Updike in Nashville

I arose quite early today, in anticipation of seeing John Updike speak at the Nashville Public Library. And I did see him,
kind of.
The problem is this: for some unknown reason, the folks down at the public library didn't think ahead, or else they didn't think many people in Nashville read. I say this because, upon arriving at the library this morning, I was ushered into a room that was small and filled with chairs facing a projection screen. A projection screen? I didn't get up early on a Saturday morn to come here and look at a screen. I came here to see and hear John Updike. Alas, the room he was actually in- a very small auditorium- was already filled. It only seats 200 people. 200 people!!! What was the library thinking, putting Mr. Updike in a room that only seats 200? I was very disappointed.
The excessive overflow of people had to be put into two more rooms. Perhaps next time, they might consider a larger venue?
All of this aside, hearing John Updike speak was a pleasure. He's smart, articulate, and old enough to have a sense of the overall picture of America and the world, and his place in it. He spoke about America's consumerism, our greediness, in such a way that was not insulting. He read one of his short stories, written in 1960 ( I forget the name of it) that was based on one of his early experiences, a young boy of ten in Pennsylvania. He said something I found intriguing: once you (the writer) has written a story, it "gobbles up your memory." So you write a story, based on a memory, and the story subsequently takes the place of that memory. Essentially, you are changing the memory into something else. Another thing that struck me was his response to the question of whether he thinks that we really are using up all the resources (an aside- America uses more resources than any other country on the planet...) and what will happen when we do? His answer, erudite and funny, was that "ultimate disaster has a way of not coming." We always find a way out, avoid it somehow. So perhaps our planet has nine lives? Maybe I'm a little cynical, but will we always be able to avoid disaster? Something to think about.
Someone else asked him about his writing process, something us writers always want to know: he writes in the morning, sets a goal of 1,000 words per day. Has lunch around onepm. I was looking for something more eccentric, more magical, but the truth is he is a writer who works at his craft: he is indeed a craftsman. I wish that more writers like him would visit Nashville. We have a lack of this kind of event, in spite of having two rather large colleges practically downtown.
So I'll end with a question: Why is that? Does everyone think that Nashville is illiterate?

"Mumblers of Words"

Some favorite quotes from the poete et militant Aime Cesaire:

"And above all, my body as well as my soul, beware of assuming the sterile attitude of a spectator, for life is not a spectacle, a sea of miseries is not a proscenium, a man screaming is not a dancing bear..."

"we sing of venomous flowers
flaring in fury-filled prairies"

—from "Notebook of a Return to the Native Land" 1983 translation.

Twiggy Redux

“TWIGGY REDUX”


Why don’t you eat and eat and eat
Be fat like us
massive in person, in space
gorge yourself and don’t hold back
don’t take those dainty bites
be a glutton for once you stupid cow

we wish with envy your slight figure your young slender boy’s body

If we insult you it’s only the green rising up
only the desire to wring your swan-like neck with fat hands
until your blood
floods us.
Cleansed, we are happy now.