see where you are and what needs changing etc. Novelists require patience and faith.

So I have a very full plate. I like it this way. The more I have to do, the more I get done. Also it's easier to ignore the demons when I'm busy. With time on my hands, I can start obsessing about everything from failure to Failure.

Keep on truckin'.

2006-10-12T19:57:00.000-07:00

A bird in the hand...
... is not worth three tickets to MAHAGONNY in the hand, which is what I now have!

2006-10-12T12:18:00.000-07:00

Fixtures
This morning, after running some errands, I stopped by Fat City for breakfast. This is my favorite meal out, which I only do a few times a month. This is why I'm still alive ha ha -- my breakfasts are high CC. At any rate, I was reminded of how my favorite teacher became a morning fixture at his neighborhood cafe in Honolulu after he retired (and before the big C got him). When I visited and we went there together, all the help knew him by name. Not a bad way to be retired, I thought.

I discovered a more exotic retirement in the Daniel Boone Hotel in St. Louis, where I was put up after winning a playwriting contest with my first play. Treated like a big shot from the get go (there was nowhere to go but down). A retired Missoui writer in his 80s lived in the hotel and held court for an hour or two late every afternoon. He came down from his room, dressed in a suit and bow tie, and met people who had signed a list to see him. My actors made sure I got to meet him. He was dignified, southern-polite and formal, a real old-school gentleman, nursing his single afternoon brandy and patiently answering questions from students mostly about writing and the writing life. Another nice way to be retired.

Maybe I'll become a fixture somewhere after I retire from teaching. (Of course, I don't expect ever to retire from writing. God have mercy if I do.) To date, the only places I've ever been a fixture was long ago at Seafood Mama's and Nobby's as a barfly.

2006-10-12T11:58:00.000-07:00

Good news
One of my better screenwriting students from a few years ago has just been accepted into the MFA program at Pacific University. This woman is a natural. She was working on a romantic comedy for me that struck me as something that would have a real shot in the marketplace, and her crisp writing style and visual storytelling were naturals for the form. A born screenwriter. Good for her.

2006-10-12T07:30:00.000-07:00

How young writers avoid writing what they should be writing
Julie Mae Madsen is a talented young writer whom I met because she has season opera tickets that seat her and her friends behind my wife and me. When I learned she was a writer, I asked to see something – and what she showed me was much better than what I expected. I liked it so much I passed it on to my fiction editor, and we ended up publishing it at Oregon Literary Review. (Her story is Collection 300.)

She showed me some other things I didn’t like as much, and we began a friendship. I saw that she was serious about “being a writer” but at the same time was not as disciplined as she should be in a way that might begin a genuine literary career. She began to do some things to change this. She applied to grad school to get an MFA, for example. I expect she’ll be accepted. She began a blog of a daily haiku, good discipline. She also is an annual participant in several speed-novel writing competitions, also good training.

But she didn’t seem to be doing the practical things that would help her most: regularly writing short stories and submitting them to literary magazines that get read by the three annual anthologies of literary stories; and, above all, working on a slowly developed, serious, personal novel, a stroll and contemplation rather than a sprint through novel territory. A literary novel expressing her own unique voice. Intensely personal. The book no one else could possibly write.

The other day I received an email from her asking if I needed any help on any of my projects. This came shortly after I’d read an entry at her regular blog in which she whined about her dead-end job, debts, lack of direction, etc. In the email she said she had lots of time on her hands.

This was an amazing but not unusual communication to receive from a young writer. What she and all young writers need more than anything is “time on her hands” – so she can use it to write the serious novel that surely is inside her! This is the very purpose of dead-end jobs, to buy time, and since hers appears to be painless, something she doesn’t drag home with her (as opposed to a commercial writing job, which typically screws up the creative juices at home), she should be thankful for it – and take advantage of it by writing her sweet tush off. I told her as much.

As a result, she’s going to go on a schedule of at least 1000 words a week and write her “real” novel. The personal one. The one you can’t dash off in a three-day weekend. The one that's going to make her break into a sweat. Tears, laughter, the shakes. From the gut.

I volunteered to be her cheering section. She has a ton of talent, and I think she can write something uniquely her own.

Go, Julie.

2006-10-11T21:39:00.000-07:00

Writing begets writing
I'm a morning writer. I like to work as soon as I get up. I can re-write anywhere any time but for new pages, give me the early morning hours. That's why what happened tonight is so unusual.

Earlier I gave such an enthusiastic pep talk to a young writer that I talked myself into working! I wrote 1000 words tonight, a rare nighttime achievement. Makes me grin.

Still have morning prep before class but I'll get it done. Onward.

2006-10-11T11:38:00.000-07:00

Talent
What is it about talent that so many writers who think they have it, don't; and so many who do, don't think they're any good? At least that's been my experience.

2006-10-11T08:42:00.000-07:00

On losing friends
I can't believe it will be 8 years this December since Dick, my soul brother, and the inspiration for Kerouac's Scroll, passed away. And three years since Ger, my best friend in Portland, passed away. It's hell to outlive your best friends.

The worst thing about it is losing the special silences you share. Dick and I shared 40 years of adult experiences; we could communicate with a mere glance. Indeed, on many occasions, we'd be somewhere, something would strike us as amusing, we'd have eye contact and immediately see we shared the response, and then we'd break out roaring. People thought we were nuts. We did a lot of silent communication. I miss losing that.

I also miss my weekly long coffee sessions with Ger. We'd talk for hours, always on the same wave length about the arts, politics, the scene outside, whatever. I miss losing this, too.

My wife keeps telling me to meet new people, make new friends, but it is simply impossible to replace 40 and 30 years of shared experiences. If I'm going to hang with somebody I don't know, I call my dog. I'm at the age, in fact, where my best friend is a dog. This is the ending of Kerouac's Scroll:

...
In retrospect, it feels like I hallucinated much of my life. I hallucinated the enduring love of my years with Sally. I hallucinated the expected heights of my literary career. I hallucinated future possibilities, however vague, with Mary. But I never hallucinated my friendship with Hooker. He was my buddy, and the gods can’t take him away from me.

Lately I spend my days reading and walking with Idaho [a dog]. I watch a lot of movies, some of which I worked on. I write occasional letters to former colleagues and students. Mostly we keep to ourselves, Idaho and I. I have no energy to make new friends at my age. Hooker is a hard act to follow.

In memory I walk along the scroll of my life the way a native returns after many years to visit his homeland. I remember this! I remember that! I wander the hills and valleys of my past and marvel at the scenery. So many memories!

Then Idaho leaps up on my leg to demand attention, I find a ball or, if we are outside, a nearby stick to toss, and we spend time focused only on the immediacy of our game, and the past falls silent. And this is my life, an old man playing with his dog, as the present pulls against the past and becomes the tether for the future.

That old cliche about "it's no use crying over spilt milk" doesn't tell you not to cry about it, just that it's not going to change anything. A significant distinction.

2006-10-11T07:11:00.000-07:00

137 days -->
"As you make your bed, so you lie on it
The bed can be old or brand-new;
So if someone must kick, that is my part,
And another get kicked, that's for you!"

2006-10-10T16:07:00.000-07:00

Story of the day
Australian Man, 91, Completes Law Degree
By Associated Press

October 10, 2006, 5:21 PM EDT

SYDNEY, Australia -- A 91-year-old man has received a law degree from an Australian university, finishing the six-year course more than a year ahead of schedule because he said "time is of the essence."

Full story.