Where the Rescue of Art will come from
If someone is willing to hypothesize that today’s literature is moribund or close to it, what would this decayed art form look like, what would be the bad signs and where would a rescue possibly come from what would that look like and what would be official response to it?
It seems like bad signs might easily be: stylishness, cliqueishness, plummeting sales, loss of popular interest, plus ever more closely defined rules for success. (And you could find your easy parallels in history.)
The rescue would come from outside and below and would enrage officials. Sales would be feverish and broad-based for the new thing. The style would be opposite of those ‘in’ at the time: rough, loose, honest, free. (Find many historic supports for just this happening.)
It’s amazing how many people simply won’t think for themselves about this topic. You might as well ask “Which program will produce the next great writer to rescue world literature in the next year? Purdue? Iowa? And when will the author be interviewed on Fresh Aire?” I mean, if it’s NOT reviewed on Fresh Aire otherwise smart people simply won’t look at it.
‘Happening’ people seem to read mainly Daniel Pinkwater, David Sedaris and that sort. …Or else they have to have seen it on that ‘Salon’ forum which I haven’t been able to force myself to look at yet. It seems excruciating. Anne Lennox or Proulx or whoever she is. Writers who do gritty westerns full of realism about modern ranching, hard drinking trailer life, natural animal beauty and trout fishing with a Buddhist twist…yikes! Even the titles sound like Jim Harrison books.
I’m just lost in bookstores anymore. There are so many books. So much new fiction with their subtle, intelligent covers. All the Master degree sales clerks looking sidelong at me as my little OYB issues sell out without them lifting a single finger to help. Did I ever tell you that at the one newstand where this gungho lady actually puts folks who might like it onto my zine and where she actually shelves it in several places to account for its multi-genre aspect, that she sold 100 of the last issue? Before we’d ever met? She is from the UP!!!! Anyway, I’ve been good pals with the mag manager lady at the local bookstore for years now, but not a single clerk has ever said Hi. I’m the only local publisher. This bookstore has food, coffee, live flute music, clerks dress up like classical authors I suspect on certain days. Where do they think the rescue will come from?
I had a buddy who had majored in philosophy but who hasn’t really read anything in years comment recently on one of my pal’s philosophy books: ‘Isn’t that about one of the only copies in print?’ Snidely. As another pal was expressing some interest. What in the world are people thinking? That if it was famous it might be BETTER than what my pal has done? Can’t they put two and two together?
In OTHER art, when something is RARE it’s GOOD. Why not with books? What ever become of the notion that one had to be WORTHY of reading something, that special things are sometimes HELD BACK for good reason whatever that might be? People might agree that the best is where you don’t expect it, but in real life they can’t see that forest for the trees.
On our trip up north we made sure to visit Gwen Frostic’s printing place. Martha has been there but not me. It’s in the boonies. I’ve heard artsy types poke fun of her folksy cutesy style. She’s this 90-year-old lady who has been doing her own woodcut stationery for decades now. What a treat and a wonder visiting that facility!!! It was packed with folks buying all her great stuff. She does nature woodcuts of every type. Sells all imaginable types of limited editions, postcards, thank you notes. Whole racks of things for a dime apiece. Cards 12 for a buck. Lovely framed litho prints for $25. A bunch of old Heidlebergs cranking away in a shop down below. Waterfalls built into the rickety old cobbled together building. Low ceilings, strange fireplaces. The store went on forever. Upper walls lined with letters from various countries. A library, a pond. A round stone kiva abandoned looking. The whole thing was so ramshackle lovely that I about cried. Here’s a place that’s homemade! I left my zines in the library, just like I leave them in doctor’s offices. Sowing them as I go, as you say. An old worker guy came by while I was picking out a $3 nature mug, with ink on his hands, heading down to the presses, and asked if he could help me. Just being helpful. I said I was fine and that this was the best thing I’d ever seen. He said thank you. I saw a plaque from the local town saying they named their community center after her due to her years of loyal support. It’s just the prettiest stuff. Often 3-color with hand-registration. She has nicely bound books of her art and poetry, dozens of them, with titles like ‘Chaotic Universe’ and ‘Heuristic’. Little ladies hand wrap every purchase in special Gwen-designed printed paper and tape a little piece of evergreen to each. —-Here is a place of Heaven, a place that started small and is now world famous and is still small at heart, just doing what she does. I heard that when she dies all the blocks are to be destroyed. It’s a living thing. Hey, it’s HERS. What does she owe anyone besides all the love that she gives. It’s not always my exact style of art or writing, but I did want everything there. I couldn’t pick just one thing. Each thing so clearly had HEART. Mainly I guess it was inspirational. Just do it. Go.
I know where the rescue will come from.
