Gay Idol

My first exposure to Idol was Britian's version, called Pop Idol, when Annie and I were in England a few years ago. The winner was an out gay guy named Will Young.

I'd love it if we had an out gay/lesbian/queer Idol...and there are a number of possibilities this year.

Tonight's episode should be interesting given that the news recently broke that contestant David Hernandez--who had an outstanding performance last week--worked for years as a stripper at a gay club.

And whoa, Danny, I wish you'd wear this makeup and show this same attitude on TV! (But of course the internet is already being filled up with a bunch of homophobic rantings about these guys ... )

Things That Keep Me From Writing

* paper-grading
* lesson planning
* CLA minutae
* reading
* day-dreaming
* paying bills online
* shopping and cooking and vacuuming and cleaning out the cat box and other things I must attend to for daily living
* email, email, email
* aqua sky after weeks of clouds
* dogs under my feet, begging for a walk
* research for my historical novel (very easy to get lost in)
* insecurity about what I'm writing
* blogging (oh, I guess that means I should stop the list here)...


What keeps you from writing?
Collin tagged me to pick up the work of fiction closest to where I'm sitting right now that has 123 pages or more, turn to page 123, find the fifth sentence, then post it and the next three sentences.

Book: Norton Anthology of Short Fiction (1738 bible-thin pages)
Page 123: "Silver Water" by Amy Bloom
Three sentences:

"Nicely put," my mother said.
"Indeed," my father said.
"Fuckin' A," Rose said.

I tag anyone who will have fun with this.

Novelistic

A small press is showing interest in one of my novels. An editor has asked me for some revisions, which I've been working on all day--and last night since I couldn't fall asleep (for reasons to be discussed in another entry, once I can share them).

On the reading front, I've been luxuriating in Joyce Carol Oates' journal. Here's an excerpt written in March 1975:

"The novelist is an empiricist, an observer of facts . . . objective and subjective 'reality' . . . he must guard against the demonic idea of imagining that he possesses or even can possess ultimate truth. . . . The person who completes a novel is not the person who began it. Hence the joy of creation, the unpredictable changes, transformations, some minute and some major. As soon as the novelist stops observing, however, he becomes something else--an evangelist, a politician. . . . When one believes he has the Truth, he is no longer an artist."

She often mentions in the journal her husband, Raymond Smith, founder of the Ontario Review. I just googled him and was stunned to find out he died two weeks ago. They had been married more than 45 years.

Ellen Degeneres: We Are Not Second Class Citizens

The murder of Lawrence (Larry) King has now made it about as national as you can get. Thank you, Ellen. (and Joe.My.God.)

Less School, More Prison: Coincidence?

My partner Annie teaches in a public school district that is facing a $5 million cut next year.

I teach at a university that is also facing severe cuts; as an adjunct faculty member, I'll likely face a lay-off notice in my mailbox (that may or may not be followed-through on).

And now I see the New York Times is reporting that one in 100 American adults is behind bars.

These prison and jail statistics include the fact that these percentages are incarcerated:

* One in 36 Hispanic adults
* One in 15 black adults
* One in nine black men between the ages of 20 and 34
* One in 355 white women between the ages of 35 and 39
* One in 100 black women

It's truly a sickness that our country spends so much time and money on the back-end of crimes and not nearly enough on the front-end of education.

The abysmal statistics for people of color reflect, in great part, the abysmal inequities of the school systems, as books such as Jonathan Kozol's Savage Inequalities make horrifically clear.

Not to mention that it's much much easier to get little or no jail time for a crime when you've got money and connections--or if you're white. For instance, research shows virtually the same rate of drug use in white populations as black, "yet this proportion is not remotely reflected in the prison population."

And there's also the case of a crime as "lesser" because it's one committed by white or wealthy people (such as the lighter sentencing policies for selling powder vs. crack cocaine).

We need to stop incarcerating non-dangerous offenders. And we need to pour the savings into education.

A Literary Day to Remember

We had nice turn-outs at both ZZ Packer events yesterday. ZZ was a joy to interview on stage. She's funny and smart; she makes complex ideas graspable. She has insightful things to say about writing, literature, politics, life.

During the Q&A, she was asked if writers of color have different expectations placed upon them than other writers. She said yes, definitely--that artists who come from marginalized communites have to battle the internal voice that tells them they must somehow be representative (an impossible task), that they must showcase only positive portrayals of their community, and that they must not air its "dirty laundry." They need to silence the voice that says "make us proud" and write whatever they want to write.

This really struck a chord with me because I've written stories about lesbian and gay people that are not particularly complimentary of the individual characters--but that's only because I want to show queer people in all of our human complexities. Ultimately, I believe, we're serving our "marginalized communities" and the broader society better when we do this because we're offering human portrayals. Only complex, human characters will evoke the universal human condition. So the paradox is that the more specific and flawed our characters, the more we are likely to strike a broader chord.

As far as writing advice, ZZ said that writers must write about whatever truly moves them, whatever is meaningful to them--like "the kinds of things you'd write about in your diary; write about that, but make it better!"

In the evening events, ZZ read from the terrific story "The Ant of the Self" (from Drinking Coffee Elsewhere). The story is from the point of view of a teenage boy named Spurgeon, a high school debate champion who bails his father out of jail. Their embattled relationship is played out with the Million Man March as the backdrop.

She also read a few pages from her historical novel-in-progress. She was self-conscious about this, she told us, because it's hard for her to read from work that is not yet finished. The passage was a mind-blower. It takes place during Jubilee, the post-Civil War time when slaves had just been freed. When a now-freed slave named Lazarus tells his former mistress that he and his sister will be leaving the plantation, the woman is upset at their "desertion." She says, "I have always clothed and fed you." Lazaurs replies, "I thought it was the other way around."

The next morning, the woman comes to their cabin and says, "I'm sicking the dogs on you. You have a half-hour head start." So Lazarus and his sister take off, walking all the way to New Orleans, where they have some family members who don't seem thrilled about taking them in.

All I can say is I can't wait to read the whole novel. It's stunning. We were fortunate to be able to hear it. Another (different) excerpt of the novel has been published here by Granta. The title is Buffalo Soldiers, but ZZ has since changed it to The Thousands.

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An aside: When you put "maligned synonym" into Google, look what pops up first by clicking HERE.

Two Big Events Today

If you're in the Bay Area, we have two free events today featuring ZZ Packer. She's a hot writer and a wonderful person.

She has recently been named one of America's Best Novelists by Granta--quite a feat given that this prize was determined based on the in-process manuscript of her current project, a novel about the Buffalo Soldiers. You can read an excerpt here.

I'll be interviewing her on stage for the 1 p.m. event:

1 p.m.: On-stage conversation
followed by audience Q&A and book-signing
SJSU University Room

7:30 p.m.: A Reading from Packer's in-progress historical novel
followed by audience Q&A and book-signing
SJSU Music Concert Hall

More about ZZ:
ZZ Packer is the author of the short story collection Drinking Coffee Elsewhere, a PEN/Faulkner finalist and a New York Times Notable Book. Her stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, and The Best American Short Stories (2000 and 2004) and have been read on NPR's Selected Shorts.

ZZ was born in Chicago, and raised in Atlanta and Louisville, Kentucky. Although intent on becoming an electrical engineer, she forsook MIT for Yale (and is forever grateful she did). She received her MFA at the Iowa Writers' Workshop and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, where she also held a Jones Lectureship.

ZZ has been a public high school teacher and barmaid (though not at the same time); has worked as an SAT tutor, a purveyor of vegetables and a coffeeshop barrista, where she indeed wished on multiple occasions to be drinking coffee elsewhere.

ZZ currently lives with her husband and two sons in the Bay Area.

Has anyone seen Freeheld: The Laurel Hester Story? I haven't, but apparently it chronicles the fight of a terminally ill New Jersey woman to leave her pension benefits to her lesbian partner. It won the Oscar for Best Short Documentary last night (thanks Joe My God). Netflix doesn't carry it, so I just emailed them a request.

Why are people blowing a gasket over the release of this photo? It's a sad, sad day when trying on the traditional garb of a country doesn't point to your compassion, empathy and cultural expertise but instead at best is mocked as "silly" and at worst is said to imply you might be siding with "the terrorists."

Give me a break. It's an outrage when Muslims are lumped together as terrorists. And it makes me crazy that only a self-proclaimed old-style Christian could have a chance at winning the election. We'll have a woman President and Presidents of many colors (and maybe even a gay President)before we have a President who is Buddhist, Sikh, Pagan, Atheist, Rastafarian, or Agnostic. What's up with the Christian fetish? Why not more open minds, religiously speaking, in this democratic country of ours?

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At last: there's some solid national coverage (thanks Collin) of the horrible, homophobic murder of Lawrence King.

Family Values

Two more apparent queer-hate crimes: One involving the beating of a gay man who was eating at a restaurant with his partner and a friend, and the other the murder of a trans teen.

Both occurred in Florida, where as Joe.My.God points out, Floridians can order "Family Values" license plates.

Maureen, ZZ and Karen

I just finished Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading by Maureen Corrigan. You might recognize her as the book critic on Fresh Air.

It's about her love affair with books. My favorite quote from the book captures something that is true for me:

"I think, consciously or not, what we readers do each time we open a book is to set off on a search for authenticity. We want to get closer to the heart of things, and sometimes a few sentences contained in an otherwise unexceptional book can crystallize vague feelings, fleeting physical sensations, or, sometimes, profound epiphanies."

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Busy week ahead. In addition to the usual whirlwind of teaching and grading, I will be interviewing ZZ Packer on stage on Wednesday. That event is followed by a dinner with our advisory board and some donors, an evening reading featuring ZZ, and a reception. My co-director and I are responsible for all of this. Whew. I just need to remind myself to relax and enjoy it as much as possible since the major work of organizing these events is behind us.

I also have another big thing happening this week that I can't talk about here but will be able to soon.

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It's gray. And Monday. Brings to mind this:

Gender Bending, Blending, Rending

Last night, for a friend's birthday, we went to AsiaSF, a club and restaurant that features what they call "gender illusionists."

Yes, the women in this photo are "gender illusionists," but I don't think the men are.

Actually, I take that back. Everyone is a gender illusionist. Cut your hair short and wear a suit, and no matter what's beneath that suit you are a male impressionist.

Last night's adventure is a reminder that "female" and "male" are costumes we wear.

As Gloria Steinem once said, "All women are female impressionists."

I'd add that all people are gender impressionists of one sort or another.

Steinbeck on Writing

I recently finished reading John Steinbeck's Journal of a Novel, which charts his writing of East of Eden. Every day before he began working on the novel, he wrote a letter to his editor, a kind of warm-up that resulted in his musing about life and writing.

Apparently, he never intended these letters to be a publishable book, but I'm glad we have them. They offer wonderful insights into craft. (Guilty admission: I liked Journal of a Novel better than East of Eden.)

Steinbeck was a real work-horse, writing this massive novel in pencil in less than a year. He was obsessive about having a number of well-sharpened pencils within his reach at all times.

A workhorse, yes--but not a racehorse. He wasn't racing to the finish. In fact, he found if he created deadlines for himself (saying, for instance, the novel would be finished on X date), that threw him off. Instead, he liked to write imagining that he would never be finished. That way he could focus on what was in front of him.

About writing, he says, "True things quite often do not sound true unless they are made to."

I like this. Often in writing workshops, someone might doubt the sense of authenticity in a story. Then the writer will say, "Well, it really happened!" That's not the point. Obviously we know we are reading fiction. But we want the satisfaction of an authentic experience echoing a larger truth. The point is: was it written in such a way as we believe it?

Steinbeck writes a lot about "refrain"--about returning to a key theme, idea, image. He says refrain is "a recapitulation of intention" and that it is "one of the most valuable of all form methods. Refrain is a return to the known before one flies again upwards. It is a consolation to the reader, a reassurance that the book has not left his understanding."

In this way, music and writing (both prose and poetry) are alike. I like thinking about that. In fact, I like music playing while I write, sometimes--and that may be why.

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Speaking of Steinbeck, if you've never been to the National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, California, it's definitely worth the trip. One of my favorite things was seeing actual manuscripts written in his tiny, pencilled script. I also was amazed at seeing Rocinante, the actual truck with camper that Steinbeck drove across the country, as he writes about in one of my favorite Steinbeck books, Travels with Charley.

Charley is pictured here, with Steinbeck.