Almanac of Story Tellers: Jonathan Swift

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Nov. 30th

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    It is the 334th day of the year, leaving 31 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 1667, the satirist Jonathan Swift was born in Dublin.

    He told his stories with pointed wit, playful humor, and sometime harsh charms. His writing was sophisticated and exuded rational thought, making his parodies all the more brilliant. He attacked irrational behavior with even more absurd, if deadpan, responses.

    Most of his works were published anonymously, and it became a great parlor game of the day to guess the actual writer -- although it was generally known that Swift was the real author.

    He started his career as a secretary and budding poet. He was ordained as an Anglican priest. But his writings took off when he turned his hand toward satire.

    His first work in that category was A Tale of a Tub, which he wrote in the mid 1690s and published in 1704. A tale of three brothers seeking a loophole in their father's will, it's a take on the three main branches of Western Christianity. It was enormously popular during its time, taking on the excesses of religion, politics, medicine, and writers.

    Drapier's Letters was a series of pamphlets that attacked the idea of privately minting copper coins in Ireland by portraying Ireland as politically independent of England. A Modest Proposal was a suggestion that England solve its hunger problem and Ireland's perceived overpopulation problems by dining on Irish children.

    But his major work was Gulliver's Travels. Exactly when it was written is unknown, although it is believed to have been during the 1720s. It was published in October 1726.

    It's a wide-ranging tale of voyages to fantastical lands, which comments on the individual against society, the corruption of government and science, the petty differences between religions, and whether humans are inherently corrupt or simply become so over time.

    Swift died in 1745.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Madeleine L'Engle

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Nov. 29th

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    It is the 333rd day of the year, leaving 32 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 1918, the author Madeleine L'Engle was born.

    She told her stories, often fantasies for children and young adults, about good and evil, responsibility, and her understanding of god. Her major works wrestled with the question of life's purpose as we grow from children to adults.

    Her belief in Christian universalism -- meaning that all souls would be saved, not just those who believe in the Christian god -- was an underlying theme pinning her works together. It also meant her works were criticized both for their religiosity and her particular faith.

    L'Engel's first book in 1945, The Small Rain, was an adult book about a woman who chose her art over her relationships. Her first book for young adults, And Both Were Young, came out in 1949.

    Her best-known work is A Wrinkle in Time, which came out in 1962 after being rejected by more than two dozen publishers. It wound up as a best seller that won the Newberry Medal for best children's book. It told a tale of four youngsters traveling through time and space while battling a force of evil.

    It's chock full of metaphors and encompasses L'Engle's great themes. Her use of a strong, leading female character was critically praised and unusually for its time. She eventually wrote four more books in the series.

    L'Engle died in 2007. 

Almanac of Story Tellers: William Blake

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Nov. 28th

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    It is the 332nd day of the year, leaving 33 days remaining in 2022. 

    On this date in 1757, the engraver, painter, poet, and visionary William Blake was born.

Blake's Eve Tempted at the Creation,
at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London

    He told stories of his visions; he told stories of his gods and angels; he etched stories into  copper; he painted stories, and he wrote stories in verse with some of the most illuminating and lyrical couplets written in the English language.

    Generally unrecognized during his lifetime for his brilliance, his creativity, and his humanity, Blake today is considered one of the great Romantic poets. His paintings and visual arts are displayed in museums around the world.

    But it is his writing that comes to mind first, such as the poem, The Tyger, from his Songs of Innocence and Experience.

                    When the stars threw down their spears

                    And water'd heaven with their tears:

                    Did he smile his work to see?

                    Did he who made the lamb make thee?

    It contrasts with the creator of The Lamb, who

                    Gave thee clothing of delight, 

                    Softest clothing, wooly bright;

                    Gave thee such a tender voice,

                    Making all the vales rejoice!

    Blake's life and work continues to be examined today. His has influenced artists from the Irish poet William Butler Yeats to American folk musician Greg Brown, from beat poet Allan Ginsberg to British writer Aldous Huxley, and from surrealist artist Paul Nash to  abstract artist Graham Sutherland.

    Blake died in 1827 in London.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Gail Sheehy

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Nov. 27th

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    It is the 331st day of the year, leaving 34 days remaining in 2022. 

    On this date in 1937, the journalist and author Gail Sheehy was born.

    She told her stories about the rich and famous, and the poor and destitute, with shoe-leather reporting that produced intimate details, insightful analysis, and scenes that matched any novel. She covered and wrote about women's issues, mid-life crises, and the changing culture in which she lived.

    Sheehy was among the group of mid-century journalists who practiced so-called New Journalism, which put reporting -- and sometime the reporter -- at the heart of the story. For a magazine article on prostitution in New York, Sheehy donned hot pants and go-go boots to interview the prostitutes, and hid a tape-recorder underneath a mattress to get the authentic language used in the sex-work trade.

    Her first newspaper job was at the Democrat and Chronicle, a daily paper in upstate New York. She moved to the city, and wrote for several newspapers, along with New York  magazine, then in the early years of its existence. One of the stories she wrote then was about Robert F, Kennedy's 1968 campaign for president.

    In the 1970s, she continued writing for magazines, profiling people and covering cultural and social trends. She wrote several novels. In East Hampton, N.Y., she found two women living in an old, worn down mansion, and wrote a profile on them for New York. The women, known as Little Edie Beale and her mother, Big Edie Beale, were reclusive cousins of Jaqueline Kennedy Onassis. 

    Perhaps Sheehy's biggest and best-known book was Passages, about how men and women enter a mid-life crisis in their mid-to-late 30s before discovering a "second adulthood." It was a best seller that remained on the New York Times list for three years, and the Library of Congress named it one of the 10 most influential books of our time.

    In the 1980s, she started writing political profiles, first on U.S. presidential candidate Gary hart, then of others in the race, before going international -- Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev. Many of the profiles were turned into books.

    In 2014, she wrote a memoir, Daring: My Passages.

    Sheehy died in 2020.

Book Review: The Last Barracoon

 

•  Author: Zora Neale Hurston

• Where I bought this book: National Museum of African-American History and Culture, Washington. 

• Why I bought this book: While doing research on Hurston, I found I wanted to read her books. This was a good start.

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   The protagonist in this book is known by several names -- his African name and his slave name, which is the name he adopted for himself. But it is only because of Hurston's persistence that he gets to tell his story, although the books wasn't published until 2018.

    And it's a story that needed telling. 

    It's a horrific, devastating story about the last newly enslaved men, women, and children who were captured in Africa and sold in America. It's how, despite all odds, Africans have survived despite bigotry, hate, and oppression.    

    He was known as Olulae Kossula -- the English spelling is a transliteration from his native tongue -- the name his mother called him and that he used in Africa. But in America he became Cudjo Lewis -- a combination of his African name and a corruption of his father's name.

    He was born in 1841in the West Africa town of Banté, a member of the Isha group of the Yoruba people. In 1860, a group of illegal slave traders came to his area, and -- with the help of some tribal enemies called the Dahomey -- captured him and a number of his neighbors. Bear in mind that Cudjo had no idea what was happening, and when shoved into the hull of a slave ship, had no idea what was happening to him.

    Ultimately, he was taken to the United States by the Meahers, Alabama brothers who enslaved people, and he was owned by Jim Meaher. After freedom, he lived in Africatown, which the former slaves built themselves on the land of their former plantation, which they had worked and saved to purchase.

    The story is told mostly in Cudjo's voice -- with his dialect and pronunciations as close as Hurston can transcribe. It is moving and compelling. It is overall horrifying, sometimes angry, often sad, and exhibits a loneliness that he felt near the end of his life. Some of its accuracy -- particularly how much is Cudjo's words and how much is the author's -- has been questioned and defended. But the overall story is factual.

    It tells of confusion and despair. It shows how men, women, and children are ripped from the only lives they've known -- their family, their culture, their liifestyle -- and dropped into a hellhole. They are not told what's happening, are literally treated like cargo, then dropped off in a strange land and told they must now work for strangers or be beaten and tortured.

    But it shows the utter joy that Black people experienced when they learned they were free.

Know how we gittee free? Cudjo tellee you dat. Da boat I on, it in de Mobile. We all on dere to go in de Montgomery, but Cap'n Jim Meaher, he not on de boat dat day. Cudjo doan know (why). I doan forgit. It April 12, 1865. Da Yankee soldiers dey come down to de boat and eatee de mulberries off de trees close to de boat, you unnerstand me. Den dey see us on de boat and dey say, 'Y'all can't stay dere no mo'. You free, you doan b'long to nobody no mo'. Oh Lor'! I so glad. We astee do soldiers where we goin'? Dey say dey doan know. Dey told us to go where we feel lak goin', we ain' no mo' slave.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Thespis

 Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Nov. 23rd

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    It is the 327th day of the year, leaving 38 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 534 BCE, more or less, the first actor, a Greek citizen by the name of Thespis, took the stage.

    He told the story of another author, taking a character's name and words, and had a dialogue with the traditional Greek chorus. It was the first time anybody did this. 

    Much of what he did, and when he did it, is chalked up to Aristotle and other ancient Greeks. But he is widely credited as being the first actor, and thus with inventing the art of tragedy. Thus, stage actors are, to this day, called thespians.

    Many of the details -- the exact date, the play, and the character he spoke for -- are lost to history. But he was said to have played multiple speaking roles, using masks to distinguish between characters.

    Before Thespis performed, the stories on stage were told by a chorus, singing about the heroes' deeds and failure. Characters may have danced during the performance, but neither the hero nor anyone else spoke for themselves.

    Thespis is said to have changed that, 

    Indeed, his idea became so popular that he became his own traveling troupe, visiting cities throughout Greece, performing various roles, carrying his costumes and masks in a horse-drawn wagon. It is also said that during a City Dionysia competition -- sort of a showcase of playwrights and their plays -- in Athens during the Sixth Century BCE, he was awarded first place for acting.

Almanac of Story Tellers: George Eliot

  Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 22nd

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    It is the 326th day of the year, leaving 39 days remaining in 2022.

 

  On this date in 1819, the writer George Eliot was born.

    She told her stories with deep character portrayals, startling realism, and an abundance of psychological insight. Her depictions of simple country life were often based on her lived experiences. But she also drew on her knowledge of religion, artistry, and intellectual studies in her novels.

    While she had little formal education, she was able to read at least five languages. So she began her literary life as a translator, and the ideas in the works she studied were later used in her fiction.

    She wrote novels under a pseudonym so her work could be judged without any preconceptions because of her gender or her previous writings, which included scholarly work, and several short stories and poems in addition to her translations.

    He first novel, Adam Bede, published in 1859, was set in the country, and involved a love story and a murder mystery. It remains part of the canon of 19th Century literature.

    Eliot's later novels, Silas Marmer, Romola, and Middlemarch, present a range of genres. The first is the tale of a weaver, but explores religion and industrialization in its themes. Romola is a historical novel set in 15th Century Italy.

    And Middlemarch, which one contemporary called "a novel for adults," is set in the rural English midlands, and deals with marriage and the status of women, religion, politics, and education. It contain humor amongst its realism. It is considered Eliot's best work, and among the great English novels.

    Eliot died in 1880 in London.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Nadine Gordimer

 Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 20th

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    It is the 324th day of the year, leaving 41 days remaining in 2022.

 

  On this date in 1923, the anti-apartheid writer Nadine Gordimer was born in Springs, South Africa.

    She wrote her stories about the  people in South Africa struggling against the chains of apartheid -- and the tension between isolation and the commitment to social justice. She wrote in clear and controlled terms about the helplessness caused by the reality of apartheid, coupled with the inability to change it or accept exile. None was acceptable in her eyes.

    The statement accompanying her Nobel Prize in Literation, awarded for her body of work in 1991, said her literature "create(s) rich imagery of South Africa's historical development."

    She was born into a privileged middle-class background, started writing early, and sold her first story when she was 15. She continued to examine her home country, and learned from her extensive reading the horrors of apartheid. In 1951, she published Watching the Dead, a short story, in the New Yorker. Her first two books were collections of short stories,

    Her first novel, Lying Days, was published in 1953. A semi-autobiographical tale, it tells of a young women who grew up in a mining town in South Africa, who slowly sheds her naivete of the world around her. A 1963 novel, Occasion for Loving, explored an interracial romance, then illegal in the country. 

 

   In 1974, she won the Booker Prize for The Conservationist, a novel that combined Zulu culture with the tale of a powerful and oppressive white industrialist who wants to take up farming in the country.

    Gordimer became an activist against apartheid, through her writings and her activity in politics. She became friends with Nelson Mandela, worked on his defense during his trial in 1962, helping him write his "I am Prepared to Die" speech. When Mandela was released in 1990, she was there to see him leave prison.

    Several of her works were banned in her home country. Among them were Burger's Daughter, July's People, and A World of Strangers, which explicitly attacked apartheid and was banned upon publication in 1958 for a dozen years.

    Gordimer died in 2014 in Johannesburg.   

Almanac of Story Tellers: Margaret Atwood

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 18th

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    It is the 322nd day of the year, leaving 43 days remaining in 2022.

   

    On this date in 1939, the Canadian poet and novelist Margaret Atwood was born.

    She tells her stories from a feminist and humanist perspective. She deals with issues of gender, ecology and the environment, the excesses of science, and Canadian history and identity. Some of her works are based on the myths and legends of the past, while others portray a dystopian future because of the mistakes and indulgences of the present.

    Her poetry includes many of the same themes, particularly fairy tales, along with the power of language.

    She is a Canadian icon, and her works have been honored with some of the world's top literary prizes, including two Canadian Governor General's Awards, France's Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, two Booker Prizes, the Arthur C. Clarke Award for science fiction, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

    She began her writing career with a book of poetry, Double Persephone, self-published in 1960. A graduate of the University of Toronto and Radcliffe College, she also taught English literature at various universities in Canada. Her second book of poetry, The Circle Game, was published in 1966 and won the Governor General's Award.

    During the 1970s, she continued to write books of poetry, novels, and short-story collections. By the end of the decade she was becoming Canada's most talked about writer.

    In 1985, she published The Handmaid's Tale, often considered her magnum opus. It's a futuristic novel in which most women become unable to bear children, and the few who can become handmaidens to the powerful men who run the country. It's a dark, religiously intolerant society in which women are oppressed and used. (She wrote a sequel, The Testaments, in 2019.)

    Her other novels include Cat's Eye, Robber Bride, and The Blind Assassin, a work of historical fiction that focuses on two sisters, their literary lives, and their experiences in 20th Century Canada.

    In the 2000s, she wrote the MaddAddam Trilogy -- Oryx and Crake, The Year of the Flood, and Madd Addam -- a speculation on a future that arose because of excessive human consumption, scientific overreach, and corporate control. It includes the consequences of genetic manipulation,and disasters from man-made climate change.

    Atwood lives in Toronto and continues to write and publish fiction and poetry.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Gordon Lightfoot

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 17th

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    It is the 321st day of the year, leaving 44 days remaining in 2022.

 

    On this day in 1938, the Canadian singer and songwriter, Gordon Lightfoot, was born in Orillia.

    He tells his stories with a 12-string guitar and a baritone voice. His words aree heartfelt and decent, using simple language to show honesty and integrity. His music is folky and folksy.

    He started performing early in life -- in the fourth grade, he sang Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ra at a parents event in his primary school. He learned to play piano and drums as a teenager, mostly self-taught, and attended the Westlake School of Music in Hollywood, Calif. By his early 20s, he was performing with his band, The Singin', Swingin' Eight, and had released two singles.

    Lightfoot's songwriting also found favor with singers such as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash,  and Barbra Streisand. He put out his first album, Lightfoot!, in 1966.

    He found success during the '60s and '70s singing his own songs, among them If You Could Read My Mind, Sundown, and Early Morning Rain.

    But the song he is best known for is about a shipwreck on the Great Lakes during the winter of 1975. The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald showcases Lightfoot's storytelling and musical ability with a melodic tune and inspired lyrics. 

    It starts with a native legend "of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee," turns to the hard November weather on Lake Superior -- "when the waves turn the minutes to hours" -- before focusing on the 29 men who died when the tanker ship sank.

    Lightfoot explains, with some artistic license, their final minutes, then turns to a geography lesson on the Great Lakes -- "Huron rolls, Superior sings in the rooms of her ice-water mansion" -- before ending with tribute to the memorial service at the Mariners' Church of Detroit, where the "church bell chimed till it rang 29 times."

    Lightfoot lives in Toronto and continues to tour.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Chinua Achebe

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 16th

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    It is the 320th day of the year, leaving 45 days remaining in 2022.

   

    On this date in 1930, the Nigerian novelist, Chinua Achebe, was born in Ogidi.

    He told his stories about a changing Africa, particular regarding the clash of Western cultures with traditional African values and mores. He often called out colonialism and racism, and discussed themes such as feminism, masculinity, and history and politics.

    He was born of the Igbo tribe, but his father was a Protestant minister who was a convert to Christianity. Achebe was baptized at St. Simon's in Nneobi. A the time of his birth, Nigeria was a British colony, and remained so until 1960.

    He attended University College in Lagos, first intending to study medicine. But after reading Joseph Conrad, Joyce Cary, and other English novelists, he became determined to study literature and become a writer. He was enraged at the British writers' portrayals of his countrymen as savages and buffoons. 

    He published his first novel in 1958, Things Fall Apart, which explored the clash of traditional Igbo culture amid the European invasion and introduction of colonialism and Western values during the 19th Century. The novel was popular and praised, and it has  become the touchstone of African views of European domination of the continent.

    He wrote in English, which is the official language in Nigeria, and the one, he said, in which he could reach the most people.

    He followed his debut novel with with two sequels. No Longer at Ease (1960), is about a newly appointed civil servant in the colonial Nigerian government who cannot reconcile the values of his people with his new obligations. Arrow of God (1964) is set in the 1920s, and features the chief priest of the village dealing with agents of British colonialism and his son's conversation to Christianity. 

    They formed a trilogy that maintain a pivotal place in African literature, and remain among the most widely read and studied books in the African canon.

    His later books include Man of the People and Anthills of the Savannah, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 1987. Achebe won the International Man Booker Prize in 2007. He also wrote short stories, poetry, essays, and criticism.

    Achebe also worked as a writer and producer at the Nigerian Broadcasting Company in Lagos, as a teacher of English and literature at schools in Nigeria, and he later served as a professor at Bard College in New York and Brown University in Rhode Island.

    He died in 2013.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Georgia O'Keefe

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 15th

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    It is the 319th day of the year, leaving 46 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 1887, the artist Georgia O'Keefe was born.

    She told her stories on canvas, painting realistic natural images so detailed that they often resembled abstract, even surrealistic, drawings. She painted flowers and landscapes, enhancing her works with subtle shades of color, shape, and size.

    Her landscapes includes drawings of the skyscrapers in New York in the 1920s, She later moved on to more natural settings, such as the images she saw from a summer home in New York's Lake George area, and later from her beloved deserts of New Mexico. After extended visits to New Mexico over the years, she eventually settled there permanently. 

    Born in Wisconsin, O'Keefe went to school in Chicago before moving to New York, where she taught for a while. While taking a class in Virginia, she learned the modernist idea that paintings should be an artist's interpretation of what she saw, which included some Asian techniques.

    She later became the prominent artist in this idea of abstract modernism. She enhanced it by making her drawing both realistic and abstract. One of her methods was to enlarge the detail of, say a flower, so that the immediate impression of the viewer was not to see the flower or the detail, but a larger, more abstract image.

    In the 1930s and '40s, she was working and living part time in New Mexico, where, entranced by its stark landscape, she concentrated her work on its rugged mountains and the sun-beached animal bones that surrounded her.

    O'Keefe died in 1986. 

Book Review: Fairy Tale

 

•  Author: Stephen King

• Where I bought this book: Carmichael's Bookstore, Louisville, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I've read every one of King's books. I ain't gonna stop now.

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   Fairy Tale is a shining example of the genius that is Stephen King.

    It's got a great story, with wonderful characters, and it's well told. What's not to like? I'd say this is among the Top 10 novels King has written.     

    It highlights the strengths of a King story, while playing down the tropes and flaws. But they are there. Indeed, as King seems to be drifting away from horror and into the realm of fantasy and thrillers, he has heightened his tendency to over-describe and overwrite.

    I first noticed this in 11/22/63, the story of the JFK assassination, when Jake Epping/George Amberson chases Oswald through Dallas in chapters that seem never-ending. In the latter part of Fairy Tale, when the action gets fast and furious, King's penchant for extraneous details slows things down.

      But so what? By this time we are so wrapped up in Charlie Reade's adventures with his dog, Radar, in Lilimar, that we easily speed through to the ending. But here's the thing -- we like Charlie, and his dog, and what he is doing, and we really don't want it to end. Because with King, we know it could have a happy or a sad ending.

    And because we have come this far, we know Charlie. We like him. Like many a King character, he's a normal teenager in a regular middle-of-America place (there's even a crazy old man in a weird house on the edge of town). Charlie has an unremarkable life -- his mother died young; his father struggles with alcoholism, and Charlie finds solace in football and his friends.

    But remember that old guy, name of Howard Bowditch? Well, Charlie somehow meets up with him, and they grew to like each other. Bowditch tells Charlie something remarkable about that shed in the back yard; Charlie looks into it, and the adventure begins.

    He enters a different world, one of hope but exacerbation. He senses its history, and how it seems to be  falling apart. He meets people he's never known before -- could never have known before -- but knows whom to trust and whom to help. It's a remarkable journey.

    When we first meet Charlie, the teller of this tale, he speaks in the voice of a young man. We watch him grow up as we hear him age through his words. Such is the power of Charlie's story and the mystical voice that King gives him.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Kurt Vonnegut.

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 11th

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    It is the 315th day of the year, leaving 50 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 1922, the author Kurt Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis.

    He wrote his stories with a satiric voice, dark humor, and a worldview that embraced humanistic values. He could be resigned and cynical, yet idealistic. 

    When he wrote Slaughterhouse Five in 1968 -- a fantastical, allegorical novel based somewhat on Vonnegut's experiences during the firebombing of Dresden during World War II -- its strong, moralistic anti-war view caught on with the youth protesting the Vietnam War. 

    He started his writing career as a reporter with the City News Bureau in Chicago, which he joined after a stint in the U.S. Army in World War II. He was captured by the German Army and and survived the Dresden bombing by hiding out in a slaughterhouse.

    In the 1950s, he wrote numerous short stories, many dark and pessimistic, on technology and the future. His first novel, Player Piano, continued in that vein, while his second, The Sirens of Titan, explored the past, propounding the idea that life on Earth came about as a mistake by an alien spacecraft.

    In the 1960s, he found an irreverent voice, writing novels about an American writer who was a spy in Nazi Germany, (Mother Night), an obscure Caribbean religion that mistakenly ends life on earth (Cat's Cradle), and a capitalist who starts giving away money (God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater). The latter novel introduced the writer, Kilgour Trout, a stand-in for Vonnegut who appears in many succeeding novels.

    Vonnegut's novels in the 1970s and 1980s also drew on questioning social values and American society for their themes. He also explored how people find a purpose in life, or questioning whether life actually has a purpose.

    In addition to his novels and short stories, Vonnegut wrote a number of plays and non-fiction essays. He was a popular speaker, particularly on college campuses.

    He died in 2007 in New York.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Emile Gaboriau

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 9th

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    It is the 313th day of the year, leaving 52 days remaining in 2022. 

   

    On this date in 1832, the French author Émile Gaboriau was born Saujon, France.

    He was among the first writers to tell detective stories with a fictional police investigator who resolved intriguing crimes and wrongdoings. Yes, before there was Sherlock Holmes, Gaboriau created Monsieur Lecoq as the prototype of the methodical, deductive detective.

    But Arthur Conan Doyle came along some 20 years later, and his Holmes made people forget his predecessor. Indeed, Holmes once described Lecoq as "a miserable bungler."

    But it was Gaboriau who is credited with breaking the mold on the genre. He is sometimes called the French Edgar Allan Poe, another writer of detective fiction.

    Gaboriau wrote 21 novels in 13 years. But it was his first detective novel, L'Affaire Lerouge, published in 1866, that gave him fame and an international following. It introduced Lecoq as a young police officer. The character may have been based on a real-life thief turned policeman who memoir may have been based on a true story.

    Nonetheless, the book was a hit, and Gaboriau was off. He started churning out a book a year, including Le Crime d'Orcival, Monsieur Lecoq, and L'Argent des autres (translated in English as Other People's Money or A Great Robbery). The books were serialized in magazines and other periodicals of the day.

    He died in 1873.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Bram Stoker

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 8th

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    It is the 312th day of the year, leaving 53 days remaining in 2022. 

    

    On this date in 1847, the Irish novelist Bram Stoker was born outside of Dublin.

    Stoker wrote several books over his career, but only one mattered: Dracula, arguably one of the most famous works in English literature. It is the quintessential Gothic horror novel; as a vampire, Count Dracula had no peer.

    The book remains popular with the average reader. Critics and English majors have written hundreds of treatises on it, exploring its themes of sex and sexuality, gender, seduction, race and ethnic issues, and the Victorian fear of disease. The vampire genre has been recreated by hundreds of writers, from H.P. Lovecraft to Stephen King to Anne Rice. 

    Dracula has been adapted for the stage and screen dozens of times; the first movie, Nosferatu, was released in 1922. Stoker's estate promptly sued the producers, and a judge ordered all copies of the film to be destroyed.

    The book itself takes the epistolary style, written in the form of journals of and letters from the main character, Jonathan Harker. He had met Count Dracula at his castle in Transylvania and realized he needed blood to live and stay young. The novel shifts to England, and after a serious of horrifying and frightening adventures, Harker manages to slay the vampire.

    The inspiration for the Dracula character has long been debated. It could a 15th Century Romanian prince known as Vlad the Impaler. It could be a dreadful tyrant of Irish folklore. It could be Sir Henry Irving, an actor Stoker worked for as a personal assistant.

    While Stoker took copious notes during his research in preparation for writing the novel, the question has never been definitively answered. Scholars and critics continue to discuss the issue.

    Stoker died in 1912.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Margaret Leech

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 7th

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    It is the 311th day of the year, leaving 54 days remaining in 2022.

    On this date in 1893, the two-time Pulitzer Prize winning historian Margaret Leech was born.

    She told her stories with diligent and dedicated research with and vivid, detailed writing that pulled no punches. Her prize-winning books tackled presidents at the opposite ends of the spectrum -- the beloved Abraham Lincoln, credited with saving the country during the Civil War; and William McKinley, mostly ignored before her book, which was called "a first-rate study of a second-rate president."

    She was graduated from Vassar College in 1915, started working for Condé Nast publications, and became a member of the Algonquin Round Table.

    Her first books were novels -- The Back of the Book, published in 1924, was a semi-autobiographical tale of a woman working in New York. That and two others were praised for their detail and fine writing, but after a couple of biographies she co-wrote, and a failed play, she found Kleio and moved on to writing history.

    She spend five years reading letters and other documents in New York and Washington about life during the Civil War. The result was Reveille in Washington, 1859-1865, published in 1941. It became a bestseller and won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1942. It was praised as showing "an implacable concern for the grim and bitter truth."

    Leech spend 12-plus years researching her next work, In the Days of McKinley. Her careful and detailed writing in the book, published in 1959, took a new look at McKinley, and actually improved his reputation. In addition to the Pulitzer Prize for History, she also won the Bancroft Prize, one of the most distinguished academic awards.

    Leech died in 1974.

Almanac of Story Tellers: Harold Ross

 Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books. 

Today is the story of Nov. 6th

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    It is the 310th day of the year, leaving 55 days remaining in 2022.

 

  On this date in 1892, the editor Harold Ross was born.

    Harold let other people tell their stories, but he ensured their prose was crisp and clean and, above all else, readable.

    He spent most of his life at the New Yorker, which along with his wife, Jane Grant, he helped found in 1925, and then served as its editor for the next 26 years.

    The New Yorker, he said, was for the urbane, sophisticated, well-rounded and socially conscious reader. It was not, as he said in the first issue, for "the little old lady in Dubuque."

      He saw the New Yorker as an adjunct to the daily newspapers of the day. His magazine would not deal in sensationalism, but in interpretation. It would seek out the facts and stories that took extra effort. His magazine would be funny and interesting, he said, a dig at his own quotation that "if you can't be funny, be interesting."     

    As an editor, he insisted on writing that was clear and concise, yet precise. He appreciated wit, but eschewed sexual content. He promoted and enjoyed the single panel cartoons that soon became a trademark of the publication.

    He was always on the lookout for good writing, and cared not a whit if the writer was well-known. He was, however, a member of the writers clique known as the Algonquin Round Table, so he knew people who knew people.

    He often gave these young, then-unknown writers their first assignments and bylines in his magazine. Among those who wrote for the magazine during his years were J.D. Salinger, Dorothy Parker, E.B. White, and Ogden Nash. Artists included Charles Addams and George Price.

    Ross died in 1951 in New York.