Enough About Burt?

A man's man..Pic courtesy of Wikipedia

TODAY

It is the last day of January and it is springtime gorgeous – 72 degrees. It is a fluke of the weather gods; cold weather is predicted for the balance of the week. I just had an incredible “world salad” here at Central Market. I had Thai tofu, lemon humus, and Greek cucumber salad among other things. It was way good. In previous blog articles, I think I misinterpreted this wonderful place. For me, it isn’t so much a place where you go to buy groceries. It’s where you buy a delectable lunch, sit in the sunlit café, and people watch. Also, you can blog using the HEB wi-fi.

STREAMING MAELSTROM

I just purchased the Amazon Fire TV stick, and I’ve been binge watching “Mozart in the Jungle”. There are now so many TV and streaming options, I cannot keep up. We’re getting “Baskets” on FX and a new “X-Files” on Fox. We’re about to be blessed with the OJ Trial on “American Crime” and “Grease” performed live. Throw in a couple of purchased seasons (“The Affair”, “Man Seeking Woman”) and I can scarcely keep up. I now have Apple TV, ROKU and Fire TV.. They are all good and a person could be pretty well served by any of them. Apple TV is conspicuously missing a viewer for Amazon Video – they need to fix that one shortcoming.

BUT ENOUGH ABOUT THAT

My actual topic is the Burt Reynolds memoir “Enough About Me” that I just heard on audiotape. It is a great audio experience for someone who grew up watching and sometimes idolizing the great Mr. Smokey. The book covers his entire lifetime and I won’t attempt to recap the whole thing. I’ll just cover some main impressions and direct you the blog reader to the complete bio at the iTunes bookstore.

I’ve long suspected that there was more to Burt than his action star movie persona. I mostly think of: "Dan August", "Deliverance", "Longest Yard", Car Chase movies and "Evening Shade" when I think of Burt's roles. It turns out Burt did several other movies (eg, "The End", "Paternity") and longed to establish himself as a serious thespian with great range. Alas, even though he was number one male lead at the box office from 1976-1981 he was pretty well typecast as a bubba in a Firebird. He regrets that he chose so many movie roles based on travel perks and the fact that his good friend Hal Needham was directing.

Burt’s father was a WWII war hero, construction manager and police chief – an ultra-macho man who sounds like he could’ve played ¾ of the Village People with such manly roles. Burt’s dad was grim and disapproving – he never liked Burt’s acting career. Burt spent the better part of a lifetime trying to win his Dad’s approval. It might explain his penchant for doing dangerous, body-wrecking stunts and macho buddy roles that pretty much closed the door on being the next Sir Laurence Olivier. In truth, Burt was quite macho – he would’ve been a pro footballer and pro coach if a college injury hadn’t cut short that career.

Burt’s relationships with women were kind of star-crossed, like his mid-life movie roles. His one true love was Dinah Shore, a lovely talk show maven old enough to be his mother. They parted amicably and stayed friends. Sally Field was another Burt lady friend. Sally distanced herself from Burt after their breakup and said little about the aborted romance ever after. The two women Burt actually married – Judy Carne and Loni Anderson, ended up as “frenemies” to Burt. The marriages were short-lived and not much love lost. Familiarity must breed contempt. Burt also had a coterie of male friends which included Dom DeLuise, Jim Nabors and Charles Nelson Reilly. One only guess if there is another dimension to Burt’s bio but nothing more is shared in the memoir.

THE LION IN FLORIDA WINTER

In later life, Burt settled down as a happily confirmed bachelor. He worked for many years as an acting coach at his Jupiter, Florida theater company. He was then visited by “the plagues” in recent years. He had to have a heart bypass and then went through a 2014 bankruptcy which rid him of most conspicuous possessions. Friends and a favorite niece helped him to rearrange his finances such that he could keep a nice home and live comfortably.

ENOUGH ABOUT BURT?

This book was hardly enough about Burt. There are so many things in the book that might beg a question or arch a curious eyebrow. His career bridged across eras from the MGM star system of the 50’s to the hip, indie, sexually frank films of the 90’s. Burt’s life is an unqualified success, if you go by excitement quota and living every minute to the fullest. I’d like a Burt bio II, but that may not be in the offing as he is 80ish, walking with a cane and talking with a very hoarse rasp.

© 2016 Snillor Productions

Orange Inflections

Breaking Bad good .. - Pic courtesy of Wikipedia

by Trebor Snillor
It’s been a while since my last entry -- lots to cover. I actually have 3 topics but probably not enough imagination to do a full article on any one of these. I will land on each thing, hummingbird style, and see what I can add to the topic.

IRAQ

Iraq is having a highly predictable meltdown as I write this. A Sunni-Al Qaeda offshoot called ISIS is rolling across northern Iraq. It’s already taken Tikrit and Mosul as well as several smaller towns. President Al Maliki’s army outnumbers ISIS 30 to 1 and it has state-of-the-art weapons donated by the USA. Such a defeat would be surprising if not for a few background details...

MOSQUE/STATE -- The Middle East has no concept of Mosque-state separation. Whatever mainstream religion is in the catbird seat will play its advantage and suppress other strains of Islam. The Iraq government is a patched together group of Shi’ite leaders who have given no acknowledgement to the Sunnis. The Sunnis are a majority in the recently conquered areas and have no allegiance to Al Maliki.

DEMOCRACY -- Jeffersonian Democracy is a hard sell throughout the Third World. It calls for an educated, involved public and one that is uncowed by any particular organized religion. The US cannot side with any religion in that region without alienating large groups of people. Obama probably has a good idea to send military advisors and request that Al Maliki be more inclusive.

HILLARY’S HARD CHOICES

I’m listening to Hillary Clinton’s latest book, Hard Choices. I have to say that it comes across like a campaign commercial -- lots of unabashed bragging about her accomplishments as Secretary of State and a “Team of Rivals”. Her first book, Living History, seemed more genuine and modest. In Hard Choices, she scolds previous Secretaries of State and Defense for taking their eyes off the ball and losing long term focus. Her book was published a couple of weeks before ISIS swept through Iraq -- the irony abounds. I’m only on Chapter 3 of a 35 chapter book so I may have more to say. Overall, I like Hillary but this book is more like a geography lesson from Doris Kearns Goodwin. It tends towards boring when it’s not bragging. Maybe it’ll pick up in the chapters to follow.

ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK

Orange is the New Black is a break-out hit on Netflix. The comedy-drama about a women’s prison has garnered a slew of awards and is a top-rated show nationally. I have a new expression -- “Breaking Bad good”. Orange is Breaking Bad good. Like Breaking Bad, it shows complicated, flawed, basically decent people who’ve made some bad choices. The show compels the viewer to sit in and binge watch a whole season in one day.

The main character, Piper, is serving a one year sentence for working as a drug mule. Pretty blonde Piper is challenged immediately in a world which is ruled by gang politics and race-based maneuvering for influence. The threats of violence and sexual aggression are very real -- the women’s universe is very much a mirror of what happens in men’s prisons. The performances are so perfect I wonder if some of these actresses might have served time.

CONCLUSION

Today we had an entire day of gentle, soaking rain. Dallas desperately needed it, but I’m surprised the channel 5 News Team completely missed this in their forecast. I’ll probably relax at home and take in another two episodes of Orange, Season 2.

Hillary’s book is a bit of a chore -- I’ll listen to it on my iPod while I work out, when I work out. The 20 minute segments will be about right for that.

Iraq is a nasty quicksand pit as anyone might’ve predicted. The country is an ill-defined hodge-podge from British Empire days .. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it fracture completely apart along geo-religious lines.

© 2014 Snillor Productions

Weighing Arnold

He's baaack- Picture courtesy of Simon & Schuster

by blogSpotter

This week, I'm listening to Arnold Schwarzenegger's memoir, Total Recall -- abridged version. I have to say, it's a success story like very few others. His life is fascinating and covers a lot of territory; I'll try to condense it some. I'm only about 2/3 through it, so the shenanigans with the maid aren’t covered here...

Arnold was born in a small Austrian village right after World War II. His father was a police chief and part-time band leader. He was also a former Nazi officer although there were no ties to death camps or particularly nasty Nazi-related affairs. The Schwarzeneggers lived a very humble existence in an old house that lacked flush toilets or running water. Arnold was buoyant, cocky and athletic from day one -- his poor family could hardly deter him.

Arnold became infatuated with body building from looking at a few muscle magazines and seeing Tarzan movies in nearby Gratz. He began body-building in earnest at age 14 and made his way into central European contests that were hosted in Munich. At this point, Arnold’s career took an improbable trajectory that was made possible by his incredible sunny attitude and unbelievable self-confidence.

Arnold made these promises to himself at a young adult age -- he kept every one of them:

• I will be a millionaire by age 30 
• I will win the Mr. Universe and Mr. World bodybuilding competitions 
• I will be not only a Hollywood actor, I will be a top-paid lead actor 
• I will become a naturalized American citizen and run for public office 
• I will marry a beautiful Kennedy woman 

Some of these, he trounced. He won Mr. Universe 6 times and became the face of the body building industry. His net worth is easily $200 million. Most of these achievements were under his belt (except for Kennedy in-law and governor) by the early 80’s when he starred in Conan the Barbarian. Arnold’s combination of naiveté and hubris is astounding. As an actor starting out, he was offered good roles as bouncers, hit-men and tough guys in various movies. Most starving actors would’ve jumped on any of them. Arnold said, “No -- these roles don’t fit my star-to-be stature”.

Danged if he wasn’t right. I’m reminded of the Miami real estate agent who got his houses to sell by raising the prices. Whatever works, and it definitely worked for Arnold. In one small passage, Arnold explains that most people worry, fret and over-think things. We’re all paralyzed with fear of doing and fear of failure. Arnold says that he likes (even still) to jump into activities with both feet and face down problems later. Obviously, with the family maid bearing his illegitimate son, there are some exceptions to that rule even for a fearless dare devil.

One more thing struck me -- and this may foretell that Arnold wasn’t just a dumb hunk. When he had his first successes selling weight equipment and appearing in movies like Stay Hungry, Arnold did a smart thing. He bought an 8-unit apartment complex in LA and became the landlord. Lesser humans would’ve bought a Malibu pad and a Porsche. I still am not a Republican and would diverge from some of Arnold’s ideas, but I have to say his memoir is fascinating. The man is impressive and it’s way more than muscles that impress.

© 2012 blogSpotter

Digging in the Zen Garden

Statue of Buddha in Laos - Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter

I recently splurged $8 on a bargain book at Barnes and Noble.,  “The Essentials of Philosophy” by James Mannion.  It gives the reader a whirlwind tour of world philosophy – across all of the ages and all parts of the world.  It gives a condensed version of everything from Plato’s Forms to Bertrand Russell’s mathematical Empiricism.  Turns out that various thinkers have been misunderstood or mistranslated through the ages – Epicurus was characterized posthumously as a Hedonistic bon vivante.   In fact, he was more about quality of life and savoring things at a slow, reasoned pace.  In some ways he was the very opposite of his “sensual man” image.

Virtually every person and philosophy has some merit or reasonableness when seen in a particular context, a singular glint in the prism of “deep thought”.   Some of these, when taken out of context can turn into Frankenstein monsters that need to be dispatched with a pitchfork, quickly. Friedrich Nietzsche proposed the idea of a “Super Human” who acted from confident knowledge, and not groupthink.  It’s ironic that his idea, which had academic merit per se, was twisted into a pretzel of death camp rationalizations by none other than Adolph Hitler.   Frequently such bastardizations happen long after a philosopher is dead and he can no longer set the record straight on what he actually thought or said.

Possibly more interesting in “Essentials” than anything were the ideas of Siddhartha Gautama, aka Buddha.  Buddha was a liberal, Hindu, Indian prince who disavowed some of the violence and illogic he saw in Hinduism.  The contrasting religious background reminds me of how Jesus was a Jewish rabbi – who also became the foundation of a whole new religion.   Buddha originated many aphorisms, principles and ideas (The Four Noble Truths) which I won’t detain you with here.   Many of these ideas overlap with similar wisdom that Westerners might glean from the 10 commandments, the beatitudes or the Book of Psalms.    But Buddha suggested something else altogether unsettling … Buddha says that we chose our parents, our current life situations and our gender in a past life.  

Thus, this life with all its problems and nastiness is something for which we voluntarily checked a box!   We asked for it, as if scanning a special Sears Catalog of perverse conditions.    Put me down for “lower middle class, speech impediment and lackluster career.   A big nose, high forehead should certainly round it all out”. Have to say, I'm pretty sure I never asked for my slings and arrows explicitly. Buddha sees these features as the work of a compensating God, not really a lesser God.  

I’m just not sure where to draw the lines.  Did I live before, and my previous life has some spirit-connection here in this life?   Or is that total nonsense …  Are rewards and punishments something that come in a promised afterlife and not realized already?   Even Exodus in the Bible speaks of the father’s sins visited upon his offspring.   I can’t imagine what sins were done by my forbears; I can only hope that bygones will be bygones.  There are so many ideas to mull over in “The Essentials of Philosophy”...    No one particular idea has an iron grip yet (on me anyhow).   I may need to delve deeper than an $8 bargain bin foray to see what actually exists over the rainbow of this spiritual quest.

© 2012 blogSpotter

Digesting a Naked Lunch

Lay off of the bug powder... - Courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter

PREFACE
Before launching into my review of Naked Lunch, I’d like to briefly mention the cultural “phenom” called Jersey Shore. I stumbled across this on MTV yesterday and thought I’d give it a look since it’s garnered so much press. Have to say that it was a total waste of time. It was 30 minutes of overly tanned, tattooed 20-somethings swearing at each other. Ronnie was breaking up with Sammie “Sweetheart”, and his total dialog had to be bleeped as he threw her bed and belongings on to the porch. Sammie crouched and cried dramatically when she saw what he’d done. Rivers of mascara flowed, and mingled with the over-applied lip gloss. Every person on the show is a ham who emotes dramatically to the camera every few minutes, seeking audience approval. Jersey Shore is so very bad that it might almost qualify as camp humor – something to watch and laugh at with friends. I won’t give this show any more coverage because it doesn’t even deserve as much as I just gave it. Let’s proceed to the weightier matter of Naked Lunch…

NAKED LUNCH
Being in my middle age, I’ve seen many strange movies in my day. I didn’t think you could really top the coprophagy of John Waters’ Pink Flamingos or the bizarre blue box antics shown in David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive. Imagine my surprise today, when I happened upon Netflix' offering of Naked Lunch -- David Cronenberg’s ambitious 1991 film adaptation of William Burroughs’ famous 1959 novel. I thought that “psycho-sexual” surreality had to be a byproduct of the 1960’s mind-expansion era. It seems that Burroughs cornered everyone, decades earlier with his bizarre, semi-autobiographical “drugalogue“.

Let me speak to a couple of things right at the outset… The book Naked Lunch is so non-linear, strange and impressionistic there is no sane way to capture its essence in a movie. Some in the literati world even figure Burroughs was schizophrenic -- his “rants” couldn’t translate to celluloid. Cronenberg added a rational, almost “film noire” structure to the story making it flow from beginning to end, and he made it a sort of symbolic telling of Burroughs’ life. The story involves giant, talking insects, a conspiracy of intelligent centipedes, typewriters that can morph into cockroaches, and people who ingest exterminators’ bug powder like cocaine. I won’t try to tie all of this together intelligibly -- as I watched the movie I assumed that much of the weirdness was the hallucination from a drug ingestion in an early scene.

When I looked at Burroughs’ life story, I was totally surprised to find that much of the weirdness was true! Burroughs was something of a spoiled rich boy, who became addicted to drugs in the late 40’s before it was “cool”. Much of his writing was autobiographical in nature. He was also an out-of-the-closet gay man in an era where very few Men of Arts (at least in America) were bold enough to do that. He was friends with two other renegade writers of the time -- Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. In the truth-is-stranger-than-fiction department, Burroughs really did kill a woman in a gun accident. He really did travel to North Africa and other exotic locales in pursuit of drugs. He really did cavort with gay Germans, who were running from the Nazis. He also did work as an insect exterminator very briefly as a young man. If he had committed his history to paper without the insect imagery, it still would’ve been incredibly strange.

What might we make of the book or the film in 2011? The material is so radioactive, that it remains controversial to this day. The movie has very strong sexual imagery -- talking anuses, giant vaginal-looking orifices, and marauding penises. It has S&M scenes as well as centipedes engaged in an act which is a cross between sex and cannibalism (with a human). It twice shows the main character shooting his wife in the forehead (deliberately?, accidentally?). Apparently the movie has actually softened and quieted the sex and violence themes that permeated the pages of the book.

I did an earlier blog about Marquis de Sade -- I concluded that he was a brilliant, albeit very disturbed man. I have to likewise conclude that Burroughs inhabited a bleak, nightmarish landscape. He’s said to have hated insects, which may have much to do with their prevalence in his book. During his drug forays, and even between, he must’ve felt the unholy presence of creepy, crawly things that unsettle the soul. I hope on a more personal (and less literary) note that Naked Lunch was not a final, real summation of Burroughs' complete life.

© 2011 blogSpotter

Retaking Woodstock

Ode to joy in Bethel, NY -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I recently had the pleasure of listening to Elliot Tiber’s personal memoir, Taking Woodstock; I then watched Ang Lee’s movie version of it a day later. Elliot Tiber was the 30ish president of the Bethel, New York Chamber of Commerce back in 1969. He helped his parents, two curmudgeonly, Russian Jewish immigrants manage their dilapidated roadside motel, El Monaco. He also did whatever desperate things he could do to attract new business -- art house movie night, swinging singles night, pancake buffets, etc. Elliot also lived a dual existence -- he was a straight-arrow motel manager on weekdays, and a very gay, Manhattan art director/designer on weekends. Batman’s Bruce Wayne would’ve been tested by this frequent change of identity.

Tiber is known for a Holocaust book he wrote, High Street (popular in Europe) but is more broadly known as the brave soul who offered his small town of Bethel to Woodstock Ventures, Inc, for staging of the world-shaking ‘69 rock music festival. He endured racist assaults, nasty graffiti, mob extortion attempts and innumerable spit wads from various angry neighbors and greedy onlookers. He withstood these many trials, and Woodstock went forward.

Tiber actually coordinated things with good friend, neighbor and dairy farmer Max Yasgur two miles down the road from his motel. El Monaco was a cramped, 10 acre swamp; Yasgur’s Farm was hundreds of verdant acres in the natural shape of a sloped amphitheater. Tiber was blessed to have Yasgur on his side -- the rest of Bethel was ready to tar and feather him. I won’t go into the details of Woodstock -- we all know it was a sun-and-rain drenched festival of sex, drugs, music and self-discovery. It was quite possibly (as described in the book) the center of the universe in August 1969. Editorial aside -- Woodstock Ventures repaired all damages and even gave the City of Bethel a 25K donation. 3,000 workers were engaged for the cleanup effort after the landmark event was over. Woodstock put the small town on the map, and Tiber was fully vindicated by the success and handling of the event.

I like to see how a multi-dimensional book gets condensed to a credible, two hour screenplay. Tiber’s book is a detailed autobiography which covers everything from Hebrew schools and sisters’ weddings to gay, coming-of-age stories. Woodstock only occupies the last part of the story and is more the backdrop than the story itself. Ang Lee’s movie starts with Woodstock -- the festival is actually the main focus and Tiber’s family is nearly a side story. Also some colorful characters are compressed into one or two for the sake of brevity. I guess a movie narrative has to pick up the pace where a book can meander all over the place and still maintain the reader’s attention.

There were a couple of passages that caught my attention in the book (and more obliquely) in the movie. This almost made Taking Woodstock worthwhile all by itself… Tiber’s father was an elderly (75ish) Jewish man, tired and spent from a life of grueling labor putting tar on roofs. Tiber’s mother was portrayed unsympathetically as a loud, bossy, money-grubbing nag. You might think that Tiber’s father would be at his wit’s end. Also, just prior to the Woodstock contract the father had been diagnosed with colon cancer. You might think he'd be ready to fold up shop, then and there.

But Tiber Senior was so invigorated by the Woodstock event that he came almost supernaturally alive -- he directed traffic, hired temporary help, cooked mass quantities of food and helped protect the motel from various would-be evil-doers. This stoic, quiet conservative Jewish man became fast friends with Vilma -- a transsexual security guard hired to patrol El Monaco. In fact, he became friends with a host of people he previously might’ve shunned. His mind opened to a whole new world and he was blissfully blown away by it. The colon cancer finally caught up with him a year after Woodstock and he made a special request to Elliot on his death bed… “Bury me in the small cemetery next to Yasgur’s Farm, facing Woodstock. That’s the best time I ever had in my life.”

I don’t know what special epiphany, if any awaits me for my future life -- hopefully something will blow my socks off. Must add, it’s always preferable that doors open when you’re young and healthy, not at death’s door. But it’s somehow encouraging to know that something from the 11th hour of this man’s life gave it way more meaning and joy. His body was old, decrepit and diseased and yet he laughed and danced -- he probably tacked a good, very good eight months to his time left. I think it's possible for us to schlep through a whole life devoid of anything so rewarding -- perish that thought. If you have six hours to devote, you might listen to the (sometimes shocking) audio memoir. For a less jolting experience, you can still “turn on” to the two-hour movie and travel back to 1969’s center of the universe -- Woodstock and the El Monaco motel.

© 2010 blogSpotter

Midland's Desert Marigold

Bush with school children in 2005 -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I just finished listening to Laura Bush’s memoire, Spoken from the Heart. I’ve always liked Laura, and the plain-spoken, sincere and evocative life story that she delivers here just solidifies that impression. Her background in education and reading shines through – she gives vivid descriptions of her Midland origins. You might feel like you’re there yourself -- enduring a dust storm, spying a horned toad in the garden or counting the stars on a Midland summer night. Her gift of words is a welcome counter-balance to the often ineloquent speech of her husband. In fact, Laura’s story makes the entire family seem more endearing; the Bush’s remind me of many of my own relatives.

Mind you, I wouldn’t want to see any of these relatives as President with their hardened attitudes about race and religion, but they are nonetheless well-meaning people who’ve been exemplary in many other ways. It’s a complicated world – hard to write off every person with whom you have an intellectual quarrel.

Laura was an only child, born in 1946 to a Midland home builder and his wife. The Welch’s were middle class but her father, Harold Welch was a “mover-and-shaker” who did well in his real estate business. He situated the family near the best schools and soon had his shy, bookish Laura enrolled with the scions of oil families. Despite her shyness, Laura was pretty and blue-eyed – she dated several prominent young men. At 17, Laura was in a tragic car accident driving her father’s Impala. She failed to see the other car -- a Corvair driven (ironically) by a former boyfriend. He was killed instantly, causing grief to the entire small town of Midland. Laura was deeply affected and says that she has pangs of guilt and sorrow to this day. Some political enemies later tried to portray it as a cover-up; there was no cover up – just a community moving past a local and unchangeable tragedy.

Laura went to SMU and graduated in 1968 with a degree in education. She added a Masters in Library Science in 1973. She taught at various public schools and libraries in Houston and Austin, finally settling at Austin’s Dawson elementary in 1977. She loved Austin (as does blogSpotter the author) so we share this central Texas affinity. Shy, sweet 31 year-old Laura, who read Russian novels while sunbathing, was about to have her life take a major turn. On a visit to Midland, her friends introduced Laura (the self-dubbed “old maid of Midland”) to George W. Bush, “Midland’s most eligible bachelor”. George was smitten with Laura and they married 3 months later. Some of Midland society was aghast – George married someone from the middle class.

From here, Laura’s story becomes a blur of political races and historical data, peppered with a few personal events. The couple had trouble conceiving a child and were about to adopt when twins Jenna and Barbara were born in 1981. She felt a chill from her mother-in-law Barbara Bush, who closed ranks with immediate family and served tart, judgmental remarks to the young Laura. They later became closer after shared experience as first ladies. George had mixed successes as an oil man and baseball team owner. His fortunes changed for the better when he quit drinking at Laura’s request in 1986. He redirected his focus to helping his father’s campaigns in ’88 and ’92 and then to his own gubernatorial race in ’94. The camera-shy Laura had a national audience when she spoke at the 2000 Republican Convention for George’s Presidential nomination.

This isn’t a George Story so we’ll leave out the (still, I think) sorry details of Dubya’s term in office. For her part, Laura worked on several causes – she wasn’t the Stepford robot that some accused her of being. She supported literacy – the National Book Festival was one of several such programs she started. She worked for women’s health issues – Heart Truth and Susan Komen foundation benefited from her work. Laura also traveled the world and promoted cures for HIV/AIDS as well as malaria awareness. Laura described herself several times as “apolitical”. However, she has come out in several different forums as pro-Choice and pro-gay marriage which put her leftward of Bush and his cronies. She also seems better-spoken and less doctrinaire – is at any wonder that she was voted by Gallup as one of the most popular first ladies in history? Her presence helped to soften the brunt of the Dubya Bush policy debacles.

When push comes to shove, Laura is a staunch defender of her much-maligned husband – you still have to love her for (apologies to both Tammy Wynette and Hillary) standing by her man. She makes some valid observations about the incredibly crass, negative discourse that’s come about in our pop culture. The negativity goes both ways and Obama has been on the receiving end of it more recently.

In all, Laura Bush is a charming woman, whose common-sense approach to life and basic decency come through in all her life’s chapters. If you listen to the book on tape, you’ll get to hear Laura’s Midland accent -- she and George emphasize the sibilant plurals “our heartsss” and “fragrant grassessss”. It’s all good, and if you’re a native Texan, Laura’s story will be in many ways like a trip to a long-forgotten prairie home.

© 2010 blogSpotter

In the Shadow of Madonna

Madonna as big sister? -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I just finished listening to Christopher Ciccone’s Life with My Sister Madonna -- I had the book on tape for 6 months before I got to it. I thought it would be boring, but it was actually fascinating. Christopher’s book describes a love-hate sibling rivalry in which the creative, gay Christopher orbits as a satellite around his 2-year older, million-megawatt celebrity sister Madonna. Christopher’s book gives a first-hand look into the frailties, quirks and vulnerabilities of the Material Girl. From 1984 thru 2006 (when a quarrel left them estranged) Christopher was Madonna’s dresser, stage manager, backup dancer, decorator, and moral support. Though he is gay and a brother, I discern that Christopher probably felt like “first man” in Madonna’s life -- he probably felt usurped when Madonna married English producer Guy Richie who was apparently homophobic and unaccepting of Christopher’s orientation.

Ciccone’s book was generally panned as a disloyal rant from a disgruntled brother and ex-employee. I don’t get that from it at all -- in fact I think Christopher’s book is as much a brotherly love paean as a critique. Christopher and Madonna are both hugely talented and creative -- you can see where some professional jealousies as well as territorial feelings could creep in. I foresee that these two fellow travelers will get back together at some point. Some of Ciccone’s revelations about Madonna actually go counter to her public persona; she doesn’t drink or do drugs and is fairly modest around the house (no slinky gowns or underwear). Ciccone describes his sister as a highly disciplined task master who has total control over her finances and schedules. The “slutty girl” image is very much a fabrication for publicity. If Ciccone's stories are true, Madonna drew him into her sphere at various points with promises (apartment lodging, production roles) that she would then withdraw. That Ciconne would come running back over and over again reminds me just a little bit of Lucy and Charlie Brown with the football.

It looks like the undoing of the sibling togetherness happened in the mid 90’s when Madonna befriended Ingrid -- a wealthy gossip from Miami who convinced Madonna that Christopher was hopped up on drugs (true, in part but highly exaggerated). Madonna withdrew her patronage from Christopher’s design efforts, and even eventually refused final payment on a couple of the projects she‘d engaged him in. At one point where Madonna was raking in $53 million a year, her poor brother was tanking in his restaurant business, begging rides after his car was repossessed, and scrounging up money for a $10K medical bill.

I don’t see this book as sour grapes. I too have an extremely out-going popular older brother. I spent my teenage and college years being “Bryan’s brother”. I can tell from Christopher’s account (even his gift with words) that he’s an extremely smart and talented person -- someone who would shine brightly if he wasn’t having to shine next to Venus or the Sun. What I read between the lines is that Christopher and Madonna are soul mates of sorts -- people who have actually accommodated each other’s dysfunctions since a shared childhood. They have a love that can probably survive the nastiest of fights. This book is a great, albeit slightly voyeuristic read. There aren’t so much heroes and villains as much as flesh-and-blood people. There’s no black and white dichotomy -- just a thousand interesting shades of gray.

© 2009 blogSpotter

Ted, Transfigured

He needs no colorization ... -- Picture courtesy of Grand Central Publishing

by blogSpotter
70 year-old Ted Turner is a well-known media entrepreneur -- actually something of a living media legend. In earlier, feisty career phases, he was called “Mouth of the South”. As you will see, he saw the light and started speaking words of wisdom on the road to World Media Domination. Mr. Turner had a vantage point that only a multibillionaire could have, and he used it to everyone’s advantage. His book “Call Me Ted” illuminates this amazing butterfly transformation.

Ted was born to a successful Georgia car salesman & billboard magnate -- he wasn’t entirely “self-made”. His father Ed probably had a net worth of @ 1 million at the time of his death. Ted’s mother Florence was a quiet matron and barely receives mention in his book. Reading between the lines, Ted’s family wasn’t close. His parents dispatched him to boarding schools (McCallie) and military academies throughout his childhood. His one younger sister died from complications of Lupus when she was only 17. Ted’s personal tragedies were compounded when his parents divorced and then his chronically depressed father killed himself with a shotgun, later in mid-life. 24 year-old Ted was left holding the reigns of Turner Billboards. Ted had just been expelled from Brown (for having a girl in his room) and never finished a college degree. Many associates thought that the young “punk” was too small for the task of running his Dad‘s company but the manic Ted proved them very, very wrong.

It would take 70 pages to enumerate all of Ted’s business and life successes so I’ll just touch on the highlights:

o He expanded Turner Billboards into Turner radio advertising and then into Turner broadcasting
o He decided to expand the reach of his Atlanta Turner station beyond the South (considered a technical impossibility at that time) -- he defied the naysayers and created a satellite uplink company for Atlanta and harnessed the power of then-new cable signaling.
o Moved mountains as necessary -- sued RCA when they wouldn’t offer alternative satellite coverage (after a new satellite designated for CNN crashed). Sued the U.S. government when CNN was barred from being part of the White House Press Corp (won both lawsuits).
o Turner’s new Super Station concept rewrote the industry rules and forced changes in national TV ad rates as well as cable fee structure
Turner innovated 24-Hour news, all-movie channels and a cartoon network along with other new concepts
o In addition to his many business successes Turner was an avid sailor and won the America’s Cup for sailboat racing in 1977.
o Turner purchased the Atlanta Braves in 1976, initially as a ploy to attract viewers to his channels. In the process he became involved in the coaching and helped them to become Series winners (albeit many years later)

Turner ran into rough waters in the early 90’s and what some might call his undoing was really his “doing”. He wanted to vertically integrate Turner Broadcasting, which possibly entailed acquisitions of a movie studio, a broadcast network and/or other big venues. Turner didn’t have the resources and allowed a merger with Time-Warner to provide the needed capital. Turner quickly lost influence in the merged company -- CEO Jerry Levine gradually moved Turner out of all network decisions and basically into a non-acting role “down the hall“. Turner feels that he was vilified for predicting a dot-com meltdown and for seeing problems in the merger with a hugely over-valued AOL. Turner was right, and Levine was eventually given the boot (in essence) but Ted, Time Warner’s largest share holder at the time, was tired of the whole affair and sold his shares soon after. It’s estimated that Turner lost 7 billion dollars in the entire sequence of events -- leaving him a relative pauper with only a billion or so left.

Unlike many other wealthy moguls, Turner’s success gave him pause -- how much megalomania do I really need to demonstrate? Can I make a qualitative as well as a quantitative difference? Starting in 1986, Ted embarked on a series of philanthropic actions that have truly transformed the world:

o CNN hosted the Good Will games of 1986 (and later years) so that athletes who were shut out because of the 1980/1984 Olympic boycotts could compete. These games are thought to have advanced détente with the USSR.
o In the early 1990’s, Turner donated $1 billion to the United Nations, founding the United Nations Foundation. In addition to fighting disease, hunger and overpopulation, Ted’s donation shamed other mega wealthy people into giving more money.
o Ted purchased over 2 million acres of ranch land with the express purpose of restoring habitat and endangered species.

Ted married the beautiful and oft-controversial Jane Fonda in 1991. She was his third wife. In his book, he makes little mention of his mother or first two wives. Again, reading between the lines I can tell that Fonda was the late-September love of his life. Though they divorced in 2000, he discusses her at length, and still professes his love for her. She still lives near him in Atlanta and serves on a couple of his non-profit boards. The divorce was probably more due to incompatible lifestyles than any disrespect -- they both appear to still enjoy quite a bit of each other’s company. Turner said that he was raised in a conservative Republican household and never questioned those ideals growing up. As he became ensnared in the hustle-bustle of business he started to realize that supposed "conservative values" did not really suit him. He states that Jane Fonda was both brave and right in her anti-war stance. He admired her fortitude then and admires it now.

Turner’s most recent enterprise has been a chain of Steak Restaurants (let’s ignore the fact that they serve bison). His other efforts are largely philanthropic -- fighting pollution, global warming, overpopulation and disease. Turner has become solid friends with the progressive community (Al Gore, Tom Hanks et al). In the near completion of his political/intellectual metamorphosis, he embraces Democratic politicians and their causes. Ted has been to the mountain and back -- it is good to know that with all his capacities and experience, he’s settled into a lifestyle of giving, caring and loving our troubled world back to health.

© 2009 blogSpotter

Encroaching Night

Never should anyone forget ... -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
One of my purchases in Washington D.C. was the powerful and compelling novella Night, by concentration camp survivor Elie Wiesel. I bought it at the Holocaust museum, and it is an excellent read for anyone. At 105 pages, and with large print it can be read in one sitting – although the import of its words might take much longer to distill and digest.

Night chronicles the Wiesel family (Elie, his parents and 3 sisters) and their horrific internment in German concentration camps. The Wiesel family and all the Jews of Sighet, Transylvania were deported to camps in late 1944, as the war was actually approaching its end. The timing availed the Wiesel’s nothing – Eric’s parents and youngest sister perished. I carried away from my reading some general impressions and ideas – ideas that extend to current events and social phenomena by the way.

The Jews of Sighet could not believe that a religious group was being singled out for persecution – they were in denial. In early 1944, a synagogue custodian had escaped an internment train and told the townspeople what was happening in the camps; they just wrote him off as a madman. Then Hungary turned the government reigns over to Germany, and German officers settled into Sighet’s guest houses and hotels. The townspeople were told they had to be moved to a new encampment; they rationalized that the move was a protective one, to keep Sighet’s Jews from the dangerous battlefront. They also speculated that Germany just needed their tradesmen for special war efforts – nothing sinister at hand.

They couldn’t have been more tragically mistaken. Within weeks, the Germans had corralled the Jews into a ghetto, then packed them in a cattle car train off to Aushwitz. At the front gate, Germans did “selection” to separate slave labor (the physically robust) from the others. The others – slight women, children, infants, the elderly, the disabled and the ill were immediately gassed. Elie’s mother and baby sister were killed the very day they arrived at Auschwitz. I was impressed that competent “block workers” as they were called were actually allowed to have Hebrew services, and they were fed pretty well at least at the outset – before Russian tanks rolled near. The “select” really were needed for back-breaking labor in the war effort. Also interesting is that the Nazis targeted homosexuals – noteworthy because some of the camp administrators were closeted homosexuals and they would shield young boys from punishment or death for nefarious sexual purposes. (Although in retrospect, one might willingly endure rape as an alternative to gassing).

Toward the end of the war, food rations became scant for SS soldiers and even more so for prisoners. The prisoners had to be moved (marched by foot, in the snow, under SS armed watch) to new encampments. Food was so scarce that fathers, sons and lifetime friends would fight to bitter death over a loaf of bread. Elie couldn’t believe how the circumstances transformed men into animals. Elie, age 15, had the fortune to be encamped with his 50 year old father. However, the cold and starvation took a serious toll on his father and he died only weeks before the camp was freed. Wiesel feels guilt and remorse to this day, that he had resentments – that he was having to carry his dying father and that it might call attention to them both.

When the Russians were about to prevail, the SS could see the handwriting on the wall. The SS officers called all the block denizens to the front of the camp – usually done for roll call or formal announcements. Only this time, resistance fighters had knowledge that the troops were going to simply kill the remaining prisoners. Mow them all down with guns – they were no longer “of use” as slave labor. The prisoners remained in their blocks. It’s heartening to know that even this late in game, even after 6 million deaths, the victims had the moxie to fight back. The resistance fighters had somehow obtained guns and started shooting at the SS troops. The beleaguered SS troops were now fighting Russians and resistance fighters – they had to run.

I’ve already read much about the Holocaust, although I never read such a firsthand account as this. Wiesel had trouble getting the book published in 1955 – publishers at the time thought the topic was too dark and troubling. It’s to Wiesel’s everlasting credit that he persevered and told the story of an evil night that encroached, a night that nobody quite could believe even after it passed.

In closing, here is Elie’s poetic testament to what happened in that critical time:

“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky.
Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever.
Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never.”

© 2008 blogSpotter

Deep Space with William Shatner

Resistance is futile -- Picture courtesy of Thomas Dunne Books

by blogSpotter
I just finished listening to William Shatner's autobiography, Up Till Now. I'm interested in Shatner as an actor in general, and not just as the commander of the Enterprise. But -- I do have some Trek trivia below. Shatner grew up in a religiously observant Jewish family, in Montreal, Quebec. His father was a clothing manufacturer and his mother was a homemaker. Shatner received a business degree from McGill University in '52, and broke his dad's heart by saying he wanted to be an actor. Dad assumed that Billy would follow him in the clothing trade.

Shatner started out selling tickets and managing a dinner theater; from there he managed to transition into some acting roles. He joined the Montreal Shakespeare company after a bit and landed a role in Henry V. He says that in one show he actually forgot his lines and had to have them whispered from the stage hand. His delivery this night was halting and full of pauses – the critics loved it and thought it was deliberate. Later in Star Trek, the same halting style emerged as he struggled to remember lines – again interpreted by audiences as deliberate drama. It very nearly became his signature style.

Kirk did any acting role he could get. He was on Playhouse 90, Twilight Zone and many other 60’s shows. He played cowboys, psychos, villains and many other roles. He had no particular interest in science fiction or space when he was tapped to play Captain Kirk in Star Trek at age 35. The role was first offered to Lloyd Bridges and Jack Lord but they demanded too much money. Shatner thought the role was too serious, so they decided to lighten up the role for contrast with Spock. Nimoy and Shatner had a tepid relationship at first but grew to be friends later on. Both were Jewish men who could relate to their characters’ treatment as outsiders.

In the 90’s, various cast members wrote bios where they’d say how they “hated Shatner”. Shatner apologizes in his own book for being an egomaniac control freak – didn’t mean to be. In later years, Shatner had much fun reliving his role and interacting with Trekkies. He even wrote a sci-fi series, Tek Wars, that garnered a lot of publicity. To publicize Tek Wars, Shatner did a stint of professional wrestling. Don’t ask how these relate, they really don’t. Shatner’s other career highlights have been TJ Hooker, the Giant Head on 3rd Rock, priceline.com spokesman, and an Emmy-winning role as Denny Crane on Boston Legal.

Shatner has been married 3 times, including a very troubled 2nd marriage to an alcoholic woman who drowned in their backyard pool. He says it was the greatest personal devastation he ever had to deal with. Overall, Shatner is a delight to listen to – he is witty, irreverent and completely spontaneous. He’s abundantly willing to look silly or have fun at his own expense. One must note – his music albums Transformed Man and Has-Been are serious efforts, no laughing allowed. Also, he will not disclose whether he’s wearing a toupee; it’s for the reader to find out.

© 2008 blogSpotter

Our Fair Lady

Memoirs of Eliza -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I'm listening to Julie Andrews' autobiography "Home". She's had a remarkable adult life as an Oscar-winning screen actress and singer. She's played a gamut of roles from Eliza Doolittle to Mary Poppins to Queen Clarisse in the Princess Bride movies. At 73, she is now the Grande Dame of Anglo-American Theater (and was in fact named a Dame by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999).

Her childhood was dysfunctional to say the least. Her parents divorced when she was about 7; she spent most of her remaining childhood travelling with her vaudevillian parents. Her Mother Barbara was a pianist and the step-dad sang. Both were alcoholics in need of the program. Julie was fortunate to have a close-by Aunt Joan, and a highly devoted noncustodial father who would step in to care for her when the Mother and step-dad "flaked out" as they frequently did. Julie's Mother dropped a bombshell on her in her early teens -- telling her that her "real" father was in fact a one-night-stand she'd met at a party. Julie continued to embrace and strongly admire Ted Wells, her "societal" father as her real dad.

Her Mother and step-dad sobered up enough to notice her incredible singing range when she was about 9, and sent her to voice coaches and trainers. By age 14, Julie was supporting the family with singing engagements and appearing in small English productions including pantomime shows. Her audiences included the Royal Family by this point, although the good reviews didn't necessarily translate into money. The Andrews struggled to pay bills, and Julie was very oddly parent to her own parents -- ironing shirts, scrambling eggs and sorting out disputes between family members.

When she was pegged for The Boyfriend on Broadway, the naive 18 year old Julie was unaware of how special that was. When Lerner and Loewe interviewed her for My Fair Lady, she had no idea how legendary they were. She almost took a much smaller role in another production until the casting director of that production heard the news. He magnanimously said, "Play Eliza for God's sake! It's the role of a lifetime!" And indeed it was. My Fair Lady brought together some of the finest entertainment talents, anywhere, ever, in one place: Moss Hart, Rex Harrison, Stanley Holloway and many others. A shy 20-year-old Miss Andrews had to deal with the towering egos of those around her. Rex Harrison thought she was way too young. Cecil Beaton, the costume designer, thought she was too unphotogenic and unsophisticated (and would tell her snipily, to her face). Even Moss Hart would dress her down fiercely if she flubbed any lines. Nevertheless, she persevered and got to be friends with Harrison and Hart.

Julie says that she felt at times like Eliza Doolittle -- a country girl undergoing a major metamorphosis into a Bavarian princess. Listening to the book, I realize that she was very much Eliza. She had a suit-up, show-up survivor mentality that is incredible and rare. In taking care of her two younger brothers and reprimanding her lushy parents, she was very much in the role of Mary Poppins. On top of all that, she is and was extremely knowledgeable about opera, singing and music in general. She can give a history of any song -- who sang it, how it was played and in what setting. Dame Andrews remains grounded, kind and approachable where such stellar success would go to anyone else's head. I still have a few chapters remaining in her book but much is already obvious. Julie Andrews is a Dame and a gem -- a rare find in any lifetime.

© 2008 blogSpotter

Wild and Crazy

Getting small in a big way -- Picture courtesy of Scribner

by blogSpotter
I'm almost finished listening to Steve Martin's memoir "Born Standing Up". Given Martin's driven, extroverted nature the title is nearly an accurate statement. From the time Martin was in a 2nd grade school play, he craved the spotlight and performing in front of big crowds. Martin says that he was shy under normal circumstances, but audiences didn’t bother him. Other disclosures about Martin's early life were not all that exciting. His parents were Glenn, a real estate agent and Mary Lee, a housewife. He was born in Waco but the family moved to Garden Grove California shortly thereafter. Martin revealed that his father was fairly cold and distant and they had a strained relationship.

Martin worked as a teen at the Disney Magic Shop, selling magic kits. Later, he worked at the Bird Cage in Knott's Berry Farm doing a magic act that he'd developed while selling the kits. Early on, Martin wanted to be a serious magician or maybe even a singer. His singing career was blunted in elementary school -- Martin sang "America the Beautiful" for his mother and she laughed so hard that she cried. In his magic act, Martin noticed that people laughed at his comic asides and that he almost got a better audience reaction if the magic trick failed. Gradually, Martin came to see that his gift was with quirky comic irony, and not with magic. His actual emergence into comedy was slow and winding process over the 10 years following high school.

Martin studied philosophy and theater, first at California State and then at UCLA. He never completed a degree since his performing career intervened. He started out with a beard and scruffy clothes, doing left-wing political humor. By his mid-20's, he decided that the political humor was passé and limiting -- he left it completely behind. He honed a more conservative image with a 3-piece white gabardine suit and short haircut. Martin says that he was honoring the advice of an experienced club manager: "Always dress better than your audience".

Martin supplemented his meager stand-up income by working as a comedy writer for The Smothers Brothers, The Glenn Campbell Goodtime Hour and The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour. He landed 16 appearances on The Tonight Show; he was crest-fallen when he heard through the grapevine that Carson thought his humor was too silly. For several of the Tonight Show appearances, Martin was only allowed to appear when there was a guest host. Carson later came around to liking Martin's humor (by the mid 1970's) and actually boosted his career at that point.

Martin tried recreational substances on a couple of occasions, had bad reactions and never touched them again. He actually experienced repeated anxiety attacks as the result of one dalliance with amyl nitrate. He also was a very light drinker, not liking how even one drink could affect his performance. There are details to his biography that will make one envious. He knew the Eagles as they were forming their group -- even offered feedback on the group's name ("Eagles" vs "The Eagles"). He dated Linda Ronstadt at the height of her popularity and he even had Fleetwood Mac as his opening act when he first started to headline at nightclubs.

Martin's personal life has been pretty stable and undramatic, considering the turmoil of his comic persona. He's had two marriages (Victoria Tennant 1986-1994) and Anne Stringfield (2007-present). He dabbles in art and actually has a very serious side to him.

Before signing off, here is some background on his trademark slogans and tactics:
• I'm a wild and crazy guy -- he would go into the routine when his act was bombing; it frequently brought everyone back around.
• Well excuuuse me -- the finale to an act where he told the camera man before the show to ignore his pleas for a spotlight. (very big laugh-getter).
• Arrow-through-head prop -- Part of Martin's act from the beginning; a couple of club owners who didn't get his humor told him to lose it.

The memoir deals mostly with Martin's early career, although his first stint on Saturday Night Live is mentioned (along with the rock star following that resulted). All told, Steve Martin has had a terrific career and life. Someone this complex, brilliant and driven should expect nothing less.

© 2007 blogSpotter

A Sin to Kill a Song Bird...

Harper Lee tells a gripping tale -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
The latest book in my "Boomer Lit" series is To Kill a Mockingbird. I thought I'd read this book in my distant teenage past, but I hadn't -- I only saw the 1962 movie with Gregory Peck starring as Atticus Finch.

The book has much finer detail, and more character sketching than could possibly be squeezed into a two hour movie. It's set in Maycomb, Alabama circa 1935, and the small-town Southern setting would surely resonate with my own parents. My mother grew up in Bellmead, Texas and my father grew up in towns such as Groom and Shamrock, Texas (also in the 1930's). The Texas towns' drawls, the attitudes and the racism were much the same as depicted in Mockingbird, though my parents never observed a sensational trial or a near-lynching.

Mockingbird came out in 1960, as the civil rights movement was heating up across America. The book earned a Pulitzer and was recently voted Best Novel of the 20th Century by the Librarians of America. At the time of its publication, it grabbed the attention of Hollywood and thus white Middle America -- it had an enormous influence on our collective racial attitudes and it advanced civil rights.

To Kill a Mockingbird tells the story of an 8-year old tom boy named Scout and her 12 year-old brother Jem. They are children to Atticus Finch, a widower who is the Public Defender at the local court house. Atticus is assigned to defend a black man accused of raping a white woman; the town of Maycomb is in a total scandalized buzz over the proceedings. I won't divulge what all happens, but the author, Harper Lee, tells the story with amazingly realistic imagery. Woven into the racial plot-line is the children's fascination with a local reclusive, shut-in named Boo Radley. Mockingbird adeptly focuses on issues of gossip, innuendo and labeling no matter whether the target is a poor black defendant or a cloistered, ill white person with no public identity.

Mockingbird is semi-autobiographical. Lee herself was the daughter of a prominent Alabama lawyer and witnessed race-related trials in her childhood. There is a bit of Harper Lee trivia to note. She never published another novel after this one. If only one novel was to be done, this was the one to do. She was childhood friends with Truman Capote and the character Dill (Scout's mischievous blond playmate) was inspired by Truman. There were murmurs that Capote was the ghost-writer of the book but all parties including Mr. Capote denied that. Also, the style of the book is similar to but not the same as Capote's style. Lee and Capote remained good friends through adulthood, and she even helped him with research for his opus, In Cold Blood.

Once in a blue moon, a book comes along that changes the world at least in part. Uncle Tom's Cabin and All Quiet on the Western Front come to mind. To Kill a Mockingbird is very much in that tradition.

© 2007 blogSpotter

Savage Island

The call of the wild -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
Just finished reading another novel in my "Boomer Lit" series, Lord of the Flies. Lord of the Flies (LOTF) was the first novel by Nobel Prize winner William Golding; it was published in 1954. The book only sold 3,000 copies its first year but developed a following and is now considered one of the best English-language novels ever written. Warning: there are spoilers that follow; in fact I'll probably give away the whole plot...

LOTF has a fairly dull beginning but is a gripping thriller by the last couple of chapters. It deals with a group of @ 30 British school boys ages 6 to 12, who become abandoned on a Pacific Island when their plane (part of a war time evacuation) crashes with no adult survivors. There's a natural age segmentation between the 'big'uns' (ages 10-12) and the ‘little’uns’ (ages 9 and under). At the outset, the boys organize in a fairly "Democratic" way. The older boys take charge, holding an election. They elect the genial, fair-skinned Ralph as their Chief. Piggy, a plump boy with glasses is Ralph's friend and implicit advisor. Jack is a "macho" strong-willed rival to Ralph. He loves to bark orders and is incensed at Ralph's victory. Even so, at the beginning the boys have a cooperative society. They set about to build huts, gather fruit and build a fire (using magnification from Piggy's eyeglasses). The fire is intended to send a skyward smoke signal to any rescue ships that might pass by.

Jack has a small group who are designated "the hunters". Their only stated mission is to hunt wild pigs using wood spears and a knife. They succeed in killing a couple of animals and become big-headed at their success -- they even originate a celebration dance ritual. After cooking one of the pigs they let the fire go out, which deeply troubles Ralph -- the rescue signal has been snuffed out. Ralph confronts Jack and the two groups develop a fissure. Jack challenges the group: "Whoever wants to be part of the hunt, join with me!". Astonishingly, most of the boys glom to Jack -- maybe impressed by his macho certitude or maybe liking the pork dinners.

From here, things spiral out of control. The hunter group gets carried away with itself and its ritual dance (in which they imitate the capture and slaughter of a pig). Simon, a solitary boy who belongs to neither group, happens on the ritual scene and they slaughter him much like a pig. The hunters steal Piggy's glasses and in a group confrontation, Piggy is shoved off a 40 foot cliff, to his death. By this point, Ralph's "Democratic" group has dissolved or abandoned him. Ralph stands alone against the remaining 'big'uns'. A chase ensues where the hunters intend to kill Ralph. Knowing how skilled Ralph is at hiding in the underbrush, the hunters decide to smoke him out with fire. They inadvertently set the whole island on fire. The chase ends for Ralph and his tormentors when a rescue ship is drawn to the burning island. The boys transform from savage hunters back into skittish school boys as the rescuing Naval officer chastises them for slovenly habits and juvenile war games.

This book was mesmerizing -- I was taken by the turn of events. E.M. Forster wrote the forward to the book, and says that it's a political allegory. Ralph represents Democracy, Jack represents fascism or despotism and Piggy represents reason and truth. These symbolic equations make perfect sense to me. Whether you take the account literally or symbolically, Lord of the Flies is a powerful tale. For anyone who's ever been drawn into office political drama or Faustian bargains of any sort, this book is a must-read. You'll recognize people you've known albeit in an extreme fashion. Some critics have said the book's overall message is that man is fallen and hopeless. I prefer to think that man has hope, but here is what happens when reason takes a back seat to brutal force.

© 2007 blogSpotter

When the Teacher is Willing ...

...the student will appear -- Picture courtesy Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
In continuing my "Boomer Lit" series, I just completed A Lesson Before Dying, by Earnest Gaines. Cards on the table -- this isn't precisely a "boomer" book. At Borders, it was on the same table with other boomer books as recommended summer reading. In fact, it came out more recently in 1993 and was promoted by Oprah's Book Club in 1997. I grabbed it along w/ several other books on the table; its themes concerning racial strife and human dignity certainly put it in a category close to boomer lit.

Set in fictional town Bayonne, Louisiana in the late 1940's, Lesson is about a poor young black man, Jefferson, unjustly convicted to die in the electric chair. Jefferson is witness to a liquor store robbery and ends up being held (wrongly) as the killer. Jefferson's defense lawyer, a bombastic white racist, refers to Jefferson as a "dumb hog" and the main line of defense is that Jefferson is too slow and stupid to have orchestrated such a thing. Jefferson's surrogate parent, his godmother Emma is mortified that her godson has been so maligned. She beseeches her best friend, Emma for help. She asks Emma if her gifted young school-teacher nephew, Grant Wiggins, will meet with Jefferson on death row to teach him something, give him some erudition in his last months of life.

Grant is dubious about the benefit of such an exercise. He is agnostic and doesn't see much point in his teachings or the ministerial visits of Emma's friend, the Reverend Ambrose. Jefferson himself is very depressed and reluctant at the outset, referring to himself as a "hog" and turning his back to visitors. In dealing with racist wardens and local politicians, Grant sees firsthand the elements that doomed Jefferson. He sees in the age-lined faces of his Aunt Lou, Emma and the Reverend Ambrose a wisdom and spirituality that comes from decades of living and not from a college diploma. In the last chapters of the book, Grant is transformed into an advocate for vicitims' rights, and more deeply spiritual (though still not necessarily a Christian). Jefferson becomes a highly composed, dignified man who has no fears about his afterlife -- he is by far the most composed person in the death chamber, in the final chapter of the book.

Lesson is a book about transformations of the soul, transformations that come about when you embrace a situation closely rather than staying a cool, convenient distance from something unsettling. What all of us might carry away from this Lesson is that God walks in the unlikeliest of places, and gives credence, life and meaning to the "lowest" among us. That's quite a lesson to learn for any of us -- and we don't have to be on death row to glean something from the words in the book.

© 2007 blogSpotter

In His Image

Hitchens talks about God -- Picture courtesy Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I just read one atheist book, The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. I found some points of common ground, but on the most important of points (belief in God), I had to differ. I like the way some of these atheist writers get me to thinking. I'm now listening to Christopher Hitchens' God is Not Great. Hitchens is a staff writer for Slate on-line magazine; in this world of strange bedfellows, Hitchens is politically conservative, pro-W Bush and in favor of the Iraq War. In fact, part of the motive for this book was his distaste for Islamo-fascists and the whole concept of religious jihad.

Hitchens makes some interesting points about how we color in the outline of God. We were made in his image, so it's said, but Hitchens believes we have it backwards. With our avid imaginations, we've created God in our own image. And what kind of God have we created? Apparently a very insecure God -- he wants us to bow, scrape and pray to him on a regular basis. He wants us to beseech him for favors, beg forgiveness and make monetary if not human and animal sacrifices. He's the God of tasteless practical jokes -- how else to explain his commanding Abraham to sacrifice his son and then calling it off at the last moment? The God described in the Bible is punishing and vengeful -- even in the New Testament he displays more of a wrathful than reasoned approach.

So what have we devised here? A person like this God would be: vain, insecure, intolerant, short-tempered, inappropriate, cruel, nasty and vindictive. A person with these traits would be on the "do not invite" list. And yet we have no qualms ascribing these exact traits to our Higher Power. I myself depart from organized religion on these points -- the God of my own understanding is not a blustering egomaniacal rage-a-holic.

Imagine if you will, the traits that make for an excellent human. These might include: humility, self-assurance, understanding, forgiveness, deep insight, kindness and love. Depending on how human you want to make him he might also have a sense of style, adventure or humor. My God would never ask me to kill my son, not even as a test. And he's not so insecure about my fealty or belief in him that I must ritualistically recite chants or face a certain direction. He made me and knows every nook and cranny of my mind.

I'm only a couple of chapters into the book, so more may be revealed. Hitchens speaks of a road checkpoint in Belfast where the armed soldier asks him his religion. "Well, I'm an atheist," he replies. The soldier is not satisfied in the least. "Are you a protestant atheist or a Catholic atheist?" The nonsensical nature of this exchange will be obvious to a secular believer such as me -- and it will make perfect since to an Islamo-fascist. I'm sure Hitchens, like Dawkins will part ways with me in some fundamental topics further on, but so far he makes some good points.

© 2007 blogSpotter

Time Travel with Vonnegut

Mixing Sci-fi and WWII -- Picture courtesy Delacort Press

by blogSpotter
Today's blog is another entry in my "Boomer Lit" series -- a quick review of Slaughterhouse Five. I never before read this book and was surprised by its content. Slaughterhouse is a Kurt Vonnegut's semi autobiography about an American WWII POW in Dresden, Germany. I'd say that it's set in 1944, except that the unusual premise of the book merges in science fiction and time travel. It's set in 1944, 1967, 1976 and far into the future. It tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, a tall, frail POW and his travails being moved about to different German prison camps. Vonnegut describes Pilgrim as a friend but I think he's basically a representation of Vonnegut himself. The German guards and officers are depicted somewhat humanely and not as stereotypical Nazi police dogs. "Slaughterhouse Five" is the street address of his last prison location -- an old slaughterhouse being used to house prisoners. Vonnegut (who passed away earlier this year) was antiwar and his book served to publicize the inhumanity of the Dresden bombing. In his book he claims 135,000 people died (@ 60K more than Hiroshima) but Wikipedia places the number more at 35,000 -- still a huge number. Toward the end of the book, Vonnegut describes in some detail the horrors of the bombing.

Vonnegut describes Pilgrim as an avid science fiction fan, whose favorite author is Kilgore Trout. Kilgore Trout is another alter ego of Vonnegut himself; I suspect that Vonnegut believed some of the sci-fi scenarios to actually be true. He expressed his "far out" ideas in the guise of science fiction, through the voice of a cheesy sci-fi pulp fiction writer. Here are some of the ideas conveyed:

o A civilization far advanced over us exists -- millions of light years away on the planet Tralfamadore.
o Tralfamadorians can visit us easily using Time Warp.
o Tralfamadorians can also travel through any other time (the 4th dimension).
o Tralfamadorians have actually 7 sexes, although 4 of them can only be seen in the 4th dimension.
o Tralfamadorians know that everyone who has ever lived is actually still alive in some Time segment that can be revisited.

In the book, Billy Pilgrim is actually abducted by the Tralfamadorians for some time and used in a Zoo exhibit of Earthlings. Slaughterhouse never makes it exactly clear whether Pilgrim is mentally ill or if he really has been abducted. One other review I read suggests that the sci-fi events are hallucinations and that Billy suffered injuries that made these happen. Because so much of Billy's time travel mirrors what he read in the Trout novels, you have to suspect he's been strongly influenced by the sci-fi reading.

I must say the book was an interesting read, but I'm left scratching my head. The sections about WWII are very impactful, much as any antiwar book like Diary of Anne Frank or All Quiet on the Western Front. The sci-fi sections which are thoroughly interlaced seem like non-sequiturs but may be seen as a literary device -- showing how our barbarism might come across to a more advanced civilization. As stated above, I can't help but wonder if Vonnegut was a time travel proponent, and Slaughterhouse Five was his way of presenting it to a mass audience. I cannot say that this book has altered my life in any way, or hugely expanded my consciousness. I will say that it's a very quick and interesting read and it will provoke you into thinking about war if not time travel.

© 2007 blogSpotter

Piecing it Together

New dimensions in Boomer lit -- Picture courtesy Scribner

by blogSpotter
Two months ago, Newsweek magazine ran an article called "Boomer Literature". In it, they talked about books written in the 50's, 60's and 70's that are now considered modern classics: Catch-22, Slaughterhouse 5, A Separate Peace, Lord of The Flies, Confederacy of Dunces, etc. There were easily 50 titles on the Boomer list, only a handful have I actually read. Feeling very sadly deficient, I've purchased about 10 of these books and intend to buy another 30 or so from Audible.com if I can be disciplined enough. The thing is, these books are now being assigned to high school kids and I can't "be there" to discuss a hallmark of my own generation if I haven't read the book. Toward this ambitious end, I just finished A Separate Peace and now I can share my own viewpoint of John Knowles' poignant tale.

Set in 1943, Separate Peace is the story of two teenage boys who are roommates in a northeast prep school, Devon. They are both popular and out-going but one of them, Gene Forrester tends to be more quiet and academic while Phineus (aka Finny) is a popular, accomplished jock. The boys become best of friends while at the same time developing a fierce competition between them to see who can be the most popular well-rounded athlete. Warning -- something of a plot spoiler follows. The love-hate spirals out of control when the two boys undertake a dare devil stunt together -- diving off of a high tree limb into a river; Gene deliberately undermines Finny and causes him to have a serious accident (a crippling fall from the tree). The rest of the book examines the way all the young men at Devon deal with this tragedy and other life traumas, all against the backdrop of World War II which looms large for 16 and 17 year old boys. The book's title partly comes from the fact that Devon is an insular environment for these young men, not old enough to be drafted into war.

Do not bother to get out the Cliff Notes -- blogSpotter will give you the two major themes of this book.

RELIGIOUS OVERTONES

Devon has been likened to the Garden of Eden and the jumping-off tree has been likened to the Apple Tree with forbidden fruit. Gene and Finny have been directly compared to Cain and Abel from the Bible. The fall of Finny has even been likened to the Fall of Man. These symbolic connections probably played some part in the author's subconscious, but they weren't to me the predominant theme.

SUBTEXT

Some reviewers have said that the book might have a "homosexual subtext". To these people, I say "Oh, please". It's not even a subtext, it is the text. This book is soft, gay pornography circa 1959 when the book was written. How gay is this book? Let me count the ways...

First of all, the book has virtually no female characters. There are brief mentions of a night nurse and one boy's mother, but the characters are overwhelmingly male. The author speaks through the character of Gene, and gives extremely precise descriptions of other boys' clothing and anatomies. Much is said of pink shirts, khakis, gym shorts and tee shirts. More is said of long arms, lanky legs, stocky builds and certain shapes of buttocks. A story being spoken through the vantage point of a straight man would give nary a mention to these things, much less paragraph-long elaborations.

The description of the boys' feelings toward each other is more telling than anything. I may paraphrase a bit from the actual text. Each day together is a joy, a victory, a rebirth. Gene cannot imagine a life more exciting than with Finny as his room mate. This culminates in a spur-of-the-moment bicycle outing to the beach where the two boys play in the sand and "sleep" under the stars. The studious Gene even skips studying for a Trig test he knows he'll fail to do this outing with Finny.

Much later in the book, after Finny has recovered from his accident and returns to school, Gene puts off his plans to run away and enlist in the navy. His heart beats faster and he is elated that Finny is back in his life. He changes his whole course of athletic training and physical development per Finny's instructions. At the very end of the book, Finny finally realizes that Gene deliberately pushed him from the tree, and he speaks harshly to Gene. Gene walks around the Devon campus in a daze and sleeps under a bridge, he is so distraught. Now most straight boys, however much they like a male friend do not experience "joy and renewal" from each day of togetherness. They don't sleep under the stars or go into a tragic tailspin over harsh words. The behaviors and feelings described in the book are those of love-sick puppies, deeply in love.

Some of the comments made by other characters such as classmate Brinker are rather pointed and insinuate more than just a jouncing of the tree limb. The end of the book features a mock trial which some people have described as an "outing" of the relationship between Gene and Finny.

CONCLUSION

A movie was made of Separate Peace in 1972. Movie critic Leonard Maltin rated it as a bomb and then dissed the novel by saying it was overrated. Mr. Maltin is probably letting his phobias show through. The book is still a good read, though it is a little chaste as 1950s soft porn goes.

© 2007 blogSpotter

Delusional About God?

Who do we blame for life? -- Picture courtesy Bantam Books

by blogSpotter
I'm listening to Richard Dawkins' book, The God Delusion. Dawkins is a well-known British science professor best know for his strident atheism; two of his other best-sellers are The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker. Much of his book targets organized religion rather than God per se. He describes the God of the Old Testament as a "sadomasochistic, capricious malevolent bully". He lambastes the Gospels of the New Testament, saying that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were cherry-picked from eight other Gospels that had their facts provably wrong. Dawkins says that the four Gospels chosen are inconsistent about such things as the whereabouts of Joseph and Mary. (Were they in Nazareth, going to Nazareth, why did they have to go to Bethlehem?) He says the translations from Aramaic are fraught with serious translation problems. The word for "virgin" also means "young lady". The word "carpenter" can also mean "learned man". And so forth ... I myself am not a fan of organized religion, so much of the critique made sense although it might be a bit on the nasty side.

Now Dawkins seems to be upset with scientists such as Michael Faraday or Fred Hoyle who have some kind of God belief. Fred Hoyle is noted for saying that life evolving on Earth by Natural Selection is about as likely as a wind blowing though a scrap yard, assembling a Boeing 747. Dawkins says that Hoyle knows nothing about Natural Selection (NS) and that NS is anything but chance. He waves the term NS around describing it as "elegant" and "beautiful" but never says to anyone's satisfaction how the molecular mutations are anything but chance. There's no suggestion as to why a collection of molecules has a motivation to grow, mutate or do anything in particular. What I'd say of Darwin's Natural Selection is what I once heard said of New Jersey -- "There's no there there". Even if you tried to go with that theory, there is some type of implied intelligence in something that does the "selecting". Fred Hoyle was absolutely right and he doesn't have to be talking about anything as advanced as a cricket. A complex protein or virus would never happen purely by random molecular collisions. I submit that Neo-Darwinists are a delusional group unto themselves.

Dawkins' other main argument is that someone would have to design God. I have a reply of sorts. Can you imagine the intelligence it would take to create you, fallible though you are? It might not take someone infinitely intelligent to create your cerebral lobes, etc but it would take someone pretty damned smart. Let's set our own goal as being merely that smart -- not at all smart enough to create the Universe. Now -- once we have achieved that state of awareness I submit that you only have to be a tad smarter to understand what created the creator. We answer one question at a time, and then we come closer to answering the Ultimate Question whatever that may be.

A second delusional group are people who are willing to ignore a mountain of geophysical and fossil evidence to claim a literal embrace of the Bible. This same group claims an all-powerful, omniscient, supernatural God who is external to the Universe. They believe that God created us like play dough figures, all in a single, highly productive swoop. Now, there are some problems with that idea. If we were an original handicraft why did God give us vestigial organs? We have an appendix which is a remnant of a herbivorous ceccum. We have a coccyx (tailbone) which is a remnant of a monkey tail. We also have ear muscles no longer in use. Not only is there monkey business here, but God also made some big "fubars". The human anatomy is full of mistakes -- many of them related to our recent bipedal status. We have hip joints ill suited to bearing the weight of the trunk. It leads to hip degeneration and even femoral neck fractures. We have knees with inadequate tibial cartilage, leading to frequent knee problems. The female pelvis is too small for the human baby's head leading to frequent birth problems (probably due to rapid evolution of head size). If starting from scratch, wouldn't God have done it flawlessly? As a computer programmer, I'm well aware of putting Band-Aids on old systems to add on something new. Because of time and budget constraints, we programmers don't get to "start fresh". Humans look like the product of corporate evolution, not instant infallible creation. As H.L. Mencken said, it's obvious that life was designed by committee.

So, what kind of God are we left with? One that is finite, fallible and within the Universe. If that is so, why can't we see Him? It could be that this Intelligent Wumpus doesn't want to be found -- he could be victimized by his own clumsy creations. It could also be that he exists in a different scale or dimension that makes him invisible to us anyway (though nevertheless real). Is he a God of magic and supernatural abilities? No -- he is more likely a God of practical approaches, frugal with resources and gradual in his achievements -- very much like us, his creations. The "miracles" to behold are those that you already see -- highly complex, organized matter.

© 2007 blogSpotter