March 10, 2010

Retro Book Review: When the Stars Went to War

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An introduction: Blame my mother. I’m not sure what children’s videos were on offer when I was a child–I pre-date Barney, along with the rest of the dinosaurs–but whatever the options were, my parents didn’t feel like plunking us in front of them when they needed to balance checkbooks, make a phone call, or anything else that needed to be performed without 2 or three children clinging to one’s legs. Instead, we watched musicals. Similarly, Raffi and Peter, Paul, and Mary were the only kid-centric music we got on road trips; the rest of the time it was The Beach Boys, The Beatles, Elvis, and The Everly Brothers. This probably explains why the main crushes of my formative years were Gene Kelly and Elvis (only the young version, mind). As a result, I continue to be fascinated by the relatively-recent past: if it’s a pop history book or a pulp fiction novel, and it focuses on anywhere in the 1920s-1950s, it’s probably already in my Amazon basket. Anyway, I thought rather than rambling to my thoroughly bored friends, I might as well ramble to the internet as a whole! Behold: my new feature, the Retro Book Review.

For this inaugural review, I’ve rather brilliantly chosen…a book you can’t buy on Amazon. Well, you *can*, but it’ll be a used copy. Let me explain how I got *my* hands on it. Last year, I had a fellowship at the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library in Norwich–officially, I think I was titled the inaugural American Scholar; realistically, I was the all-singing, all-dancing, all-shelving American mascot (I type this with affection). To back up slightly: Norwich, for those of you unfamiliar with the wilds of East Anglia, is the biggest city in the bit of England that juts out towards Europe. During World War II, Norfolk was where all the air bases were for air raids against Germany, etc, and so there was a *huge* American presence for the duration of America’s involvement in the war. At the end of it, the American servicemen and -women started a subscription fund for a memorial about their time in England, and the result ended up as this library, which was intended to be a living memorial celebrating the ties between England and America. It’s a sort of annexed little room off of Norwich’s main library, and the focus of its collection is on all things American, with a particularly good collection of materials about World War II, and the 2nd Air Division in particular. Anyway, a fellowship was started last year for an American post-graduate, or as I put it to my family, it’s like god created a fellowship for which I was qualified. It was a really great gig in a *really* great place, and the fact that I had to give it up after a year doesn’t stop me from regularly swanning in and acting like a VIP to the poor subsequent fellowship-holders who’ve taken my place.

So, it has this fantastic collection of World War II books, yes? One of them is When the Stars Went to War: Hollywood and World War II, by Roy Hoopes. It appears to be out of print, but if it’s any consolation, it seems to be readily available via used bookshops. And if you’re at all interested in the topic, I highly recommend this one. It begins with a discussion of pre-war America, discussing which stars were happy to play isolationist, and which stars (European, British, and American) were quick off the mark to try to call attention to Hitler’s rise to power. If you’re a Myrna Loy fan, this book will make you feel warm all over–she was a tireless agitator against fascism, and has what I think is the best quote in the whole thing, saying disgustedly that Frank Sinatra “used to be a good Democrat.” From that initial discussion, it moves to the outbreak of war in Europe, and has a good overview of the tug-of-war between British actors eager to return home, and the Hollywood studios eager to keep them safe (and making films) in America.

The part I most enjoyed was the gossipy middle section: there’s a great treatment of the fundraising trips across America, which has led to innumerable daydreams of being trapped in a train compartment with James Cagney, as well as a truly dishy discussion of the Hollywood Canteen. I’m guessing you may have heard about Bette Davis’s legendary hook-ups (if you haven’t: she drew more servicemen suitors than any of the other, more classically attractive, starlets; when someone inquired about her popularity, one soldier said “I heard she screws like a mink”), but trust me, there’s loads more in here. It also devotes a few chapters to the USO tours–Bob Hope references are old hat, but there are anecdotes from Paulette Goddard and Mickey Rooney that are fantastic. The discussion of racism within the military is brief, but memorable–as the book recounts, Lena Horne was frustrated by her role as the token black pin-up for black soldiers, and had several experiences of being brought to the (segregated) black units, only to find the first few rows in the audience filled up by white officers. (To her credit, she marched to the back of the auditorium and performed from there.)

The latter portion of the book talked about the actual experiences of stars who enlisted in the military. Aside from Jimmy Stewart’s history (he was stationed in Norfolk, so of course my ears/eyes perked up), I’m much less interested in military history, so your mileage may vary. There’s a full chapter on Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., and shorter sections on several other actors; if you’re interested in discussions of movements between branches and units, you’ll probably find it gripping. I was just waiting for Marlene Dietrich to show up again, so my attention wandered, but I still think it’s a well-written section, ASIDE FROM (and here my political bias shows once again) the portion where Hoopes glibly skates over anything scatter-brained Ronald Reagan has ever done. In his eyes, a sitting president of the United States telling a story from a film as if it really happened to him is just an example of Reagan’s dedication to the craft; I find it somewhat more terrifying.

The Gipper aside, though, I definitely recommend picking this book up, should you ever chance upon a copy. It’s a well-written, well-researched look at a particular niche of Hollywood (and American) history that isn’t typically treated in any depth. And at the very least, you get dozens of solid gossipy anecdotes out of it, which is good enough for me!

 

May 27, 2009

One more…

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…and I’ll stop with the poet gossip. Well, barring Armitage slapping Duffy with a leather glove in front of Foyle’s, of course.

Jezebel has a post on the Padel-Walcott showdown that I think summarises and articulates pretty well what’s been bothering me about the whole thing. A couple sentences that hit the mark:

But it’s also disappointing that any discussion of Walcott’s history of sexual harassment — and he has admitted to propositioning one student — is now tainted by Padel’s appearance of self-interest. Padel’s involvement has sunk the issue into the realm of identity politics, leading Yasmin Alibhai-Brown of The Independent to compare the conflict between the two poets to “the fierce contest between race and gender represented by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.”

Amusingly, I’d almost made the Obama/Clinton parallel in my last post, but thought it was too much of a stretch. But that sense of disappointment–that questions of importance are now hopelessly mired in what nearly everyone at this point is referring to as “playground scandal”–that bit is dead on.

As far as the questions of whether Padel would have gotten the same treatment if she were a male poet…I’m honestly not sure. Possibly, probably…I will say one thing, though; I’ve read a lot of commentary from people, some I know and some I don’t, where I would say the glee they’re taking in either Padel’s resignation or the suggestions of sexism are veering pretty sharply into misogyny. Perhaps I’m over-sensitive, and the guys making endless jokes about how sexist they are, of course they are, silly Padel, ohohoho, are actually doing so with a finely honed sense of irony. But then again, I wouldn’t really know; those particular conversations are ones I, and from appearances most other women, don’t feel comfortable joining–and if these commenters were actually so ironic, you would think they would have noticed it.

Oh, well. Endless news fodder for a position that pays six thousand pounds a year. I’ll yield the final thought, on this and on most academy matters, to a Jezebel commenter: “In academia the politics are so bad because the stakes are so low.”

 

May 25, 2009

At last, an excuse to use a molossus in a post…

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…said molossus being “Oh shit son.”

Ruth Padel has resigned her poetry professorship at Oxford.

I am very torn about this. Reactions, in no particular order of importance:

This is largely, although not exclusively, a matter of taste, but between the contenders I didn’t think Padel was the strongest poet for the job. Walcott is undoubtedly the bigger name (well, perhaps now they’re on even standing), but I also think he’s the better poet.

However. I think if–and this is all very hypothetical, because I don’t know enough about the back story to draw my own final opinion, much less dictate one to the internet–if the allegations about Walcott’s behaviour are true, then he shouldn’t have gotten the post. It’s a teaching position, for god’s sake; how a professor behaves towards a proportion of his or her students–be that because of race, gender, sexual orientation, level of attractiveness, whatever–is obviously a major issue. And, having been in environments where it was common knowledge that certain professors viewed university policy on professor-student relationships as more of a recommendation than a rule, I can say pretty confidently it’s poisonous, and inescapable, for all students, not just the ones directly involved.

But aside from that potential minefield, I very much dislike how Padel handled her own knowledge of the allegations. Perhaps I’m wrong about this–wouldn’t be the first time reading things on the internet has led me astray–but my impression from what I’ve read so far is that Padel quietly emailed a couple of journalists with the news, and that was about it. (As fantastically cloak-and-dagger as the anonymous mailings are, I’m going to ignore them here.) That, to me, seems entirely the wrong tack. I think questions about a professorial candidate’s past behaviour with students isn’t something that should be muttered about, and it shouldn’t be something people should distance themselves from as if it was a spurious line of inquiry; it’s fucking central. Hold a press conference on the goddamn thing–and that goes for Walcott as much as it does for Padel.

I guess I’m just disturbed because the reticence to openly talk about it seems very…retro, and I mean that in a bad way. It seems like the educational equivalent of the twin beds in a married couple’s bedroom on “The Dick Van Dyke Show”; it’s an issue that everyone knows is there, and yet the main players seem to think talking about it is somehow beneath them, or damaging to even bring up. So instead everyone is getting letters through the mail, and another round of elections. It’s amusing for the part of me that enjoys a good round of Spy versus Spy, but for the rest of me, the part that wants the best professor for the job even if that means talking about issues that will give the kids at the back of the bus a good giggle…well, it’s disappointing.

 

May 20, 2009

Just One Book

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Worrying news from Salt Publishing today. The blog post linked describes the state of things pretty succinctly, but to paraphrase even more: Salt is in the hole, and dangerously close to not being able to get out of it. It looks like bad timing of a couple of events–the end of their Arts Council funding is coming precisely at a point, economy-wise, when a publisher could really use it. Anyway, so they’ve launched an appeal to buy Just One Book. Or three, or five!

As coinkydink would have it, I’ve been on a recent book-buying spree for Ph.D. purposes, and just ordered Josephine Balmer’s new book, The Word for Sorrow. Her previous work has been amazing, so I’m looking forward to it arriving for my own selfish reasons as well. But in for a penny, in for twenty pounds or so, so I picked up a few new random books this evening as long as I had the webpage open.

I can’t express how much I want Salt to make it. Hearing they’re in trouble is quite scary, because…well, they’re not Faber, but they’re not a publishing house I think of as particularly on the edge, either. Although I suppose at the moment especially, almost any publisher could qualify as on the edge, or at least within a stone’s-throw of it.

This also illustrates something that I guess is a longstanding problem of poetry: far, far, FAR more people want to be poets than actually buy books of poetry. I guess collections of poems don’t feel cost-effective, although I would argue they’re often more worth for money than a lot of fiction–compared to the average pulp novel, which I power through in an evening or two, a book of poetry that I read slowly and come back to is more than worth its price. But besides that, I just don’t feel like one can write good poetry unless one is also reading good poetry. As it is, my default “I need to write but I don’t have any good ideas stored up” plan of attack is to sit down with a poet I don’t know very well and read quite a bit of him/her in one sitting. Either a particular poem or poem subject will catch my eye (Dear Tobias Hill, regarding “Zoo.” Please see “At the Chaffee Zoo,” by me. Thanks for all the fish.), or I’ll absolutely hate the way something was handled and want to try it myself, or I’ll become intrigued with something a poet does that I don’t (short lines, urban poems, multi-part pieces) and have a go. Bloodeaxe’s submission guidelines on their website includes a delightfully grumpy mention of this, by the by:

If you do not read much contemporary poetry, or if you write poetry ‘as a hobby’, we’re unlikely to be interested in your work. You may disagree, but we believe that no one can write poetry of quality unless they read other poets and are in touch with the literary culture.

–consider this blog post a cane-clutching fist raised in agreement.

We’ll see if Salt makes it–judging by the speed at which the appeal is whipping around Facebook and the blog-o-sphere, there may be some hope. In the meantime, I shall have my fingers very tightly crossed.

 

May 15, 2009

I never get out of bed for less than a fruit bowl.

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Back from Warwick, which George described as the Las Vegas of the Midlands. (George lied.) On the whole a rather obnoxiously resounding success. For one–and you can probably see my priorities here–the surroundings were cushy as all hell, in a soulless conference hotel kind of way, which for my tired student eyes was the best kind of soulless of all. George and Clarissa, Agi, and I were all put up in a hotel on campus; George and Clarissa’s room was at the opposite end of the hallway from Agi’s and mine, which gave us the distinct feeling of kids on holiday getting their own rooms. I thought about jumping on the bed and prank-calling room service, but just lazed around not wearing trousers and clicking through bad late-night movies instead. It was grand.

And the event itself was fantastic. The two events, students and teachers, were in the same venue, so blended into one mega-event with a large interval in the middle. It was a really interesting set-up, with the students and then professors, and one I think should be done more often. I think an outside observer would have been able to tell which students were grouped together–definitely which students went to which university–because there were certain tics of style each group seemed to encourage. (This isn’t always a bad thing.) Although Agi and I write very differently, now that I’m thinking about it; I suppose our tics are our stunning good looks, brilliant writing, and extremely shiny hair. In yet another example of how I’m steadily becoming a grumpy(-er) old(-er) git (er…), I thought the Birmingham students were uniformly lovely, talented, and endearingly nervous. Then I found out they were all in their first or second years of university, so basically fresh out of the womb, and wanted to pinch their little cheeks and knit them mittens.

Anyway, so my ego sufficiently fed, the second reading was marvellous. I’d never heard Luke Kennard or Zoe Brigley before, and liked both of them, especially Zoe–she opened with an English/Welsh retelling of the Blodeuwedd myth. I meant to corner her afterwards and ask if she’d read The Owl Service, but didn’t get round to it; lucky her. And the obligatory drink afterwards in the soulless conference hotel bar, but with great company–a Nigerian poet George knows, and two Warwich alum/tutors, respectively, who I would hate and despise for being very very good poets, but unfortunately I discovered I really like them both. Nerts.

Enormous breakfast the next day, where we all ate far too much. They hid things in little crannies, so I went back with every intention of closing my meal with some refreshing fruit and yogurt, but then found the vat of porridge hidden behind the mini-cereal boxes (is anything more encouraging of one’s larcenous tendencies than a hotel, I wonder? I turn into someone’s senile grandmother, shoving anything packaged into my handbag) and everything went a bit wrong. A nice drive back to Norwich, where George scared the pants off Agi and I by informing us that SOMEONE ACTUALLY FAILED THEIR PHD IN THE VIVA HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, and I was dropped off virtually at my front door. I may never be able to do a reading again.

 

May 13, 2009

WF ISO BYT, BYOB, WTFBBQ

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Apologies for the late notice, but I’ve had rather late notice of it myself. Tomorrow evening, I shall be reading at this:Stratford-upon-Avon Poetry Festival 2009. The breathtaking copy for my particular event is as follows:

A unique showcase of poetry from the bright young things of the Universities of Warwick, Birmingham,
East Anglia and Northampton – taught by the poets who take the platform later this evening.

Me, a bright young thing? I think I’m a bit long in the tooth for it, but it indulges my yen for trying to revive hopelessly outdated slang; so by gum, I’ll take it. As of this writing, it is eight pm the night before and I have yet to so much as consider which poems I’m taking. I have, though, decided on a lipstick colour (I think). How very flapperish of me.

 

May 3, 2009

Hey, Carol Ann, what’s your game now?

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(Can anybody play?)

And now, from my obscure song reference straight on to the grumping: so Carol Ann Duffy is the new poet laureate. I’ve been a little surprised by my own reaction to it: had I posted my thoughts pre-announcement, they would have been mostly complaining about how, when we get down to brass tacks, I think Armitage (the other main contender, in my own opinion and in what I’ve heard about the deliberations) is the better poet. Writing now, though, having had a full day to catch up on what the Guardian, BBC, et al have to say about it, I find myself mostly just tired as all hell of the rampant sexism.

Okay, so the press is hardly proposing Duffy would do better to get back in the kitchen with her shoes off; it’s not that sort of sexism. But the focus is overwhelmingly on her status as First Female Poet Laureate. And I do get it, I do–she’s the first one, that’s great, it’s long long overdue. But something about the coverage is just so…lumpy? For example, the Guardian’s approach was to accompany their article about Duffy with several poems by other female poets. Way to conflate any woman with women as a whole, guys–I notice the New York Times didn’t run an excerpt of Idi Amin’s speeches alongside their November 8, 2008 headlines, but way to trailblaze! I’m using a deliberately outlandish parallel there, of course, but I think the underlying logic is the same. Carol Ann Duffy is a female poet. So is Lavinia Greenlaw, and Anne Sexton, and Jorie Graham, but that’s about all they have in common, and to focus on Duffy as a woman above and beyond everything else about her–at times, the fact that she’s even a poet seems to recede into the background–is diminishing, and insulting, to the rest of us.

I think my thoughts on this have come out of some longer-term mulling, as well as an interesting conversation I had this weekend. I was at a party in London on Friday night, where I had a chance to catch up with a girl I started a Ph.D. programme in Davis, California with, lo these many moons ago. After a year of it, I cut and ran to the U.K., and I don’t think we’d properly chatted with each other since. She’s still in the programme there, and making a great success of it from everything I heard; I’d wanted to pick her brain about the difference between British and American academia, but we ended up talking quite a bit about gender instead. She was saying that, since she’s been here, she’s been struck by how male-dominated the academy is, which made me think–and she has a point. Compared to what I remember of American schools, UEA is a much more male-centric institution. The British poetry scene seems similar–and, if I’m going to be brutally, bitchily honest here, the Norwich scene is no exception. I don’t know that I would classify most Norwich poets I know as overtly sexist, but unconsciously?–it’s been on my mind for a while. A lot of female poets I know just seem to get left out of a lot–the plummier gigs, the planning roles, the out-of-town readings. I remember a while ago being at an after-reading gathering at a pub, and suddenly realising that a mini-caste system had emerged: the prime table, the one grabbed by the ones who arrived first, was occupied only by the boys who got it and their girlfriends. The female latecomers, most of whom had also read, were shunted off to a side table and to find their own chairs. In the grand scheme of things, I’ve had papercuts that were more annoying, but that dull stomach-punch of recognition wasn’t a good moment, and it was all the worse for surprising me.

Anyway, I’ve managed to personalise yet another innocuous news item. Good for Duffy. But–and again with the Obama reference–just as one black president doesn’t mean we’re no longer a racist society, one female poet laureate doesn’t mean sexism is dead and gone. Just ask a female poet–they’re easy to find, of course; just check the second billing.

 

April 23, 2009

BlogNor09: A Dirty Foreigner’s View

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julian-of-norwichOh Norwich. Land of endless flatness, land of the same three pubs we go to over and over and over again, land of three starbucks in a two-minute radius and incongruous gatherings of goths and frankly, the silliest accents this side of Cornwall.

I still feel like–well, I still unquestionably am–an outsider in Norwich. I came here almost four years ago, to join the never-ending ranks of UEA poets, and I’ve…lingered. Norwich seems to do that to people.

It seems silly to try to define Norwich by talking about a non-Norwich place, but I feel like I kind of have to. I grew up in Fresno, a pretty big (500,000+) California city known for raisins, voting against-the-California-grain Republican, and crime. Norwich, if I may be blunt, still spins me out a little. It’s small, especially once you factor in my lifestyle–I go to UEA, I live in the golden triangle, I usually socialise in the city centre. I recognise that’s a tiny wedge of Norwich, but just the fact that I can live my life in that little chunk of town is bizarre to me. Here, I walk places. Where I grew up, you drove everywhere–you had to. From my parents’ house, you could walk to a strip mall with a gas station and a gun shop, and it’ll take you about fifteen minutes. There are no grocery stores within walking distance. There are no pharmacies. There is a bar (helpfully called The Bar), but you’re going to have to brave one of the main traffic arteries of Fresno to get to it, and trust me, you want that street of hurtling Jeep Cherokees in between you and The Bar’s patrons. Even the houses here are cozier–terraced housing is new to me, so the concept of living somewhere where you might actually hear your neighbours has taken getting used to. While I find this proximity comforting when I’m tucked in bed trying to figure out whether that noise downstairs is an axe murderer or not, sometimes it’s also a little stifling. (Note to my neighbors on the Unthank side: your bedroom door squeaks. Fix it.)

And it’s not just the neighbours and pubs and ex-students who insist on moving off-campus and into your goddamn neighbourhood, YOURS–Norwich history keeps crowding in at every turn. I feel this deserves a disclaimer: don’t worry, I’m not about to go on a horrible American dreamy-voiced digression about your history, and how it’s just so moving and I feel so close to my ancestors here!!! Norwich history is full of sheep, undrained bogs, and a rather unsettlingly popular Jewish massacre back in the (medieval) day. (Small wonder there’s still quite the BNP problem.) But…again, my background: the historic neighbourhoods of Fresno are from the 1930s. There’s a house downtown that was turned into a museum because it was build in the 1890s. To move somewhere with its own real used-to-be-live anchorite (check the picture of Julian that opened this post) is very cool. My contribution to Norwich history seems to be the gleeful retelling of every Black Plague-related anecdote I’ve ever heard. I don’t care if they’re true. I love that I live somewhere where I can tell them.

I suppose my final summing-up of Norwich is that I can’t, at least not yet. I think you have to be out of a place to properly write about it–which is probably why these anecdotes about Fresno are tripping through my keyboard so readily. I think Norwich will be the cramped, rainy, medieval heart of my poetry a few years from now, once I’ve left it. In the meantime, Norwich is the boring, tedious, everyday place I toddle through without really noticing. I complain about it. I joke about it. I blog it. April 23rd, 2009: sunny, the teenagers are out in force on the steps of the Forum. I went spelunking for fabric in the market. Bootsie, a neighbour’s enormous ugly cat, is sitting on my gas metre waiting for me to feed him. I’m home.

 

April 23, 2009

How very meta…

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Off to this today–I’ll admit, I’m not quite sure what the deal is, but I got a Facebook invite and everything, so it MUST be important! Also, the opportunity to be famous on the internet never fails to draw a crowd.

(I’m still not convinced this isn’t all a ploy to get Stephen Fry to acknowledge Nathan Hamilton over Twitter. If so: well played, sir.)

 

April 2, 2009

A Tale of Two Readings

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So, two (very) different readings under my belt…well, one reading, actually; I quit a poetry gig for the first time ever Saturday night. But before that mini-rant, the good one: spent a large chunk of Sunday afternoon playing compere, and doing a set of my own poetry, for a gig in the Starbucks on St. Stephens. It was a lot of fun, if slightly clubby; out of about a dozen other performers I was already friends with at least half of them, and vaguely knew most of the others. That seems to be the atmosphere of Norwich, for good or bad: the poetry scene and mini-scenes are inextricably linked. When it’s good, it makes you feel like part of an honest-to-god community; when it’s bad you’re just SICK of people’s FACES and every gig is EXACTLY THE SAME. At any rate, the afternoon was an artistic success for us, and a financial one for Starbucks, so odds are it will happen again.

Now on to the bitchery! I was passed an email from another poet I know about a festival looking for poets to read. The last clinging dregs of my propriety don’t want me to name it, so I’ll just leave it at that. I emailed the organiser, got a reply asking me to bring anyone else I knew, so I cast around a bit and harassed two friends into reading with me. So, come Saturday night, we showed up at quarter after six at the Workshop, thinking with a 7:00 pm start we had enough time to catch up a bit and get partway into a drink before setting up began. So we sat and chatted…and chatted…and chatted. Finally, it was 7:00, and the only poets in the place were, well, us. Once it was about half past and no one else had shown, we figured the night was a bust poem-wise and moved on to our collective second art, Getting Pissed. You can imagine my surprise, then, when a bit after eight o’clock, the organiser showed up all ready to hold a poetry reading and to slot us on the bill…just after she and her friends read, of course.

I had two main problems with this. One: at this point, everyone in the downstairs of the Workshop was there because the upstairs was full up, not because they were there for a lovely evening celebrating the arts. And I’m all for shoving literature down people’s throats (I do teach, after all), but performing what would have essentially been a guerrilla hostage-taking poetry gig is a bit confrontational, even for me. Two: I don’t like being dicked around. I have long ago accepted that Poetry Time, much like Public Lecture Time and My Aunt Libby Time, runs about fifteen minutes behind the rest of the known world. But once you’re so belated that a reasonable person would have given up…At my college, if the professor hadn’t made it to the classroom by the fifteen-minute mark, it was assumed class was cancelled and everyone was justified in going home. That doesn’t seem like a bad everyday rule.

So yes, we told her we were leaving and walked out. A shame, since the Workshop has some killer cider, but I think saying “oh no, you go ahead, I’ll just stay here” would have been…well, hysterically funny, but a bit much.

Anyone else? At what point do you feel justified quitting a gig, if ever? Or does this poetry malarkey mean we’ll take the crumbs of performance we’re given and like it, why in my day, get off my lawn, etc etc.

 

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