My First Attempt at a Meme

I saw this ad for Mitt Romney on Facebook today and knew I had to do something with it:

So I thought I might work with it a little to "make it new" in the parlance of Ezra Pound. Here's what I came up with. Keep in mind I am new to this 21st century game:

Show Time: A Book Review

Another book came for me in the mail a while back and I finally got around to reading it. Today's review is for Phil Harvey's Show Time, a 257 page novel from Lost Coast Press.  Lord of the Flies meets Survivor in this tale of seven reality TV contestants left stranded on an island in the middle of Lake Superior live in front of an international audience. However, despite this promising premise, Harvey's novel falls flat, with clunky and far-fetched dialogue, too many loose ends, and a failure to take account of the ways reality TV has changed since the late 1990s. Despite these flaws, the novel does hold some appeal if one forgets the reality TV show aspect and focuses instead on the characters' attempts to survive in the wilderness and make it through winter without starving to death.

Show Time is set in the not so distant future, when the viewing public has become bored with what violence is offered to them on the TV. To satisfy this demand, a group of TV executives have created a new breed of reality show, where seven contestants are brought together on an island and have to survive the elements and one another. If they can make it, the contestants will win $400,000 apiece. The group onsists of four men and three woman. Each one brings skills of their own, but also faults which threaten their ability to work together to improve their odds of survival. Most of the novel centers on Ambrose, who is a capable and levelheaded, but suffers from a severe gambling addiction that he can only pay off by participating on the show and winning.

One of the fascinating parts of the novel deals with how the characters enter into a shifting array of alliances to secure food, shelter, and other supplies. Even though the seven adults know they are being watched and judged by millions of people, it does not take long until their true, instinctual natures emerge. Harvey posits an interesting take on the different philosophies of human nature, which reality television is a ready means of conveying.  However, they do not surrender to their violent impulses and create a purely Hobbesian world of endless strife on the island. Nor do they build a peaceful Utopia fit for Rousseau's noble savage. Instead, their self-interest motivates them to work together in a Machiavellian fashion. A barter economy is set up where anything, including sex, can be exchanged for goods and the contestants continue to vie for power, especially the males Ivan, Rudy, Ambrose, and Valentin.

The novel could have spent more time focusing on this development, showing how over time the behavior of the individuals on the island becomes more institutionalized and the effects of their division of labor. The lives of the female characters, Ahai, Maureen, and Cecily  would also have been interesting to spend time on. Would their trading sex for protection and food become more regulated over time in this evolving dynamic? Or would they eventually be forced to deny their right to participate in such exchanges? The world of the executives producing the television show needed work as well. It could either have been expanded or dropped altogether. Throughout Show Time, the people putting the drama together constantly speak of how the violence of the show is necessary to keep the population pacified  but this idea is never quite fleshed out with too much telling and not enough showing.

Instead, their are too many scenes which seem designed to merely showcase the authors' idea of "snappy" and "witty" dialogue. Unfortunately it is this dialogue which is likely to take the reader out of the world of the novel. All too often the characters resort an affected speech that seemed drawn from pulp and noir novels and is out of place, especially among people starving in the wilderness. These ridiculous exchanges made me put down the book and write either "wtf," "ugh," "really?", or just "?" next to the offending passages. It is not a good sign for a novel when a reader has to stop eating their malai kofta and feels compelled to mark up your book.

Nevertheless, it is a quick and compelling enough read when the novel centers on the inhabitants of the island, and no one mentions or worries about the the cameras. These sections which deal with simply trying to survive are engaging and well written, even if they tend to get repetitive. There are only so many different ways of writing hunting and fishing scenes. Harvey also does a decent job of dealing with the effects of expose to prolonged calorie reduction and heat deprivation.  At times it seems the whole reality show conceit is just a way to write a novel about survival instead a scathing commentary on the media and American culture. It seems difficult to believe people would spend so many months risking death or serious injury just for $400,000 when there are so many other televised contests that require far less risk for far greater reward.

Show Time treads on previous concerns of where reality television might be heading without adding anything new to the discussion. More importantly, it ignores the ways reality TV has changed since it initially become popular with Survivor.  This work might have been timely in 1999, when shows were centered around competitive ordeals held out in the dark wilds of nature. Now, it feels dated, showing us a vision of a future which seems unlikely due to the rise of shows which deal with the lifestyles of the somehow rich and famous. These have become America's current opiate, not bloodletting spectacles. True, we are glued to our television sets so we can watch others' bad behavior, but these deprived actions occur within civilization, not outside of it.

Into September with an Auction Silence

I have a poem up at the Junk Lot Review. Be quiet and contemplate it.

When Sartre Talked to Crabs

"Good morning, my little ones, how did you sleep?"  

"After the politicians, I went to the poets, the writers of tragedies and dithyrambs and the others, intending in their case to catch myself being more ignorant then [sic] they. So I took up those poems with which they seemed to have taken most trouble and asked them what they meant... I am ashamed to tell you the truth, gentlemen, but I must. Almost all the bystanders might have explained the poems better than their authors could. I soon realized that poets do not compose their poems with knowledge, but by some inborn talent and by inspiration, like seers and prophets who also say many fine things without any understanding of what they say... At the same time I saw that, because of their poetry, they thought themselves very wise men in other respects, which they were not. So there again I withdrew, thinking that I had the same advantage over them as I had over the politicians."

I think this section from Plato's Apology (spoken by Socrates) pretty much explains how I feel about this poem of mine in the Fox Chase Review.

The Artist Mystique, I Has It

See this? This is a link. The link will take you to the Artist Mystique. Once there, you can read their issue online. Be on the lookout of my poem, "I take Scissors to Newspaper."

See this? This is another link. This link will take you to Pyrokinection. Once there you will not have to flip any pages physical or electronic. Instead, you can just read the poem right on the screen. The name of this poem is "Bloom a Song."

This is a free service. Enjoy the lines. Email me if you are not having fun. Sovegna vos al temps de mon dolor.

The Online Empire of My Presence Is Expanding

Getting published in other people's websites is pretty much all I'm good for anyways.

Poem up at Dead Beats.

Poem in the last edition of Guerrilla Pamphlets.

Louis H. Berman of Annapolis, Maryland Is an Idiot

Sometimes I read a letter to the editor at the Washington Post and suffer a minor attack of apoplexy. Unfortunately since I cannot go to a doctor for a cure and the apothecaries are all closed, I must turn to the next best substitute for leeches: a blog post. Louis H. Berman's letter here, buried away in the paper like a hateful jewel, is today's culprit. In a few spare paragraphs, Mr. Berman asserts the following about what's wrong with the Millennial Generation and while he spouts nonsense, in the process he reveals what is most wrong with the United States: namely that we have become a country willing to believe the most absurd and malicious lies about our fellow Americans. In sum, this is Mr. Berman's "argument:" 

1) Millennials are spoiled and lazy 
2) This is the fault of the Baby Boomers 
3) However, the reason for high unemployment is still not their fault.  Even though they were not in charge of Wall Street when it wrecked the economy, blame falls on the Millennials instead.
4) There are plenty of jobs for Millennials but they are too spoiled to find one. 
5) Millennials are supposed to "learn something" from their parents (who spoiled them in the first place) about what being in a real workplace means. 

I think Mr. Berman needs to go back and actually read the classifieds and want-ads some time. Sure there are plenty of jobs, but many require several years of experience and a decent portion of what do not are unpaid. Try looking for entry-level work Mr. Berman as I have, for multiple companies, in several fields, in different cities. It might be better than just talking out of your ass to tell the damn kids to get off your lawn. Now, you may claim that the Millennials are just too spoiled to take minimum wage, which was supposedly good enough for the folks of your generation. Remember that minimum wage was good enough for all of you because it was higher. A minimum wage job today pays less now when adjusted for inflation. Also, you may not know this because higher education used to cost a lot less, but many Millennials have college debts and need to earn money so that they can pay them off, debts they incurred in the first place so that they might not have to work for minimum wage all their lives.

I'm going to be generous Mr. Berman and assume you are not being motivated by spite, but rather an adherence to the just-world fallacy. In your view, unemployment is high because people are lazy and spoiled, especially young people. I hate to break it to you (who am I kidding, I enjoying enlightening you), but there are not enough jobs to go around. Roughly speaking, there are 3.5 unemployed people per each of the much vaunted job postings you discussed. No matter how many skilled people apply for a position, they are not all going to get it in this economy. The same applies even if they all decide to take minimum wage jobs. Have you been following the news? 44% of minimum-wage workers have either attended or graduated from college. I think we can safely assume they are not waiting out for their dream job. Their dream job is having a job. Mr. Berman, these attacks on a generation are a red herring, especially when you consider long-term unemployment rates among the Baby Boomers. But I guess they must be lazy and spoiled too, because of how the GI Generation raised them. 

This economy sucks. Period. Blaming the unemployed does nothing except possibly make you feel like unemployment could never happen to you. You seem to view joblessness as something that only exists for other people who must have done something wrong. Mr. Berman, this is a fallacy and an insult to the millions of formerly hardworking Americans who have been laid off in the past few years, and all the Americans of all ages, races, creeds, and classes who want desperately to work. Many of us loved our jobs before we lost them. Many of us have taken what we could find in the interim, only to lose those jobs as well. Many of us are the victims of discriminatory hiring practices that make it difficult for the unemployment to get work. Many of us graduated in the middle of a terrible market and could never get a leg up. Many of us have put having families on hold. Many of us have put owning a house on hold. Many of us avoid seeing our friends and family out of poverty and shame. Many of us go to bed every night praying for either a miracle or to be allowed to die in our sleep. 

And here Mr. Berman, is where I am going to engage in the same kind of attacks that you have, employing (see what I did there?) both the ad hominem and the gross generalization. Now, I am not doing this because it helps my argument, but because it is fun. You sir, are a dumb asshole. Unfortunately, you are not alone. The audiences of the GOP debates were filled with your ilk. You do not have any facts to back your assertions up, relying instead on worn-out narratives that have been applied to every previous generation. Despite setting yourself up as some sort of expert, you offer no real solutions to the problems you decry either. You lack any long term vision and fail to grasp the structural issues we are mired in. On top of this, you are callous. You are mean. You are judgmental even though your previous ignorance shows you have no right to claim any sort of capacity for judgment. 

Now if you were smart and an asshole, you would at least have enough self-interest to be worried about the true causes behind the problem of persistent unemployment because it affects you. Instead of spouting off against the usual suspects guilty of the usual sins, you would have some intellectual curiosity about several real solutions. If you were dumb and kind you might not grasp the nuances of the situation, but you would at least have nice things to say to those who are suffering. Of course, it would be best if you were both smart and kind, but I am willing to settle for the other two options if it keeps you from writing another letter to the editor at the Washington Post ever again. 

The Parade of Hits Continues

Still looking for a job and a way to punch my ticket to get out of my childhood abode. Currently reading a terrible book and not sure if I want to bother reviewing it or not. Being a member of the lumpenproletariat is no fun. AND YET I still get poems published. One even has a reference to Proust. Got to keep the synapses I cultivated in college still firing. They die people, they really do. If you do not keep them activated, one day you will wake up and say "My God, what have I done!" and not get the reference!  Nevertheless, go to the Aperion Review and Misfits' Miscellany. They are waiting for you. Also, I am mentioned here.



In Parentheses We Trust

I have poems, poems, poems,

For you all to read, read, read,

Poems in In Parentheses

Poems in Humber Pie

Enjoy!

Wax: A Book Review

Wax (Blue Star Books, 324 pages), by Therese Ambrosi Smith, is a novel set in the 1940s that mixes a coming of age story with a mystery. It is a piece of historical fiction as well, taking its inspiration from the struggles that women faced as they went into and out of employment for the war effort during World War II. It centers on the stories of three Rosie the Riveters who bond while working together at the Kaiser Permanente shipyards in Richmond, California. During the day they help to build the Liberty ships that kept the Allied effort well-supplied, while at night they grow close together and bond like sisters.   

Each of the three major characters comes to Richmond, California to escape the limited options facing independently minded women in the 1940s. Matilda “Tilly” Bettencourt leaves her family in San Mateo County so that she can do more then be a waitress at their restaurant. Inspired by an advertisement starring Katherine Hepburn, she wants to do her part for the war effort and make her mark in a world previously reserved for men. Meanwhile, Doris Jura decides to give up her life selling cosmetics in Pittsburgh in order to try something more exciting on the West Coast. She quickly becomes something of a celebrity in the shipyards for scoring at the top of the aptitude tests the company gives. Finally, there is Sylvia Manning, who is the oldest of the group and from Kansas City. She comes to California seeking a new start after a failed romance with another woman. 

The first part of the novel deals with their daily life in the shipyards, showing the difficulties that women came to face during this period, as well as their personal sense of accomplishment at helping the country win the war. It focuses in particular on the development of Tilly as she emerges from her sheltered and secluded life to learn the tricks of the shipbuilding trade. Even though her home is the closet to Richmond of all the characters, in a psychological sense she travels the furthest to get there. It might be hard to imagine now, but the Bay Area was not as always developed as it is today. Of particular shock to her is seeing a colored person for the first time. However, this will not startle her as much as when she realizes she has romantic feelings for Sylvia. Times being what they were, Tilly has to keep this affection to herself.

During their time in the shipyards, the three women learn new skills, gain a greater sense of their self-worth, and deal with their new found freedom by going to bars, movies, and clubs. However, there are still limitations to what they are allowed to do because they are female. Despite the opportunities that the war has opened up for them, the characters face discrimination in pay and participating in unions. Just like all the other Rosies, they also understand that once the conflict is over, they will have to vacate their positions in favor of the men returning from overseas. So it is with mixed feelings that Tilly, Doris, and Sylvia greet the news of the Nazi surrender. On one hand they are happy for peace and victory, on the other, they know it means a return to the world they tried to leave behind. 

Just as they predicted, work in the shipyards slows down and the three women are laid off. Their services, though appreciated, are no longer needed. Tilly and Doris decide to go into business together making candles using the paraffin wax that they came across while building Liberty ships. They will build a factory near Tilly’s house on property Doris has inherited from a recently deceased uncle. Sylvia, however, has no long term plans. She is interested in buying one of the trailers they were housed in at the shipyards and taking it across America to tour the countryside. But this dream never materializes. After saying goodbye to Tilly and Doris, she moves to Reno and lives a largely uneventful and isolated life.

At this point the novel shifts into its second part, which tells the story of Tilly and Doris as they adjust to peacetime and try to build their new business. Here, Wax does a good job of showing how difficult it was for the former Rosies to go back into their old lives. They had worked outside the home and had enjoyed the fruits of freedoms previously denied to them. Now they are all expected to put these experiences behind them. Even though Tilly and Doris have a plan to preserve their independence, they face the normal challenges of starting a company, plus the rampant prejudice against females in the business world. Luckily, they are able to find an understanding ally in John Callen, a local carpenter who helps the two women build their candle factory.  

John takes a liking to Tilly and courts her despite Tilly’s lingering feelings for Sylvia and the opposition of Tilly’s mother, who harbors a secret about Tilly’s true relationship to John. They date and John asks her to marry him, which forces Tilly to make a decision about what she truly wants out of life. Complicating matters further, Doris begins investigating the silent partner who also owns the land she inherited from her late uncle. One night, after an arson attack on the candle factory, a series of events are set in motion which reveal the identity of the hidden partner, Tilly’s true parentage, and a web of corruption that dates back to the Roaring Twenties and involves John’s grandfather, a local judge.  In the end, Tilly learns the cost of keeping secrets and decides to live honestly with Sylvia without repressing her feelings.

Overall, Wax is an enjoyable novel that is a quick read. It is easy to follow, particularly when the main characters become involved in the intrigues of Bay Area politics and real estate. Smith is a skillful writer and brings a forgotten side of World War II to life. She eschews both broad stereotypes and the temptation to turn the main characters into broad symbolic representations of what women experienced working for the war effort. Tilly, Doris, and Sylvia have their own personal stories and struggles. For instance, even though Sylvia is a lesbian, her relationship to her nephew and his death in the war defines her character in the novel more than her sexual orientation.   

However, the book does undergo such an abrupt shift in subject matter and tone that one cannot help but wonder if it would be better as two novels instead of one. While Tilly’s journey of self-discovery is integrated with Doris’ investigations, separating the two stories would allow for more focus on each one. This way the experiences of the women in the shipyards can be expanded upon, just as the struggles of post-war adjustment can be explored in depth. In particular, this would have given Sylvia more exposition, a character that I found myself wanting to know more about as I read the novel. Her experience as a lesbian in pre-Stonewall America was something I thought could be discussed without detracting from the rest of the novel.  

Locofoco Memories

The Death of Locofocoism

A new poem is up at Wordsmiths. I know the website spells it differently, but the journal is Wordsmiths. The poem itself is culled from various memories I have of a trip I once took from San Francisco.

New Listing in Poets & Writers

I am now listed as a poet in the directory over at Poets & Writers. Hopefully one day I will qualify for a listing as a (prose) writer. I guess when people ask me what I do (for a living) instead of looking down on the ground in shame I can say "I AM A POET!"

The Time for Justice: A Book Review

Hello there my longtime readers and my (as of this writing) 52 followers! Today I am inaugurating a new feature for this blog, book reviews. It seems my name and website have gotten into the hands of numerous esteemed publicists and they are clamoring for me to say a few things about the books by the authors they represent. Since I have nothing much else to do these days except wait for literary stardom and attendant publicists of my own, I have decided to give this new project a go.

The Time forJustice: How the excesses of time have broken our civil justice system, (Onward Publishing, 185 pages) is a new non-fiction book by acclaimed lawyer Anthony V. Curto, written with the assistance of Ronald E. Roel. Mr. Curto has worked for several decades representing clients as diverse as Ted Turner, Linda Lovelace, and Alexander Solzhenitsyn and has an insider’s view of the problems that have plagued our civil justice system for several decades.  Curto reduces these issues to one chief obstacle: time. Specifically, the way time is used to prevent settlements from being reached and enforced in a manner that helps those who need them.

While the shortcomings of our criminal system often receive more attention in the press, Curto reveals how the bureaucratic and administrative burdens placed on the civil courts have led to justice being denied to those who turn to the courts for help. These encumbrances allow numerous delaying tactics to bankrupt plaintiffs with attorneys’ fees or prevent judgments from being collected. Through the examples of numerous court cases, Curto shows how these methods work in practice. They include creating jurisdictional disputes, arguing over how to fill out paperwork, failing to show up in court, filing appeal after appeal, and pushing back trial dates as far as possible.

Curto spends most of the book focused on one particular example which did not involve him personally, but fascinated him nonetheless as it unfolded: the case between Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. and his constituent Esther James. Their dispute began in 1960, during a television interview when Powell named James as a “bag woman” working for Harlem gangsters. James sued the Congressman to receive compensation for defamation of character and an apology. Through skillful manipulation of the judicial system, which included making use of his privileges as a Congressman, his residency in Puerto Rico, and the complicated ownership of his property, Powell managed to prevent the bulk of the settlement against him from being paid out. He also ended up avoiding punishment for contempt of court.

While Curto acknowledges that the Powell case had many extenuating circumstances involved (namely the benefits of his elected office) he nonetheless feels it showcases how the legal system can become tied up by a single case. At the end of the book, he notes that by 1969 more than 80 judges across 10 different courts had been involved in the proceedings, along with 59 jurors. The official paperwork for the case ended up forming a stack nearly 20 feet high.

In between his coverage of Esther James’ quest for justice, Curto also briefly focuses on several other cases that involve similarly lengthy periods of litigation. This helps to reinforce his arguments about specific ways the system needs to be changed and the consequences from justice delayed.  In one instance, Curto talks about a client frustrated with the stalling tactics of a deadbeat distributor. He hired goons to collect the money he was owed without telling his attorney. In another case, he shows how a man gets away without paying a jeweler for an expensive wristwatch because he manages to avoid court summons until the lawyers’ fees for the case outweigh the value of said watch.   

Curto’s The Time for Jusice is engaging and raises good points without being overwhelming to the reader or becoming mired in legalese. It is easy for anyone without a legal background to follow both the cases he discusses and the improvements he recommends. He helpfully structures the book to review his points and conveniently sets apart his suggestions from the rest of the text so that he can go into detail about them. Curto further helps the reader by reviewing these ideas at the end. His list for improvements to the civil justice system include the following:

• Set trial dates as soon as summons are answered
• Broaden the authority of judges
• Eliminate pretrial paperwork
• Require plaintiffs to pay expenses if appeal is lost
• Enforce court decisions
• Settle jurisdictional disputes upfront
• Require litigants to attend their trials
• Keep the same judge on a case
• Expand small claims court

The only major problem with the book is how Curto assigns blame for the current state of the civil judicial system. Understandably, he wants to focus on exposing the problems that the courts face without getting bogged down in partisan politics or demonizing the legal profession. However, claiming that time is the chief enemy focuses the blame in the wrong direction. After all, time is a mere abstraction. Curto confuses a chief weapon of those who deny justice with those who allow them to get away with it. Instead we should be learning who is actually responsible for our state of affairs and who is in the way of effective reform.

By telling the reader that only time is the villain, our system appears to be tragically broken. Lawyers, judges, law enforcement, plaintiffs, and defendants are depicted as merely acting out a choreography of delay.  The story behind who or what created the rules that guide them is hardly discussed. Curto’s list of specific reforms is a good start of what should be done, but without being told what individuals or organizations are working to advance them, the average citizen is given no blueprint for actually making them a reality. All that can be done, it seems, is to try and appease Chronos for the return of a judicial golden age of quick and speedy trials.

Your Cultural Activity of the Day

Rubbing the works of Walt Whitman on a jellyfish sting is known to help ease the pain

Read two poems by me here at Jellyfish Whispers. Also, you can check out these Ottoman inspired renderings of famous movies.

A Ginger Piglet of a Poem

Here a Lee! There a Lee! Everywhere a Nar-do-lil-li!

I have a poem up at Ginger Piglet. Take a break from your Independence Day activities to read it. Richard Henry Lee commands you to! In honor of freedom, you can read this essay by William S. Burroughs about his experiences with Scientology.