Southern Bookman

David Talbot's "Season of the Witch" Gives Compelling, Loving Portrait of San Francisco

After a recent trip to San Francisco, I found that part of me, as with the old song about leaving the heart, remained in the beautiful city by the bay. To bathe in my San Francisco vibe, I downloaded on my Nook tablet David Talbot's history of San Francisco from the 1960s through the aftermath of AIDS, "Season of the Witch."

Talbot, the founder of the online news site Salon and a San Francisco transplant from Los Angeles, gives a fascinating account of San Francisco's bigger than life characters and major late 20th century events, from the Summer of Love to the SLA's kidnapping of Patty Hearst, to the People's Temple James Jones tragedy and the killings of Mayor George Moscone and councilman Harvey Milk. The book, packed with details and based on a number of interviews, rivals Jonathan Mahler's similar history of New York, "Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning." Along the way, Talbot presents a gallery of characters, from left-wing lawyers, Neanderthal cops and politicians, to musicians, artists, thugs, murderers,  and political activists. He gives fresh looks at well-known figures such as former Mayor and now U.S. Sen. Dianne Finestein, 49ers coach Bill Walsh, politico Willie Brown, newspaper columnist Herb Caen and others. By the way, he also gives a minor, if interesting, rundown of the history of the famed Tony Bennett song, "I Left My Heart in San Francicso," which I've recently been playing repeatedly on the piano.

The book received a mean-spirited and off-base scolding in The Sunday New York Times Book Review from someone named Ellen Ullman, who blasted Talbot for giving two chapters to the San Francisco 49ers winning the Super Bowl, bringing healing and normality to a city that had endured decades of extreme politics and social upheaval, and, at least in her eyes, slighting the role of lesbians in rebuilding and healing the city. Talbot penned a protest of the review, which the Book Review printed, along with a weak rejoinder from Ullman.  After reading Talbot's book, I think that Ullman was completely wrong. Her piece points up the continuing decline in the book review's standards in choosing reviewers, along with their writing and judgments.

She does point to a strength of the book, Talbot's in-depth interviews. And, the two chapters devoted to the 49ers are the least compelling in the book, not because of a falloff in the quality of writing and research, but because the winning of the Super Bowl pales in comparison to the dramatic events that shook San Francisco in those years.

Anyone who lived through those times and has a strong knowledge of what occurred in the city will find a wealth of new information in "Season of the Witch." The last pages devoted to the AIDs crisis are a poignant testimony to the human spirit. The book made me feel, paraphrasing John F. Kennedy, "eich bin en San Franciscan."

Speaking of the Nook, I was full of happiness at the tablet after using it to download a copy of Los Angeles food critic Jonathan Gold's collection of reviews about ethnic restaurants in that city, a tome I'd looked for fruitlessly for years in bookstores. Alas, just when my Nook feelings had reached a new high, I bought a volume of writings by legendary rock critic Lester Bangs, only to find blank pages when I tried to read it. (A commentary on the lost brain cells of the era?) I called the Nook helpline, and talked for some time to a friendly Asian woman, who, although we couldn't understand every other word, gave me detailed instructions about how to fix the problem. However, her solution didn't work, so she promised to report the situation to a technical team, whom she said would need a week or two to fill the empty spaces with Bangs' vivid prose. I hope that occurs, but I'm skeptical, especially since Nook apparently no longer sends me emails confiming my purchases.

Despite the occasional breakdowns, I'm generally happy with the Nook, after my initial impulse to take it back after receiving it as a Christmas gift. I still love print on dead trees, but the Nook offers many advantages. I find it eases the acquiring and reading of books. Several weeks ago, I downloaded the Sunday Washington Post for 75 cents, and marveled at the facility in reading the newspaper, flipping through the pages with e-ease.

James Lee Burke Shows Jarring Contradictions, Literary Skill in Latest Work, "Creole Belle"

James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux books represent the most extended excursion I've made into the macho crime-novel genre. I've read one or two of books by Elmore Leonard and a couple by Carl Hiassen, and probably five by Burke, whose descriptions of western and southern Louisiana enflame my nostalgia for my native state.

I've just finished Burke's latest, "Creole Belle," finding it a mixed bag, as usual with his books. As with Hiassen and Leonard, the villains possess cartoonish evil natures. Burke enjoys violating crime fiction rules, memorably laid down by Leonard a few years ago. At times I wish Burke would hew more closely to Leonard's standards; Burke's frequent philosophical digressions make me long to get back to the plot. Unlike Leonard counsels, Burke is big on the weather, in Burke's books, it seems the rain is falling in every scene, or clearing up. HIs effects grow repetitive, a number of scenes begin with nearly the same wording.

Burke shows signs of wanting to be the serious literary writer he once was, which is one reason he goes against Leonard. I realize that Burke's descriptions of nature and Louisiana towns are a major reason I like his work. Burke overwrites, his words drifting deep into the purple, but when he's under control, he achieves a masterful, poetic depth.

In his latest work, Burke gives even more emphasis to Robicheaux's sidekick, Clete Purcell. He also introduces a couple of other characters, who are more outrageous cartoons than real characters. As with Burke's previous book, a prequel to "Creole Belle," he shows an end of life, elegiac wistfulness.

Burke strives to paint Robicheaux, Purcell and their families as more virtuous characters than the evil-doers. But, part amusingly and part dismaying, Purchell and Robicheaux reveal themselves as more sadistic and brutal than the evil guys they end up slaughtering. Much of this violence comes off as gratuitous, as if Burke enjoys showing how far he can go.

In "Creole Belle," Burke takes on the oil companies and the gulf oil spill, although he never mentions the perpetrator, BP, by name. While he blasts the oil companies for ruining the traditional Cajun lifestyle, he shows his characters driving from say New Iberia to New Orleans without forethought, a freedom that would be impossible without the oil companies. Thus, while painting big oil as evil, he presents a society irrevocably addicted to oil.

Burke again goes too far with his descriptions of violence; and his depictions of women are plagued by an combination of leering sexism and old fashioned paternalism. His dialogue can be clumsy and heavy-handed, along with his historical/philosophical musings. The best parts of the book are when he shows his talent as a literary artist, such as the finely imagined final scene of Clete Purcell and some Vietnamese children he befriends at a Key West beach.

Despite his contradictions, displays of careless writing and lack of consideration for the reader, Burke in the end transcends his weaknesses, presenting a tragic and artistically moving portrait of Louisiana culture under siege by environmental degradation and societal change.

Ben Bradlee Unveiled

Jeff Himmelmann's portrait of Washington Post legend Ben Bradlee upset Bob Woodward, who didn't like Himmelmann's disclosure that Bradlee cast some doubt on Woodward's "Deep Throat" myth. Woodward and Bradlee apparently both grew angry with Himmelmann, Bradlee's assistant, and I was swayed by Woodward and Bradlee that the book, cleverly titled "Yours in Truth," crassly sought to stir up scandal and controversy and was not worth reading.

Well, being a Washington Post/Bradlee junkie, although not as vervent as I am with The New York Times and New Yorker, I decided to download the the book on my Nook. Well, the book is quite enjoyable, and I credit Himmelman with uncovering some new, interesting information about Bradlee that Bradlee declined to disclose in his memoirs. Beyond intriguing takes on the Bradley/Katharine Graham relationship, Bradlee and first wife Toni's friendship with John and Jacqueline Kennedy, Bradlee's leadership of the post and his personality, and Bradlee's marriage to Sally Quinn, along with Watergate, Himmelmann is an engaging writer.

Apparently, the book has caused waves among the Georgetown set. I don't know how much of Himmelman is right, but a lot of what he says has the ring of truth. Plus, it's sort of pleasing to have Woodward, known for dredging  up secrets about American presidents, being stung himself. I haven't heard what if any reaction Woodward's Watergate mate Carl Bernstein had; Himmelmann gives an interesting portrait of Bernstein, who with all of his flaws comes off as more appealing than Woodward. He also gives a human dimension to the Bradlee legend, showing him as often a more ineffective leader than his reputation claims.

"Yours in Truth" is largely based upon Bradlee's files of memos, letters and other writings. Himmelmann also carried out an impressive number of interviews. Himmelmann at times loses control of his narrative thread, but all in all gives a more balanced, nuanced portrait of Bradlee than presented in "All the President's Men" and other books. As an old newspaper guy, my overriding feeling is one of sadness at how diminished newspapers, including the Post, have become since their heyday in the Watergate era.

Farewell, Gore Vidal

Gore Vidal's death came as a surprise, as if I believed that his supercilious, patrician intellect would even intimidate the Grim Reaper. Alas, Vidal died this week at age 86, showing that he, too, was mortal.

I agreed with the late Christopher Hitchens and others that Vidal's writing in later years spun off the rails into ravines of crankiness and absurdity. His contenton that George W. Bush knew in advance about Sept. 11, following his belief that FDR had advance knowledge of Pearl Harbor, was one example, as was his nutty admiration for Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

Vidal, though, will always live in my personal pantheon of literary stars and characters. When I was a young man, reading his essays revealed many of the negative aspects of American culture, politics and society. I'd suspected much of it previously, but Vidal gave me a language and framework for understanding the abuses of American power and the corruptions of our culture. Along with other radical writers  I discovered at the time, he made a major contribution to my skeptical, critical outlook about our history, government, literature, economy, business and culture.

I made an attempt to read Vidal's historical novels, but I found his fiction artificial and stagy. His essays pulsed with energy, laced with satiric humor and a world-weary, cynical learning. With all of his erudition, he also had brilliant insight into American popular culture, particularly movies, TV and the theater. He championed writers like the neglected Dawn Powell and fired blasts at overly popular figures. Although I was too young to remember them, I enjoyed accounts of his TV feuds with William F. Buckley and Norman Mailer. I also found his late memoirs entertaining.

Another voice with whom I measured my life is gone. The decline of the American republic that Vidal accurately registered in his best work accelerates. Writers such as he appear more and more as sirens sounding without affect, lost in the cacophony of ignorance. 

New Yorker Examines Book, Film Industries in Changing Times

The current New Yorker offers two articles that say a lot about what's happening in the book and movie industries. The always excellent Ken Auletta analyzes the Amazon and Apple-book publishers battle over ebook pricing. Ted Friend's profile of the comic star Ben Stiller provides a wealth of auxiliary information about how it's decided which movies are made and become box-office hits.

Auletta shows how the book publishers hope to preserve the venerable system in which publishers depend upon bookstores to market their books. The e-book system is an entirely different model. The article shows that the Justice Department overreached in suing the book publishers and Apple for colludng in setting ebook prices, and sees Amazon as the monolith seeking to control the entire book operation, from publishing to sales. However, while Amazon's drive for a books monopoly is seen as potentially limiting the varety and quality of books published, Amazon does open the gates to self-publishing, letting writters bypass the traditional dependence upon publishers. The Amazon operation might let thousands of voices speak, or, as is likely, a structure will arise in which quality and popular appeal take precedence.

The conclusion reached by Auletta is an important one: The publishers make up a relatively small cottage industry and the real battle for dominance in among the giants, Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook. They are seeking to control the Internet world's "entire equation," as F. Scott Fitzgerald said of his film producer Monroe Stahr, hardware, software, content, products.

Friend's profile of Stiller, one of the Hollywood's diminishing number of bankable stars, shows the movie business in a desperate hunger game of how to attract an increasingly distracted and fragmented audience. Fewer movies are being made and fewer stars emerging as the big profits are made from superhero vehicles and techno-franchises. Young men from 17 to 25 hold the key, with films limited for the rest of us.

 

 

Farewell, Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury said he received his education in the public library, so it is apt that I'm writing this appreciation of him in the public library. The science fiction writer died Wednesday at age 91.

With his hardscrabble background, Bradbury was the essence of American democracy, a self-taught author who succeeded through hard work, perseverance and talent. My first memory of Bradbury was reading an except of his "Farenheit 451" in Esquire magazine. I also loved his "Illustrated Man" story, although I stayed away from his Martian chronicles. Another memorable work was his writing manual, loaded with classic advice and inspiration for writers. I recall his anecdote about how he wrote at typewriters for which he had to pay an hourly fee to use. So, I'm now writing this on a computer in which I have 55 minutes. The last thing of Bradbury's I read was a childhood memoir in the New Yorker's current Science Fiction special.

In this age when science and education are under attack, especially from America's now sadly mainstream right wing, the loss of a learned humanist like Bradbury shows the decline of public discourse. The atmosphere of his "Farenheit 451" is all too prominent.

Robert Caro, dinosaur rock star

Robert Caro's "The Passage of Power," the fourth volume of Caro's massive Lyndon Johnson biography, is receiving the kind of attention that books usually don't receive any more. The 78-year-old Caro, who has been working for decades on the biography, has been profiled in the New York Times magazine and Esquire, and the book has been reviewed universally, including Bill Clinton's rave on the front page of the Times Book Review.

Ironically in this era when movies for adolescents generally receive this burst of attention, articles on Caro emphasize his old-fashioned techniques. He works in an office in New York City, writing first in longhand, then on a Smith Corona electric typewriter. Shunning the computer and the Internet, he keeps cross-referenced paper files, kept in metal cabinets, in the once familiar manila folders. He's also drawn attention for his obsessive accumulation of details and the long delays in publication of each volume that has appeared so far. Times columnist Joe Nocera recently ridiculed Caro for this need to account for every minuscule piece of Johnson's life. He also disdained Caro's continued delays in finishing the project. At 78, Caro  has not yet examined the bulk of Johnson's presidency.

While Nocera's hit job smacked of an envious middleweight swinging wildly at a heavyweight, Nocera scored some hits. Caro's compulsive acculumulation of facts, ancient techniques and relentless editing and rewriting can seem pathological. Yet, in reading Nocera's piece, I wanted to defend Caro as one of the last, if not the final, upholders of an ancient tradition of scholarship and writing.

I'd recently read Natalie Dykstra's fine biography of Clover Adams, the tragic wife of pioneering American historian Henry Adams. Dykstra shows Henry Adams as very similar to Caro in his constant uncovering of details and stretching projects into mulitiple volumes. I wanted to tell Nocera that Caro deserves honor and acclaim for searching for the truth no matter what it takes.

Still, Adams finished his massive history of the United States under the Jefferson and Madison Administrations much faster than Caro has done with his work. And, the descendant of John Adams and John Quincy Adams later published his "Education of Henry Adams" and "Mount St. Michel and Chartres."

As as reader, I bailed out of the Johnson project after Caro's first two volumes. His look at Johnson's years as the master of the U.S. Senate bogged down in legislative minutia. The New Yorker published an excerpt of the "Passage of Power," Caro's  account of the Kennedy assassination, which captivated me. I'll probably make an effort to read the entire book, which begins with Johnson's effort to gain the Democratic presidential nomination in 1960, examines his lost years as Kennedy's vice president and ends with Johnson's leadership in passing landmark civil rights legislation.  The look at Kennedy's presidency from Johnson's viewpoint promises to give a fresh account of "Camelot."

By the way, the title "The Passage of Power," strikes me as odd. This has a passive tone, as if the power passed to Johnson in some magical, mysterious way. It almost sounds as if it were a normal passage of power, as happens when an incumbent ends his two terms, or loses an election. The title's bland construction denies the historical reality that Johnson gained power because of the assassination.

Ed Sanders Remembers the Fugs

I'm finding it all too easy to buy books for the Nook. The cost is less per book than in a bookstore, but clicking that little tab quickly adds up. 

My latest ebook purchase is "Fug You," the memoirs of Ed Sanders, one of America's overlooked cultural heroes. How ironic that I would follow Ed's career into the ebook era, when I first encountered his work on vinyl 33-rpm records when he was the leader of The Fugs and a solo artist who produced one of the great albums, the "Ed Sanders Truckstop." I have also read many of Sanders' books, including "Tales of Beatnik Glory," poems and "The Family," the best book written about the Charles Manson trial. Even when he was publishing iconoclastic works such as his "Fuck You, a magazine of the arts," Sanders stood outside of the bohemian counterculture.

Like another satirical genius of the '60s, Frank Zappa, Sanders has a conservative side that allows him to look critically at the excesses of the philosophies that took root in the '60s. As with Zappa, Sanders' songs take a broad aim, examining middle class conventional society as well as the hippie, left wing culture that brewed its own deadening conformity in rebelling against "the bourgeoise."

Like Sanders, Zappa first produced classics as the leader of a band. Zappa's Mothers of Invention and Sanders' Fugs produced brilliant satire that showed a firm grasp of a range of musical styles, not only in melody but with lyrics. Then both of them produced ground-breaking work as single artists. While Sanders also wrote poems and books, Zappa moved into different realms as a producer on Bizarre and Straight records, with such imporant works as a album of Lenny Bruce's Berkeley concert and Captain Beefheart's "Trout Mask Replica." 

While Zappa's music grew more sophisticated and self-conscious with its models on jazz and classical music, Sanders found a similar model in country western and swing. Both found rich troves in early rock and rhythym and blues. Like all great parodies, Sanders "Truckstop" not only makes fun of country motifs, but shows great love and respect for them. As with Zappa making great rock and jazz while parodying them, Sanders makes great country and swing music.

Sanders with his blue collar characters such as "Johnny Pissoff" showed an early understanding of and sympathy for working class anger that most '60s writers lacked. Zappa understood a different class, a more suburban, California-mall-oriented group, while Sanders captured the feelings and cultural touchstones of truckers and plumbers and carpenters, haunted by Jesus, sex and booze. Sanders' humor is more free-swinging and guttural than Zappa's. The Fugs, who also included the late Tuli Kupferberg, were part of the New York village scene that also produced Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, while Zappa came from the Southern California freeway-oriented musical mix. While turning to country, Sanders and the Fugs kept the Lower East Side influence; while Zappa remained rooted in Laurel Canyon.

Sanders' self styled "investigative poetry" is too programmed and topical, but I'll always remember reading his "Poems for New Orleans," on the abuses in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. His poems put these in a more memorable and compelling form than the countless magazine articles and books about the storm's aftermath. As with all of his work, he shows a jazzy, free-form sensibility along with a deep knowledge of New Orleans' history and culture. I bought that book in Cambridge Square, then spent a nice morning in Harvard Yard reading it. Sanders' poems, like his other works, are viscerally entertaining.

The Fugs' name, like that of his new memoir, comes from the euphemism that Norman Mailer used in his celebrated first novel, "The Naked and the Dead," for the old four-letter Anglo-Saxon f-word . This nod to literary culture is another hallmark that set Sanders apart; he has a strong knowledge of American poetry and fiction, with Fugs songs making references to Ezra Pound, Marianne Moore, and Hilda Doolittle (HD). He references Homer and the Iliad in "Truckstop."  Unlike some anarchists and bohemian figures, he had a strong reverence for books and writing, a desire to preserve and celebrate the literary culture. That's why his book on Manson displays such deep understanding; Sanders knows and is part of the nihilistic cultural waves that produced Manson, but possesses the disgust and foreboding of a cultural conservative.

At 72, Ed Sanders continues to provoke and entertain. Reading him, I am saddened that Zappa didn't live to see the social media era. But I'm thankful to have Sanders still among us. 

American literature is blessed with writers like Saul Bellow and Philip Roth who continue producing vital work into old age. Sanders, for all of his idiosyncrasies, can stand among them.

 

Encountering the Nook

Now I've entered the e-book world, having received a Barnes & Noble "Nook" for Christmas. I've used the Nook for reading the celebrated "Pulpwood," the collection of magazine writing by John Jeremiah Sullivan. After reading orgiastic reviews by the New Yorker's James Wood and others, I wasn't that blown away by Mr. Sullivan, whose work struck me as remote, and emotionally un-engaged. Too much about him, not enough about his subjects, although he did introduce me to an old blues song I'd never heard of, 'Last Kind Words Blues."

I also used the Nook, which always reminds me of the old nasty word for female genitalia, to purchase Patti Smith's memoir of her friendship with Robert Mapplethorpe. I also downloaded quite a few classics, either free or for $1, such as Alexander Pope's translation of "The Odyssey," James Joyce's "Ulysses," etc. In some ways, I find the Nook easier reading than a book, easier to rapidly skim through, so I thought I could at last finish Joyce's work and others. In searches of what's available on the Nook, I've found some puzzling and distressing omissions. One day, I suppose, I'll try movies, TV shows and movies on "The Nook."

Speaking of magazine writers, I've read two pieces, Wood's and one by David Brooks, that calls all magazine pieces "essays." The term can refer to pieces used to be known as "articles," i.e. factual works based on reporting. I thought the term essay referred to personal, reflective pieces, although an author can write an essay on subjects outside of the self, such as books, paintings, cities, places. Yet, I was curious that the term essay has been expanded. Is this a cover for the blending of fact and invention? Would celebrated pieces such as Norman Mailer's look at Vietnam Moratorium Day, or Tom Wolfe's look at the Merry Pranksters, be called essays, not reporting? 

On a trip to New York, I discovered a recently released collection by a vintage New Yorker writer, Wolcott Gibbs. He was a triple-threat man, doing articles, short stories, theater reviews, "Talk of the Town" pieces. His most famous piece, I suppose, was the paradoy of old Time-ese, "Backward Ran the Sentences Until Reeled the Mind." Reading Wood's piece on Sullivan, which claimed for Sullivan territory covered long ago by New Journalists like Mailer, Wolfe and Gay Talese, I felt a similar dizziness.

 

Farewell, Christopher Hitchens

At Christopher Hitchens' death, I recall in some amazement how much of his work I've read. Before completing his memoirs, "Hitch-22," I regularly read his columns in Vanity Fair and the online magazine Slate, as well as collections of his essays. I first started reading him years ago in "the Nation," when he was an unalloyed member of the left. I've also read some of his other books, such as his appreciation of Orwell.

Reading his book reviews for the Atlantic in his recently released volume of collected essays, I return to my earlier opinion that he was at his best writing about literature, although he perhaps was better known as a political and social polemicist. Although he never wrote fiction or poetry, or at least published any, he possessed as a critic a perception of imaginative writers' purposes and how well they accomplished them.

At times in his political writing, I felt he was a fraud, a charlaton with opinions a bit too glibly stated. He was always, though, an engaging writer who challenged thought, an examinatioin of my own opinions and conceptions. I liked his swaggering, wise-guy personality. His takedowns of Mother Teresa, Kissinger and Bill Clinton remain in my memory, bolstering my skepticism and natural propensity to shun idols.

His final writings gave excruciating details about the progress of the cancer that killed him. A final piece in the current Vanity Fair vividly renders the pain and humiliation of a terminal patient. It reads like great fiction, making me wish that he had written novels and short stories.

He dies at 62, the same age my father died of cancer nearly 30 years ago. Hard to imagine the world of thought and language without Hitchens' distinctive voice.