June 01, 2008

Book Review, "Bobbsey Reminisces"

Dr. Hershel Schemdick
Iowa City Press Citizen, September 6, 1980

In a review a few years back I alluded to the "Bobsy twins" and was both confused and amused to realize I may have misled the reader in my spelling and allusion to the "Bobbsey" twins. The old review was about the growing popularity of the infamous Bobsy twins that terrorized cattle and sheep in the grazing grasslands of Montana during the legendary range wars of yesteryear.
Browsing in the children's section of the new Prairie Lights Bookstore for a birthday book for daughter Sara, what whistles to my eyes is a few "Bobbsey" novels, that series which was a mainstay in my youth. What was reawakened -an "ah ha" moment"- in me was an immediate desire to do justice to a dormant part of my youth and its author, Laura Lee Hope: "There can't be rainbows without rain." (To those who know better, I am not going into the wonderful and fascinating life of Edward Stratsmeye and his Chancery-like assembly line of writers and best-smelling finished books).
The Bobbsey twins were those adventurous sets of fraternal twins: Nan and Bert, and Freddie and Flossie; an obstetric phenomenon I am still curious to know the odds on but has little to do with my _naissance posthume_ appreciation then as today of the almost subliminal artistic invention of a wizened child psychologist and wit (who also rewarded us with the lavish "Nancy Drew" and near comprehensible "The Hardy Boys.)"
How soon we forget or how quick we're reminded; and I would warn against the nonchalant acceptance of _we_ as editorial.
Have we not all chalked up and dismissed the Bobbsey adventures to post-diaper rash? -to our seedy coming-out? -companions only of a brisk childhood? Do we not honestly and in reality forget at that time the Bobbsey capers stretched us gently, firmly and politely, toward a wider advancing estimation of a then other and scary world around us? -a world where other kids and real people could be, impossible as it seemed, like ourselves, individual and sacred? And cranky?
Take Danny Rudd and Jack Wesley: not quite Keats' lovers, "forever young, forever free," but certainly forever our nemesis, borne in fact or fiction. ("They were always playing mean tricks on children smaller then themselves.)"
If you had never encountered these perennial Bobbsey bullies in print, you could not have guessed ahead at such a dark, potential likelihood; unlike the shadow of a hawk enlightens immediately a newborn turtle. Here, you had been coerced by a subtle, tempting language to suspect. Through Laura Lee Hope's understanding, we all understood or felt more than the presence of words in one day's chapter.
Only rereading, looking back, can one comprehend the impertinence that the fact of the moment was not the truth of the moment; not suggesting an eternal continuity or constancy but that a moment is never repeated.
Existentialism as a point of reference is as alive this instance as it was the moment you turned page 39 to 40 in your third Bobbsey thriller.
Though we often forget to remember to remember, we "remember" time flies, or as Einstein said: "...you sit on a hot stove for a minute, you think it's two hours."
The (admittedly) labyrinthian point is taken: simply that we must recall past experience in light of its emphasis on our past at the time we experienced it. Re-examine Laura Lee Hope and the Bobbseys in the glow of first encounter, primeval revelation, ratio and success of initial potential just as we would if we could an influence that today has left us a better person than we were yesterday or an hour ago.
When you reread Laura Lee Hope it is imperative that you give up all your conceived notions and childhood "subjective" opinions. Remember to remove emphasis on right and wrong or good and bad: try to recall things as they were, tabula rosa, immanent, innocent.
If you listen closely, recollecting in tranquil quilts, you will not only hear Nan, Bert, Flossie and Freddie heralding in candied snow, the avant guard of the wasteland we skinny-dip in today, but you will hear them in the echoes of your memory (like the TV snow echoes the big band). Listening to good old Dinah and Sam Johnson and Aunt Sally Pry, you will be listening to your own spindrift conch, hearing renewed, re-sweetened, oftentimes samite-sheeted whispers -"Great! Swell! Keen! came the happy cries."
True communication of our history, moment to moment -as "To thine ownself be true" as likely as a hog on the moon- depends, at least, upon being straight-forward with our memory. Do you really recall being breast-fed (by your mother)? Will you legislate Laura Lee Hope to a chuckle because your parents read aloud Rimbaud, Rilke, and "Little Black Sambo"? Will you sweep whatever lit you were weaned on under the rug before guests arrive and spray sweet confusion like painted scent upon the painted air?
The wasteland is in us. And the rainbow.
"May I look at your engine?" the man asked.
"Sure, but be careful with it," Freddie replied.
He handed over the toy. As the man stared at it, he slid one hand into his pocket. He brought it out again closed.
"Listen," he said earnestly: "Will you do me a favor?"
Freddie looked surprised. "What is it?"
"Put out your hand."
Freddie did as he was asked.
"Just hold this for a minute," the stranger said. He placed something in Freddie's palm.
The boy looked down... (Pg. 47-48, "The Bobbsey Twins & and the Playhouse Secret," Grosset and Dunlap, NY, 1968).
Can there ever be rainbows without rain?
Laura Lee Hope knew that her wetless rainbows, decaled on tender souls, would in the reality of our aging, run like mascara, with craftlessness and hardly sullen art. The books don't. The Bobbsey's won't. So what does it matter?
"That is not what I meant at all. That is not it, at all"
Nan, Bert, Freddie and Flossie, aren't they all, their ageless lives and adventures, perhaps simply painted on a portion of our lives? Hope is a humble idea because we give her no reason to be other than a noun.
Our raised eyebrows no more reach her than they do Nan and Bert -or Edward Stratsmeyer for that matter.
Raised eyebrows (doubt), like parachutes, open on impact.
Reviewing the Bobbsey's or Dagwood or Little Lulu or Henry, as if they have been created, as if they are without understanding the reality and spirit within which they do verily live, what price growing up? Seeing Mickey and Minnie Mouse in a cage of mice; Donald and Daisy Duck in a cage of ducks; does this miscarriage our youth. Indeed so! I couldn't choose between Betty or Veronica. Waking up next to one, I would pinch my mother.
In an exact sense, the only thing I can actually ponder in my life is that on which I have generated. Reading the Bobbsey's, I replay the notes of my own flowering melody of early childhood, feeling the old body, seed, root and take.
Sadly, the Bobbsey's are the dancer and the dance but then we must know flesh and blood, in many cases, are cartoons that lie and bleed; rain, rain, rain, and nothing following.


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May 29, 2008

"The Book of Hollywood Quotes"

Hollywood never fascinated me. I suppose that's because I grew up there.
I didn't know it was famous until I came to Iowa fifteen years ago.
Returning to LA in l977 on a three year sabbatical, I found myself astonished (Keats: "...silent upon a peak in Muscle Beach.") Hollywood never looked better.
I immediately starred in 17 movies: "Rocky 11," "Roller Boogie," "1941," and "The Rose" among them. I was type-cast: I always played the cast of thousands.
The things I heard about Hollywood both as a child growing up and as a returning vet always amazed me: They never had anything to do with Hollywood. So it was no surprise that Gary Herman's "The Book of Hollywood Quotes" (Omnibus Press, San Francisco, 1979) didn't either. The city -suburb- is part of Los Angeles along with Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, Westwood, Watts, Boyle Heights (my birthplace), Cheviot Hills, Ocean Park, Venice,, Brentwood, ad naus. In poetry, "Hollywood" would be called a synecdoche as in "Hey, nice wheels!! refers to a nice car. Pedantic aside, it's a fun read (book). The compilation of insults, insights,, famous lines, are indeed by people who passed through tinsel town or have come close: Ernest Hemingway, for one: "Let me tell you about writing for films. You finish your book. Now, you know where the California state line is? Well, you drive right up to that line, take your manuscript and pitch it across. No, on second thought, don't pitch it across. First. let them toss the money over. Then you throw it over, pick up the money, and get the hell out of there."
Or, Dorothy Parker: asked if she enjoyed the cocktail party -the party was in New York city- replied: "Enjoy it! One more drink and I'd have been under the host." Or, Groucho Marx: "Military Intelligence is a contradiction of terms." Or Humphrey Bogart: "I don't trust any bastard who doesn't drink." Or Robert Benchley: "It took me fifteen years to discover that I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous."
The book is infamous for non-Hollywood quotes but somehow, somewhere, somewhat, they are related and riotous. It's a joy to read in the john, on the bus, in a literary bar (for possibly more fun later).
"I bought some batteries. I got home and found they weren't included." -Steven Wright. That's not in the book but I thought the reader should have an idea of what amuses me. Mostly one-liners: "I was so ugly when I was born, the doctor slapped my mother." -Rodney Dangerfield. Returning home from an eight-week stand-up tour, Rodney asked the taxi driver to take him where the action was. "The taxi driver took me to my house."
Back to my favorites in Gary Herman's book.
Samuel Goldwyn (nee Samuel Goldfish -honest!) moved into film-making with money made as a successful glove salesman. A pioneer of the industry who spent most of his productive career as an independent -in Culver City- is also fondly remembered for his success with his off-screen dexterity of the English language. (It should be noted here that lines attributed to one person -all those named here- were _attributed_ but we give the benefit of the doubt. (In a previous review of a book on sports quotes, it's still not certain if Yogi Berra was the source who observed that "Toots Shor's restaurant is so crowded nobody goes there anymore.")
Samuel Goldwyn:
"Gentlemen, include me out."
"If you can't give me your word of honor, will you give me your promise?"
"I'll give you a definite maybe."
"I read part of the script all the way through."
"Tell me: how did you love the movie."
"What we want is a picture that starts with an earthquake and works it way up to a climax."
"We have all passed a lot of water since then."
"I don't care if it doesn't make a nickel. I just want every man, woman, and child in America to see it."
"A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's printed on."
Robert Benchley, journalist, critic, actor, was a member of the famous (infamous?) "round table" of the Algonquin Hotel (NYC) group of Broadway and "Hollywood" literati:
On leaving a restaurant and spotting a uniformed man at the exit, Benchley asked him to get a taxi. The man replied rather indignantly: "I am a rear Admiral in the United States Navy!" "All right," Benchley replied. "Get us a battleship."
"The biggest obstacle to professional writing today is the necessity of changing the typewriter ribbon."
"Let's get out of these wet clothes and into a dry martini."
Told that his favorite drink was slow poison, he replied: "So who's in a hurry?"
I kept Benchley in the church. Dorothy Parker, short-story writer, screenplays, versifier, critic, and Algonquin regular: humor that approaches naughty, to be polite -"naughty" abounds throughout the book.
"Scratch an actor and you'll find an actress."
"He's a writer for the ages -for the ages from four to eight."
Hearing that Calvin Coolidge died: "How can you tell?"
"That woman speaks 18 languages and can't say 'no' in any of them."
Commenting on a Yale Prom: "If all those sweet young things present were laid end to end, I wouldn't be surprised."
I'll conclude with a favorite from Fred Allen: (and it mentions PLACE!)
"In Hollywood, people from Iowa mistake each other for stars."

Glen Epstein: For the Press Citizen (November 22, 1980

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May 28, 2008

MARY ELLEN'S BEST OF HELPFUL HINTS

When Florentine scholars, early in that period we know as the Italian Renaissance, began searching for the elusive classic authors, they uncovered numerous manuscripts written in Carolingian minuscules, maybe halfway back to Greek and Roman "classics" -say, the late Dark Ages or Early Middle Ages. To some Florentine consternation, many dealt with domestic, everyday problems; recycling, e.g. utilizing cattle, goat, human droppings for better homes and gardens.
These mini-tomes did appeal, however, to more humanists than previously thought through a growing library of new-found Renaissance adopted and expanded versions of killing two aviaries with one stone, so to speak. These editions surprised scholars in the sense that the rebirth of knowledge Renaissance was, in a domestic venue, "all thumbs" when it came to getting paint out of mosaic "valleys" or getting ink to flow freely from clogged (and poorly constructed) quills.
These early "household" briefs, almost overnight, were recognized -some scholars say even written- in the Papal Chancery and the courts, and spread throughout Europe. England, in fact, not only enjoyed the "little diplomacies" but also loved the "Italic" writing -from which the name came from.
A comparison of these early briefs and booklet guides with the numerous household shortcuts and problems and solutions today -the "Heloise Connection"- illustrate "time-honored" -club soda, today’s spot-removing panacea was Arrighi's _medicati fontes_-mineral water; today's cold cucumber on puffy eyes were Tagliante's _cucumis frigidus_; and today's ticking clock to keep puppy from whining is not far removed from Niccole's gravel glass. In an interesting aside, Niccole warned his readers to be prepared to be up and down all night turning the glass over.
The contrasts are obvious: our dependency on electricity, to name one technology, has lengthened our how-to's considerably (not to mention our numerous problems resulting from electricity like your every-other-day short in the toaster or fork in the garbage disposal.
I have perused some two dozen "up-to-date" references and found "Mary Ellen's Best of Helpful Hints," (Warner Books, NY, l977) perhaps the most useful and, sadly, perplexing of the lot -"perplexing," from this critic's pov, who may be guilty of the over-ambitious physics connecting the problem to the solution. Here, the reader is asked to allow the reviewer or critic their quiddities especially when the editorial "we" may be a large bucket of bait on a thin limb. Like her household colleagues, Mary Ellen Pinkham rarely if ever place crumbs between the means and the ends nor do most readers question why placing a bag of golf tees in the trunk when driving in ice or snow may come in handy. Household hints, admittedly, are gift-horses and not even I can question Matthew's "By their fruits ye shall know them" or Ovid: "Exitus Acta probat" -results are the wisdom of the pudding; not the recipe.
It should be remembered or we should be reminded that a common vice of human nature is trust, especially in success clouded within the strange and unknown. When Mary Ellen tells us not to plant garlic near peas nor cabbage near strawberries, we must accept without benefit of enlightenment. Sometimes this reviewer wants to know why "rabbits hate talcum powder." When we are informed to drop a penny into the vase so the tulips will stand erect and not open too wide, I find it annoying trying to constitute such accurate "gimmicks" in the gaunt flowerpot of my intellect. However, I know better than to push the river -and the reader.
"Mary Ellen's Best of Helpful Hints" include chapters on cars ("Some hints you _auto_ know"); beauty ("Face It!); children ("Achie Baby"); and the family ("Pass the salt -or else!").
With the reservations I have touched on -and passed through resignation and patience- the book does, as such books are wont, lack thrilling speech; however, the ideas are clear, cogent, and earnestly forwarded. I would say what works best here -and I can't always defy impersonal tendencies- is the seems at home. "If your ball-point becomes clogged with too much ink or goo, insert it in the filter-tip of a cigarette." "To prevent flies from swarming around garbage, spray them with Windex or Jack Daniels." I'll choose the Windex.
The reader will learn not to question. _Ratio est sine culpis_ -let it be.

Dr. Hershel Schemdick, "Iowa City Press Citizen," September 20, 1980

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May 27, 2008

BOOK REVIEW: "Iowa City Telephone Directory"

BOOK REVIEW: "Iowa City Telephone Directory" (Dr. Hershel Schmedick, Iowa City Press Citizen. Oct. 25, 1980)


[Ed. Note: Glen's Graduate Fellowship to the famed University of Iowa's Writers' Workshop was for poetry. After the UI, he spent three years managing Gerald Stevenson's "The Paper Place," a bookstore catering the underground, the writers and artists. While there, Glen edited Stevenson's "The Iowa Defender," a liberal weekly in the incunabula of "underground" newspapers. With brother Harry, he was owner and manager of Epstein's Bookstore (1969-1977). After a three-year return to LA to nurse his father, he returned to three years managing half -the literary- the book-floor at Iowa Book and Supply. (He took over the job of his friend, then and today, Paul Ingram, who went to manage the new "Prairie Lights Bookstore" -still does- and also became the father of Glen's daughter, Sara. The whole family is still a family. Iowa City
All these years, Glen was honing his calligraphy but also writing "book" reviews for the The Daily Iowan and Iowa City Press Citizen under the name Dr. Hershel Schmedick (preventing conflict of interest). Epstein, admittedly, had little respect for critics, lit and art, and found a unique voice and vocabulary expressing it.]

Dealing with the problem of falsification of the image (typos) produced by modern methods of reproduction -a problem closely connected with the problem for taste and tastelessness- is something quite underestimated by both the public and the critics.
The large-scale reproduction of handy references by means of the new technical methods represents one of the most surprising and noticeable characteristics of recent cultural evolution. Recognizing this mass-production of familiar objects and tools (the necessities taken for granted) intended for perfectly authentic treatment is an awareness beginning.
To explain why this is so difficult, but not impossible---
_The Iowa City Telephone Directory_ (1979) is a phenomenal case in point: the concept of phone listings takes its place in the rapid succession of stylistic revolutions which have occurred and blossomed in the post-war period. While it may be argued that telephone directories, in general, have little artistic content or coherence and little independent artistry on their own, there can be little room for disagreement that few topics have greater relevance to the development of modern communication as a whole.
Almost from the beginning of the modernist (post-Edison, post-Bell) revolution, phone callers have felt the attraction of a sort of reductionism: they don't want six correct digits, but seven. They -a la Coleridge- want the right numbers in the right order. Without this particular clarity, without the pure and simple combination of geometrical elements, the caller will wax and shutter in the ultimate humiliation -the wrong number.
Where does error reign? In loose or nervous fingers? or, more shattering, in a typo? Whose still, is it a disconnected number that fathers connected frustration?
From a contemporary historical viewpoint, the idea of a relationship between a typo in a telephone dictory and medical emergency is rather significant, especially if it is based on mischief. Just last week there was much to-do down in Texas where a mortuary was incensed because their yellow-page ad was misplaced under "Nursing Homes." (Curiously, the nursing home staffs -and clients!- were amused).
All this tells us is that a telephone directory is not flawless, or at least only as existential as airplane signs telling us that our nearest exit may be behind us. That we are heading toward an ever-increasing "yellow" neurosis more than hints as "over-reaction:" it is not in the least absurd to think that the world, via the telephone, is tending toward a schizoid rift even if it has not reached schizophrenic, which embraces all of us and behind (or beneath) which we can still see the theological "operators" of witty information -"Your number is up" or "I've got _your_ number."
The _Iowa City Telephone Directory,_ however, is quite founded and representative of the best directories nation-wide: better than most, in fact, if you turn your eyes aside at the American Way -namely, that already- solvent businesses buy the larger (if not full) Yellow-page ad, receiving in this quicker world, more business while the small (likely as competent) business remains small, if seen at all. Vis: the fingers do little walking.
Perhaps one other apprehension felt here -read "locally"- would be a concern over -read "literally"- the 1979 color cover of multicolored hot-air balloons over the hot-air balloon capital of Iowa, Indianola. In Iowa, this is an exotic photograph in time and space (much more suitable to Iowa City). Is there not ample color in our local milieu to bespeak and behold our space. Take your average Grant Wood for example: he lived in Iowa City and doodled landscapes in and about. Faithful reproduction is certainly appreciated; faithful representation would be nice if not worldwide.
The introductory 15-20 pages of the ICTD provide -yes- fascinating and often provocative perusal. I am often amazed at how few readers even know what's up front. For instance, did you know that if you falsely claim an emergency call you can spend 30-days in the slammer? -that if a pay phone keeps your dime and doesn't give you option to make a call, you can jot down the number "of the offending phone?" (Writers of this section probably don't receive much "pay" -"...that if you have a 338 or 337 and an unwelcome guest, you can dial yourself secretly at 41021, hang up, and then receive the 'emergency' call that must take you elsewhere." Honest! -And one more lengthy haiku: "That you can avoid repeating things by having family members listen in on extension phones?" Poet's treasure, no?
These prefatory pages offer the average dialer an ethical and conversational system which cannot succeed without convention. The person who sticks to it -that is, avails himself of long-distance rates, area codes, time zones, general information all included here, is inevitably constrained, to a certain degree, to aestheticize his digital tasks and transform giving somebody a jingle, as it were, into a work of communicative art.
The listings are arranged in the usual alphabetical order, neatly and pleasantly printed with most of the white page commercial listing in darker capitals, making the overall balance of the page an unconscious joy to the eye. There is and will always be the usual confusion when looking up "City of...County of...State of..." Iowa Government and Social Services.
After the Iowa City (Coralville and University Heights) listings, there is an excellent scaled map and street guide. The essence of such inclusion may be taken for granted. Remember, the ICTD is well aware of its need, of the difference and benefits of complementing the ethical ("getting there") category with the aesthetic.
There follows a page of useful and interesting informational about Iowa City, containing some good trivia like the numbers of water meters and motor freight companies.
Nearby community listings (and locations) follow, including Lone Tree (which actually has more), Hills (which has not one), beefy Solon, seasonal Tiffin, ambitious Oxford, breezy Swisher, and others.
I have covered enough about the Yellow Pages and can only add the ICTD handles them in the best of taste, not an easy task which is too-often overlooked.
The inside-back cover is always a favorite -and or because it is always a surprise. There is always the Northwestern numbers and this year Snoopy and the Candlesticks make one think.
As a completed entity, the ICTD has an innate consistency, even in the codex sphere of architecture (printing process), which on a critical level enhances and crystallizes our ideas of the nature and philosophy of being: the other party ceases to exist without "being" there, being busy, disconnected, or sick. We, in a more realistic appreciation, are the dial tone. We are alive. The phone book is alive. Not deep here but happy to say it's a good book. It's certainly good for Charleton Heston
"Hi, Barbara, This is Hersh. Is Joe alive?"

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May 26, 2008

"GAZETTE" ps.

I was grateful the Gazette and Diane printed the article. As most of us know, most -if not all- newspaper stories have a fixed length. Many times the copywriter will delete a sentence or paragraph.
Provost Susan Johnson said adjuncts are not measured by hours per week because they are salaried. This relates to on-campus classes. Monthly deposit statements from the University to Iowa State Bank and Trust reflected this however there were always two checks recorded. One was the budget-salary but the second UI deposit was Guided Correspondence. The Budget-Salary always mirrored 19.5 h/p/w (or part-time). The Correspondence check was determined by the amount of correspondence assignments completed per month. Since Calligraphy I GC students had only six assignments to complete in nine months, each assignment averaged over an hour each. The Calligraphy classes were among the most popular in the Continuing Education. Anne Zalinski said pay per student varied by subject and appointment. Each Guided Independent Study student received 3 s.h. (approved by the School of Art and Art History and University of Iowa Center for the Book) -you know, a real university class with higher tuition and all monies going to the University and State of Iowa.
At its most popular, I would grade over 200 GIS assignments a month, or 50 hours a week. 50 + 19.5 hours a week was close to 70 hours per week. At the very slow times (80 GIS assignments a month -or 20 hours a week +19.5 h/p/w/) I'd work 40 h/p/w/. Full-time. This should allow me state retirement benefits. I did not know my GIS hours were not recorded to IPERS.
There are many adjuncts here teaching or researching 25 hours+ a week but are, according to the Iowa Code," part-time. This keeps the State from having to pay retirement benefits.
GC invited me to write a textbook and teach the course a year after I started teaching. It took 2 1/2 years to write each text (Calligraphy I and II). I was paid $5,000 for each. The texts were required and cost maybe 10,000 students $27. Both textbooks were NUCEA (National University and College Education Association) national award-winners.
The "Iowa Code" or "Iowa Law" is not a State Legislature law, but conceived and notarized by the University of Iowa. Within the past 20 years. The University does not comment on this.
I got screwed.
More about "screwing" below. A journal should have some "me" in it. A colleague said, "I hit" on every girl in her class that had taken mine. Prostate cancer for seven years and surgery two summers ago would keep me up for class. Little more.


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May 25, 2008

Higher Education OUT OF LUCK

Iowa City: In more than two decades teaching calligraphy at the University of Iowa, Glen Epstein worked with thousands of students, wrote two award-winning texts and exhibited art internationally.
In recent years, he earned $50,000 to $60,000 annually as an adjunct instructor and by teaching correspondence classes.
Now Epstein, 66, gets $1,500 a month in Social Security, but no UI pension. The reason: He never was a full-time university employee.
Epstein argues he worked thousands of hours for the UI for which he was not credited, and has official records (vouchers) of time spent on correspondence teaching. He said his part-time adjunct work combined with correspondence work should have equaled full-time hours. "Not to have those hours considered...I was robbed of thousands of hours," he said.
Epstein is raising his concern at a time when universities increasingly are relying on adjunct faculty. The number of UI adjuncts rose from 1,993 in fall 2002 to 2,426 in 2006, mirroring national growth.
Most UI officials declined to speak specifically about Epstein's situation but said Iowa law prohibits adjunct professors from receiving retirement benefits, making it an issue out of their hands.
"We couldn't have given benefits in this case because of the Iowa Code," UI Associate Provost Susan Johnson said.
Plus, officials said, adjunct and correspondence work are considered separate contracts and are paid differently.
Epstein was hired as an adjunct in 1983 to teach night and weekend classes. He began teaching guided correspondence courses, now called guided independent study in 1985 and wrote two texts for the classes.
The question of total hours he has worked, which Epstein said often topped 40 or 50 weekly, did not cross his mind until about 2000, when he asked several administrators about it. "I can't fully explain or understand why I never considered putting two and two together," he said.
Epstein was told his time spent as an adjunct and on correspondence courses could not be combined. One Dean [Liberal Arts] told him correspondence teaching was not even considered work for the state. Epstein briefly hired a lawyer but had no luck resolving the issue.
Adjunct appointments must be less than 50 percent time. They are temporary and do not include benefits, UI policy states. Johnson said faculty positions, including adjuncts, are not measured by hours worked per week because they are salaried.
Instructors for guided independent study, which falls under the distance education office, are paid per student. Those instructors come from UI academic departments, and the pay per student varies by subject and appointment, said Anne Zalinski, associate dean for distance education.
"We can't influence it one way or the other -the payment and benefits are already set by a formula," she said.
Epstein said he just wants people to hear his story. His adjunct appointment ran out last May after 24 1/2 years and he was "honorably discharged."
He will finish teaching his last correspondence students in a few months, he said. "I could have used whatever benefits Iowa Public Employees Retirement System (IPERS) would pay, and I deserve it," he said.


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December 07, 2007

History and Origin of Extraordinary Americana

"Glen Epstein's 1992 Calendar of Country Knowledge & Extraordinary Americana" was voted America’s "Most Humorous" by the National Calendar Association (NCA), over such block-busters like "The Far Side" and "Garfield," whose glossy, top-published copies numbered and sold, give-or-take, a million. Glen's take was the NCA was making a point: to encourage the small printer, the limited, unglossy, budgeted calendar equally worthy of consideration, based on quality, not numbers nor sales. (Glen's calendars numbered between 2-3000, published by Goodfellow Printing, Iowa City).
The "singularity" of doing a calendar (Glen's word) was exactly that: a light bulb fully furnished, while he was working at Iowa Book and Supply, in l983. There was no hesitation in the writing of, or the knowledge of the process of publication. Glen's poetry garnered him a Graduate Fellowship to the Writers' Workshop but in Los Angeles he also wrote plays and prose and began learning calligraphy, which would also be an "angle" for the calendar. He was highly acknowledged in the book world, working three years at Gerald Stevenson's "The Paper Place," (l965-68, where he also edited "The Iowa Defender"), owning and managing with his brother, Harry, "Epstein's Books" (l969-l977), and managing half of Iowa Book & Supply's book floor (1980-84). While he worked at Epstein's, he wrote dozens of book reviews for the Daily Iowan and the Iowa City Press Citizen under the pen name, Dr. Hershel Schmedick. Among the "sleepers" reviewed was the "Iowa City Telephone Book," a "Bobbsey Twins" thriller and influence on Steven King, Rand McNally's Travel Guides, and like thrillers. The on-the-spot commitment here was simple: Glen's love of and need for writing, and a vehicle for his already internationally respected calligraphy.
Within the same day, the theme, content and format was established: it was to be an authorities homage to little-known facts of Iowa and Iowans presented in a Ripley's "Believe-it-or-not" format. It would take a casual six months to complete. The first six calendars would be about Iowa. All would have "time" somewhere in the title.
The 1st calendar: "Overtime: 1984 Calendar of Extraordinary Iowa," followed by "Time Out: 1985 Calendar of Extraordinary Iowa." "Time," as Glen's meandering mind, was indeed out with "Oh, Look! It's a Baby Cow," the title of the 1986 calendar.
The "casual" six months project, except for the printing, was a one-man operation: Glen wrote the text, calligraphed it, did the collages, designed the pages, top and bottom (as well as the cover), wrote the introduction, did the blue grid master (the top and bottom pages were laid out and rubber-cemented on a 20.5 x 17" blue grid), promoted, and distributed it.
Epstein said his real joy was in the time-consuming creation of collages, which many times became the source of the "fact." He added the first few calendars were disappointing in the resolution of the collages, dark, sans clarity. Almost all collages were a collaboration of the greatest etchers in history, filling Dover's wonderful copyright-free pictorial archive series. The trick was first owning most of these books and then matching the style and unique similarities of two or three etchers (not to mention what was needed). This was only the beginning. The perfect size that would match the collage was rare. There was much enlarging and reducing and in the early 80's, who could afford a photocopier? Scanners were far in the future. So, there were many trips to Zephyrs. It was also frustrating to find in some cases that two different etchings would lose their similarity when enlarged or reduced. Collages had to be as believable as photographs. In Archeology, vases or rocks or fossils are still done pointillistically (the dot-dot Seurat technique -or, to art historians, dah-dah Seurat); photographs don't let one feel the kinesthetic surface.
In Ripley, the line art was secondary to the masterful matter-of-factual prose, the laid back authority. If Walter Cronkite narrated everything Leonard Nemoy did, we'd believe it. Norbert Pearlroth was the key holder of believe-it-or-not and stating this, took the door out of the question. He gave the readers choice but the authority with which the information was transferred has made "Believe-It-Or-Not!” an unusual and startling truth. Glen employed this "authority" by his convincing: "Selected and Edited by Glen Epstein."
In the same year the first calendar hit the shelves (late 1983), Glen was invited by Kim Merker to become a founding charter member of Kim's dream: a University of Iowa Center for the Book. Further, Kim secured Glen's first calligraphy classes at the University's School of Art and Art History -much to the dismay of the SAAH with the one exception being Wallace Tomasini, who happened to be a unique exception as Director of the department. Then (as now), the SAAH places calligraphy alongside -no offense- needlework, crochet, beads, and cabbage dolls. However, this was the beginning of Glen's ever-expanding 24-years teaching here. It would detour but somehow salvage the calendar through 17 years.
Every time "this was to be the last calendar," fate entered.
1988 was the first of the last calendar. Glen was just finishing writing the course book for a Calligraphy Guided Correspondence class, a 2 1/2 year, 5-6 hour a day project. The course immediately bulleted to the most popular of the 210 GC courses offered. Glen did not want to produce a thin calendar. Enter Cheryl Jacobsen, a recent student who became a colleague before the semester ended. I asked and she agreed to write the entire calendar; that is, write my text. Cheryl would keep the reinspired calendar afloat for five years.
By 1992, her own calligraphy and commissions were brimming o'er. "Glen Epstein's 1992 Calendar of Country Knowledge & Extraordinary Americana" was to be the last. My on-campus classes were filled and my GC assignments, at an hour per, were a 40-hour week.
By this time, the calendars were well-known in the greater calligraphic community, both by their exposure in calligraphy mail-order houses (John Neal and Brenda Broadbent) and Glen's own growing reputation in national exhibitions and teaching workshops around the country. He was considered among the best in the country and was going to teach at the 1993 International Calligraphy and Lettering Conference in Trenton, NJ. Once there, the furnished light bulb again switched on. Why not ask the best in the world to write out my text? It was an overwhelming yes, and from 1993 to 2000, the calendar became more than "weird:" it now became a calligraphic anthology of design. The calligraphers had only to make the text readable: the means had no end.
Add to this, arguably the best calligrapher in America (internationally?), Julian Waters, agreed to do the cover.
At best, some calendars broke even. Printing costs soared. Contributors were aware of this and worked for copies (including Julian). By 2000, the printing was out of reach and it seemed a good year to stop. In the past seven years, all copies not sold became collector's items -at cost. There are still some left -at cost.
From the LA to the NY Times, journals, magazines, calligraphy guild and society newsletters, the calendars have received over 1000 reviews. One reviewer observed that the accuracy of days and dates "...are merely a by-product. The Calendars as extension of humor and fantastic calligraphy is worth more than the sum of its days."
What follows is a chronology of each calendar: a short overview, the cover, maybe another page or two, favorite facts, favorite collages, and whatever John Richard (from my host, Inertia-Unlimited) wants to do.
We will wrap with a list of all contributors.


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December 02, 2007

A Brief History of Wall Time

Wall calendars date from near the dawn of time, perhaps a little later, as seen in this Pasiega cave drawing discovered in 1911 in northern Spain, in an attic full of cave drawings. Most cave calendars were wall calendars and had been around millennia before Anthrax is discovered writing in a dival outside Kredel in southern Spain in 878 BCE (not to be confused with the other Kredel of early civilization fame). Some pale scholars deem these predival scratchings calligraphic, beautiful (the Greek _calli _ actually means "good-looking"): testament to the enduring and elusive spirit of ambiquity. They argue, for example, that the drawer of the Pasiega timetables was, undoubtedly, the clan's _cavidentia scribentia_ or "resident professional." Need more be said?
That these cavitary markings are calendars goes without saying; not what we are used to, to be sure, but representing same -what's coming, what's now, what's gone. History may repeat itself but not July 10, 343 BCE. In a rather remarkable find (1951), the "four-month" calendar representing the seasons in the cave at Altimira, demarks the earliest recorded "holiday:" spring -the circular mark- is done in red. That heavy traces of selenium is evident (the same in the good airplane sniffing glue), have led paleopharmacologists to speculate that, rather than the traditional symbol for rebirth, the trendy sign more likely announces the ripening of _Stylophorum diphyllum_ (Celandine poppy), from whose roots a generic lysergic acid is extracted. Be that as it may, the markings are calendrical: sequence may not always be evident or logical nor weekends included, but time-sense is undeniable.
By the time the Egyptians show up, calendars have long come off the wall and are popular items in the marketplace around Christmas even though the Egyptians have no idea what they are nor mean. This was status quo. They were forever up to here trying to decipher what their own scribes were saying. (It was the Egyptians who, commenting on their own system of writing, coined the cartouche

"It's Greek to Menes!"

The first Egyptians, though crude in construction and lacking foresight, did provide texture and -more vital to calendology- reason for invention. It only marked _passing_ of time, in groups (spans) of five (seven-day weeks (spans) began in 1340, with Chaucer), which was coolly received by future generations who were wont, by nature, a suspicious people, robust yet amusing, who wanted more than "counting the days." They demanded, in essence, guarantees of such phenomena as "later," "tomorrow," next week," and in athletic circles, "next year." They wanted an IOU from Mr. HOPE.

Enter, instead, Mr. Hittite.

The calendar here is more complicated than it looks and more calligraphic than modern eyes behold. To appreciate this, knowledge of the everyday Hittite hand is prerequisite. Take my word for it; this scribble needs a fly-swatter. (It is interesting to note –pun intended! - three out of four Hittites were doctors). To make up for lost time, late Hittites introduced collaboration and interns; different scribes for different months. Beginners got a day or two in winter. The inevitable petty squabbles and jealousies ensued ("Why does Achim get May when I've been here longer?"), climaxing when Assinines stalked off the job taking May, June, July and August with him.
After seven of the coldest years in Hittite civilization, Assinines returned (with a beautiful tan) but things were never the same. Not until the coming of Christianity and
Arabic numerals would the calendar revive. Not for long: the Dark Ages were nigh and spring still under construction.
*
The glory days of the calligraphy calendar were Tuesdays and Fridays during the Renaissance: every packaging imaginable was proffered, including the prototype of this very edition, the _d'etorinare calende Italiana_ (modeled by Enrico, in a casual beige jerkin with a splash of rose, cloistered in a natty ensemble by El Cyd. Again, a short glory: The printing press and Gutenberg -the RCG called him a "dupe grande" -put the calligraphy calendar out of print.
In 1901, a browser in a London museum was tearing apart some annoying bindings of way out-of-date manuscripts and -lo! - rediscovered the monthly grid.
And here we are. Though this has been brief, much has been left out. It should, however, give the reader a notion of the foundations and detours from whence the present volume springs. I like to quote Paul Ingram from his recent ("Bookworms") review: "'Off the wall' does neither Epstein nor his calendars justice."

-The "Introduction" to "Glen Epstein's 1995 Calendar of Country Knowledge & Extraordinary Americana."



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November 26, 2007

Book Reviews

"Book Reviews: the Rare and the Strange," (Glen Epstein, "Houston Calligraphy Guild Newsletter, l981)

[I was in the book business -retail- 13 years, including owning and managing (with my brother, Harry) _Epstein's Books_ l969-1977. Calligraphy in America was in its incunabula -here, first ten years of budding- but books (esp. the how-to's) were few. However, I had the then one large volume, "PBIP" (Paperback Books In Print). Today, PBIP are about ten 5-inch tomes. The point is I had first access to anything calligraphic. The following calligraphy-related books were not found under "Calligraphy."]

"The book collector," Lillis Sara said, "builds a house of one-eyed Jacks only a Jill would rummy in." With this in mind, I ask no one in particular to forgive me the few promises I cannot keep. The curiosities mentioned below are out-of-print. Certainly, somewhere -in some shadow, perhaps- they lie deconstructed or edible in some attic. I remind the calligrapher that some things actually once were; that our glossy oldies-but-goodies were once baby cows. What's below existed -and are priceless so don't ask.
******
Garnered mostly from old _Saturday Evening Post_ contests, "Abecedefs: Lettering Quick Brown Haiku," (Hans Breaddar, Ed., A-W Pub, Philadelphia, 1951), is a collection of over 3000 abecedefs (alphabet sentences) which Breaddar has divided into three parts: those he calls "Naked" range from 24-39 letters in length; the "Apparelled" contain 40-104 letters; and those with 105 and more are "dressed-to-the-nines-iku." This last group numbers only 19 but their various lengths -one is twelve pages- account for nearly a third of the book. Breadars introduction and scattered interludes provides a fey, often readable parallel to the Eastern 17-syllable haiku, which "...has a wauy of getting to the gut before the head can chew what the eye has bit." The majority of the "naked" abecedefs are obscure. The dozen which are grammatically correct are also, according to the editor, profound, and like the familiar "...quick brown fox..." highly ethnic. What developes as the abecedefs take on letters is a process Breaddar calls "trailing crumbs," which reaches a peak in #1291, an alphabet sentence which Breaddar collected from "Harper'd Best Short Stories pf 1947."
*******
_The Art of Dry Flourishing_ (Alistaire James, Littleton Press, London, 1946) is a top-notch manual that includes 400 copyright-free arcs. James leaves no air undisturbed in what has proven to be the last word on this cul-de-sac of calligraphy. For good reason. The book is 380 pages long with not less gthan 128 perusing the makeup of climate as a major consideration determining flourish intensity. Is there not one among you, he poses, that has not ruined a piece by that last flourish? He proceeds to convey the obvious, all leading to what reeks of familiarity. ("It's not the heat, but the humidity"). We are reminded that Palatino, two weeks of every year, went to southern Egypt to do all his flourishing, his "doce semanos acridus l'florerista." I think James did okay with a subject that in lesser hands might have become tedious. Incidentally, this book was listed under "New Arab Republic: Valley of the Kings."
********
_A Clean Well-lighted Aitch and Other Stories_, by J.R.Henderson (Everyman, NY. 1888) contains fourteen strange and wonderful fantasies which shape the mythic auras of some of our communicative denominators. If the titles ring familiar, keep in mind Ernest Hemingway was born about the time this co;;ection was published. That Henderson is a foot-note in literary curiosa brcause of Hemingway's borrowings underestimates both men. The best here include _The Old Penman and the Cee_, _A Farewell to Em's_, _The Uncials of Kilamanjaro_, and, of course, the title story. What would have been curious (or trivial) to the literary historian was the irony in the fact that J.R.Henderson was called by his peers and, at times, his children, "Papa." If a lucky calliger happens upon an edition of this first edition gem -matter of fact, all books here are first editions- I would advise (after reading, of course) bulleting to Scholes: In 1981, a copy sold for $150,000!
*******
In Delmore Davison's callitunic _Calligraphy's Greatest Hits_, (Regency Press, Nashville, 1955), no claim is made to the effect these songs ever topped any charts on any scale -one tune did become a hit but with different lyrics ( ). It is difficult not to go along with Davison when he suggests: "Table your quill, if you will, a moment to pluck, not a duck, but a lute." The ditties are delightful and include all the retreat favorites: "My Cursive Dreams," "For the Good Times Roman," "Three Coins in the Fountain Pen," "Daddy Sang Gothic," "It Was a Very Goudy Year," "Make the World Go Arrighi," and my favorite, Oklahoma Sunday Morning Condensed." The alert reader might question Dasison's "extended" definition of calligraphy what with all the type allusions.
*******
There are not many calligraphers -and fewer who will admit to it- the tag-team phenomena of the early fifties.
A delightful reminder in my possession is Jonas and Radick Annunzio's _Tag-team Calligraphy: History and Revival_ (Jiminy Chapbooks, Burbank, CA. 1953), a slim volume in the tradition of the Peter Pauper lineup.
The Annunzio Boys, as they were professionally known, section the book appropriately but not, so to speak, equally: History 0four pages; Rules, two pages; Annunzio victories, 93 pages. The 93 pages are entertaining if you're an Annunzio fan and they did have a following: Jonas saves Radick with an 11th hour Carolingioan; Radick saves Jonas with a surprising half-uncial -it wasn't insular-; jonas saves Radick, Radick saves Jonas...
it could, and tends to, get redundant. Those familiar with TTC know the importance of the especial letterform, the need of that PA ace in the PW sleeve. I don't believe any follower will ever find anything in the archives that will match Radick's tour d'clat -an unbelievable copperplate executed with a Canadian reed. For this alone, the little book is worth one's wait.
********
Not a book but an article which I feel is properly situated is "The Handwriting in the Cookie Jar: Arrighi in The Chancery" (Journal of the Renaissance, 1948, V.47, N.3, University of Stanford Press). Initially regarded as a devil's advocate, Dalton Sklar, has, with recent documented support, been (with some hesitance) reclassified as a researcher of no little significance. To renaissance scholars, Arrighi is parallel to English scholars in regards to Shakespeare. The mere mention of Sklar among some calligraphic academicians make for swift, sometimes rude exits. To many Arrighi followers, however, the argument just brings the Italic genius closer, more human. Sklar's "argument" is objective and not overloud; certainly not personal. Arrighi, along with all the other Papal scribes, was an employee in a large corporation: the Vatican. The calligraphers job was not unlike an assembly line but in a large office atmosphere -dip, dip, dipping, nine to five, eyes glancing to the large hourglass on the flat podium.Calligraphers with a little learning know that Chancery scribes were paid -and paid well. By the inch. They might also know that the chancery scribes' authority was unquestioned. The finished document, the Papal brief, was never edited, never reread. The scribe, so to speak, had the bull by the horns. Sklar, however, has taken a closer look at the documents, especially those of Arrighi, and taking "look" to perusal, has found the famous scribe's works to be, politely, "wordy." "There is none amongst us, myself at the top of the list, can ever question Arrighi's love of letters and vessels of communication. What Sklar pointed out, with authentic documents, is that which Arrighi wrote in 800 words, could have conveniently been written in eleven words.
Sklar was puzzled by the general reaction to his words, saying it was not his intention to open a can of worms. The members of the journal finally (over the years) reconciled the job of any scholar. Late in his life (1988), Sklar was quoted on contemporary scribes, saying, in effect, he has never encountered a group like these people. "They receive $300 for an article about why they never write for the money."
********
In "Six Scripts in Search of a Scribe" and "Writing for Godot," (Beacon Brothers, NY. l948), we have two one-act plays with more gravity than their titles suggest. Written in the mid-40's by Jules DFeWitt, the "machina" of of living letters was not novel. Letters as characters was status quo during and post war "commedia negra," "theatre-of-the-absurd," "Fluxus," and late dada dramaturgy. ("Six Scripts..." in fact, opened off Broadway with another tasty vinette, "Russian Dressing" by Yosef Kelley whose cast was entirely vegetables). I mention this bookin passing because although I find DeWitt stimulating and uncompromising, I feel that "Scripts" and "Writing" should be heard to be appreciated.
******
A few rare, strange, and curious books of some 300 in my collection and not one -I haven't checked PBIP in thirty years- listed under the subject of Calligraphy.


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September 20, 2007

Beauty Before Age:Turning the Page

[From "The Newsletter Assoc. of the Calligraphic Arts, 2003, V.6, No. 3"]

Leaning and improving upon Roman caps or Italic has been a lifetime pursuit form many of the calligraphic masters who began their studies with these exacting letterforms. Of course, scribes 2000 years ago did not have much of an hierarchy of letterforms to choose from and Renaissance scribes could begin with any of a half-dozen unforgiving scripts (with exception to Uncial.)

Starting a beginning student today with Roman caps or Italic is like introducing literature with Joyce's Ulysses, or the simple poetry and structure of Rimbaud, Hart Crane or Emily Dickenson; Trigonometry before addition; quantum physics before constellations; Paganinna before scales.

Roman caps and Italic as a beginning letterfrom is counter-productive to the future of calligraphy by eliminating the numbers much like the wren puncturing all the eggs in every nest within 100 yards of its own. Even more significant, it not only depreciates calligraphy, it siphons the self-esteem of the student.

Most teachers are, or should be, well aware that the first letterform taught to the beginning student is much more complicated than a first letterform. Learning to drive a car is also learning the skills of the road: stop signs, speed limits, turn signals, parking, reading gas meters, changing oil, etc. I start with an automatic, not a semi.

Beginning students have a lot to learn; their teachers learn a lot. I did. I learned that I yearned for more than status quo teaching. I had to excite beginners and I spent several years searching for that key to technicolor. Start with what calligraphers strive for: texture.

My beginning classes at the University of Iowa-- taken as an elective, start with a simplified version of Rudolf Koch's Klingspor: "...a bunch of squares and vertical downstrokes, a 45 degree pen-angle, evenly spaced (like a picket fence)." I wanted students to exit the semester with both a feeling of accomplishment and the knowledge that calligraphy, while it may be as easy as it looks, is far slower than it looks.

Still, over the years, I tossed and turned and churned. Whatcould I do to create something that would make the class fun, make calligraphy fun, and make the student walk on air, at least for three weeks, before returning to my responsibility to the craft.

Abandoning all rules of calligraphy, all traditions of handwriting, I developed a texture, a letterform consisting of two movements that could be "mastered" in a few hours with the only difficulty being the forgetting of visual grammar; no word spacing, no interlinear spacing, but all spacing being slivers of white.

What seemed like and aha! movement was a combination of doodling, fully respectful of Bob Ross' knowledge of tools - they create his 23-minute masterpieces, and knowing that distance in golf is not swinging hard, but easy. I found a way to break every rule of the craft, at the same time, defining the ultimate essence of calligraphy: texture and pattern; that thing that makes beholders ohh and ahh before a word is translated.

The first three weeks of every semester produced a classroom of students whose feet never touched the ground. Work produced, to be polite, was hard to read but readability was not the point, at least for three weeks. The point was having beginning students create beauty, and understand texture.

Not only did I develop a letterform - those who "invent" one write novels with a pen name - but one that I would incorporate into my own work. It can be "mastered" in a few days and its purpose is sound: texture. It is a simple - and beautiful - to fault, and its possibilities - variations - are as unique as the individual. It invites the inside to "go for it."

What was really difficult for the students was returning to square one, driving across Nebraska; however, the magic of playing Lizst gave new meaning to the learning of scales.

My best advice is to pick a pen angle and stick to it. Downstrokes need not be exactly the same length. They will in certain letters like "o" but the second downstroke will be a pinch higher than the first. The very short diagonal join will see to that. Slivers of white is maintained throughout: the "c" is an "o" with the second downstroke being two half downstrokes or two downstrokes of any length, the crack or slit being high or low. What will be tricky initially is the interlinear horizontal slivers but that will come.

You will notice there is little difference in height between the "n" and "h." So make a little difference at the top of the "h." the caps thrown in here and there are rest stops for the dazzled eye. They can be in the middle of a word but we do not see words even though they are there.

This texture is not just for breakfast: I use them in much of my own work. Go for it!

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September 20, 2007

Eppy

I took Eppy over to the vet at eleven. Once he laid down at night, it took longer every morning to get his 80 pounds up on all fours and his first balance was drunken. He perked a tad when I said: "Come on, Peppy. We're gonna see the Doc." It took some awkward movement and strenuous contortion to get him in the van. The Animal Clinic was five minutes away. He became more animated as the familiar houses passed and certainly more excited as we turned into the parking lot. His leash put back on, he almost leaped and sometimes fell on the pavement, straightened up, took a quick leak on the grass and the leash took on horsepower to the office door.

The staff loved this fourteen year old gentle black Lab mutt. We went through the weekly routine -well, twice a week now. Pep didn't need directions to the scale in the hallway and we didn't need to move a leg anymore to get all four on the rubber. He had lost two more pounds in three days. "Good baby."Dr. Welter entered the office (four feet from the scale) at the same time it took the nurses and me to get Eppy there. Epp always wagged his tail while it was between his legs and the Doc gave him the immediate injection in the back thigh with the few sweet words.

Occasionally, Eppy-peppie would stay a few hours for tests. I kissed him on the rump and said be a good boy. I'll be back in a little while. Melissa said, on cue, pulling his leash: "Come on, sweetheart. That's a good boy." He didn't look back. I'd be back.

In the waiting room, the Doc said he'd call. It was a take. A wrap. Eppy was great and the staff was perfect. I was good, too. Later, I thanked Dr. Welter and all personally for their great work. It was moving. Perfect.

Earlier that week, the Doctor called with the bad news that they had found a pronounced cancer in his liver, The puzzling growing arthritis now made sense. There was no fault. Eppie had, at best, two weeks. No. He was afraid of hurting butterflies or afraid of butterflies. It was a ride back home that morning six months ago. The van made it. I never did but-Eppie's playmate for seven years, Scooby, needed him as much. The love inside Epp was not that difficult. It helped Scoob because Epp reminded me there was more than me.

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August 20, 2007

Writing Beyond Words

The following words appeared in "Letter Arts Review," 1999 (V.15, N.1). The introductory remarks are by Karyn L. Gilman.

"Maureen Squires, the organizer of 'Writing Beyond Words,' a conference and exhibit scheduled for this coming August in Connecticut, solicited artists to write about this topic. Included here are [just Glen's] three responses, each addressing the subject in a slightly different manner. What is apparent from collecting and reading all the essays which were elicited, is that writing about this topic is daunting at best." (The other two responses were by Maureen Squires and Peter Thornton).

Writing about "writing beyond words" has been one dead end after another. This implausible and surreal metaphor may be the closest I come to saying anything at all.

I never thought about the process or technique of writing beyond words. It did not appear full blown. It happened. It's still happening. This is the first I've talked about it and it's been revealing to a point, surprising at times. In the end and the beginning, it remains sacred ground. I can get in and I feel that's the way it's supposed to be.

Arthur Baker was the first in my life to slap me awake into another world where calligraphy or the writing of strokes - calligraphics- can communicate, can "say" something in addition to letter + letter = word = meaning. He planted a seed that gave me permission to use my craft beyond its immediate purposes, beyond the limits of being a mere servant to the text. There were others that whispered: "Come on in, the water's fine." Poppl, Koch, Ingmire...

In my heart of hearts, much of their work, not words, was the end of my rainbow. Perhaps I instinctively knew I had to make the journey, complete the craft, burn the midnight oil. And I did. It was easier in the late seventies, early eighties. I was not confronted by the deluge of techniques tempting and stunting calligraphers today.
I wish I were among the gifted few who can write words and make the words _look_ like what they _mean_. This gift breaks borders. For me, within this concept, strokes and letters and words got in the way.

My want and certainly, need, is to recirculate what nature is pumping into me, and it is directed to every nook and cranny and person and plant and whatever on the planet and beyond. The idea of writing rather than writing words seeped into my work. What is there, is the familiarity of handwriting. At any rate, what flowed for me was just a rhythm, a pattern, that didn't happen with the big brother of decipherability looking over my shoulder.

When I began to write (again, based on nearly thirty years of learning the craft of well-constructed letters arranged well) in patterns, music appeared. Almost immediately, I found myself "silent, upon a peak in Darien." [Keats].

The above is not your average lucidity. It is not even hindsight, but it's the best I can do and perhaps the furthest I wish to explore my perception of "writing beyond words." I can offer some advice from my own observation (and maybe experience). Be very careful about defining, explaining, philosophising about your own work. You may start to believe what you are saying. What you may be doing is tarring the windows shut, locking all the doors, not allowing new and fresh air of change and growth to enter. You may be painting yourself into the center of a room.

Writing about my writing beyond words has been frustrating. It has brought me back to Keats' words: "...philosophy will clip an angel's wings."

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January 02, 2007

Quotes about Glen I

Various contemporary Calligraphers and Artists have volunteered their thoughts and feelings about Glen Epstein. We are pleased to share them with you here:

Sharon Zeugin
My Two Cents: Although I like and appreciate well-behaved letterforms, I am drawn to ones with a mind of their own. Give me letters that fling themselves across the page with abandon, clothes strewn aside, joyful in the confidence of their own nakedness and uniqueness. I want letters which are not afraid to dance and sing, scream and shout (or quietly whisper) "LIFE!"--one's which in the words of the late William Stieg, are filled with "rabid self-esteem." I want to keep company with letters that strut in full bloom across a page and then topple over laughing out loud at some inside joke. Or conversely, with ones who heavy of heart, are not afraid of rising to the somber and difficult task of uniquely and sensitively expressing the horrors and cruelties of man's inhumanity to man.

Glen Epstein's lettering/art embodies the life-giving characteristics I describe above, all without compromising any aspect of Johnston's trinity of "sharpness, unity and freedom." It is always heartening and inspiring to me to see such original lettering--sound and confident in its foundations--so freely expressing the uniqueness of the person creating it. Glen is one unique character, and fortunately for the letter arts community (and the world at large) he continues to grace us with his surprising and refreshing work. Thanks, Glen!

Arthur Baker, Andover, MA
Professor Glen Epstein (in his prose) has done more for American calligraphy than anyone.

John Burns, San Francisco, CA
I enjoyed watching Glen demonstrate his mastery of the tool. He works with what I call "controlled freedom." The beauty of the ruling-pen tool is that you can't totally control it, and Glen has developed a stroke vocabulary that beautifully complements the tool. Further, he generously shares his writing technique and what he knows about the tool, and does it with directness and a sense of humor.

Barbara Close, La Mirada, CA
Glen and I met by correspondence in 1984. I was the exhibit chair for the Society for Calligraphy. Glen had sent his piece to me via regular U.S. mail and the glass was shattered when it arrived. I replaced it and wrote Glen about the incident. He has such a charming wit that our letters kept traveling back and forth ... we became instant friends. Glen's humor continues to amuse me ... not to mention his uninhibited talent! He's not afraid to explore things. That's what I admire. He doesn't let historical "correctness" stump him at all. I love that. Anyway, he's a lifetime bud.

Paul Siegel, Dallas, TX
I have come to find Glen to be one of the most prolific artists/calligraphers in our craft. He really is very modest, however his work shows us how to take giant steps in the creation process which is known as lettering. He is an influence to all that cross his path, and I will always trust his judgement in the way he offers his friendship, his understanding of teaching methods, and his continued influences on my design skills.

Izzy Pludwinski, Jerusalem, Israel
Glen has a part that might get overlooked in that wild, rambling, energetic, break-the-convention cacophonic personality: a sensitive guy who cares, about people, work, friendship, honesty, and a job well-done. Check out his calendars and his calligraphic Tom Waits presentation, not to be missed!

Annie Cicale, Asheville, NC
I would have to say that Glen is one of the most innovative calligraphers I know. His facility with drawing has allowed him to transform the phonetic symbols of the alphabet into a powerful visual language, adapting them to fit the overall needs of his designs without sacrificing legibility completely.

Jenny Hunter Groat, Lagunitas, CA
This wild and wooly man, a complete maverick in almost every way, unleashes his calligraphic artwork to roar over the fields like a runaway, genius racehorse. He has always delighted me with his legible and illegible command of the kinds of written gesture that give life, vigor, humor and love to his predictably unpredictable marvels. The only thing I don't like about his work is that I didn't do it.

Rose Folsom, Silver Spring, MD
I believe that the lettering arts will have achieved their potential when we have as many unique voices as in, say, the world of music. Glen Epstein's work embodies a truly unique voice that does what all great art does: shows us the world we think we know through different eyes. His vision makes us laugh and it makes us think.

Louis L. Lemoine, Burbank, CA
I may be a magician with cards and coins, but Glen is a magician whose wand is the pen and the magic he produces are the beautifully choreographed words displayed in his works of art. He is a brilliant lettering artist, writer and instructor and one of the most giving people I know.

Maureen Squires, New York, NY
Anyone who has experienced Glen as a teacher can attest to a renewed appreciation for gestural marks and wizardry with the ruling pen. The thematic complexity of his calligraphic pieces require careful attention and thought. An artist not to be ignored.

Joanne Fink, Lake Mary, FL
I met Glen in 1985 at Hermann Zapf's class in Rochester and was immediately taken with the expressive quality of his work. Through the years have been impressed with his development as a calligraphic artist. His images are both powerful and impactful,- as is his personality. One of the most exciting things about Glen's work is the fact that he does not feel the need to make it legible. He lets the strength of the letterforms and design carry the message for him.

Teri Martin, San Diego, CA
One of the first workshops I participated in was with Glen Epstein teaching Ruling Writer techniques. It liberated me calligraphically beyond my wildest imaginings. Glen has a wonderful way of imparting the freedom and expressiveness of this tool, encouraging each to find their own creative voice. He's funny, innovative and inspiring. There is no doubt that my artistic path was enhanced by my experience with Glen.

Karen Ter Haar, Melbourne, Australia
Glen Epstein came blasting out of nowhere into my life around Christmas time, but I cannot remember the year precisely. Perhaps it was '97 or '98, but that is not really important. What is important is Glen's impact on my life and the reason he contacted me in the first place. I have been a member of the on-line calligraphy group, Cyberscribes, since the beginning of '96. Glen joined some time after, and the discussion at the time of his joining was centered on Ray De Boll. I, as an Australian, was fairly ignorant at that time of American calligraphers (our history being mostly British- and local-based). "Who was Ray De Boll?" Glen (shortly to be dubbed 'Iowa' by the queen of nick-name bestowal!), knowing me about as well as he might have known a brick used in some obscure Australian suburb, contacted me to ask for my address to send to me his copy of Ray De Boll's book. It has been beautifully inscribed. What sort of a man would do something so special, so spontaneously? Iowa, of course! This generosity of Glen's has been a hallmark of our relationship, and that alone would be enough to earn him a place in my heart. However, add to that his odd and endearing use of language, his formidable and incredible talent, and the sheer joy he has in life, and you have a character whom one cannot help but love,- and I do.

Cecilia Sharpley, Australia
I have never met Glen in person, but for many years I have loved his artwork. For me, his work is an exciting meld of ruggedness and delicacy, supported by a use of colour, light and shade that speaks to me with profound impact. I find his work almost musical, and sometimes wonder if the melody itself directs his interpretation, such as the lyrics used in his Tom Waits artworks. Much of Glen's writing, on teaching, learning or just plain living in this turbulent world, has been carefully stored away by me, to return to from time to time. It is plain that he is generous in his teaching and his knowledge. If he has an ego, I have never caught a glimpse of it.

Randall M. Hasson, Del Mar, California
As a novice and aspiring calligrapher I was fortunate enough to take my first workshop from Glen. After a couple of years of learning the "basics" in a formal program, it was a pleasure to be introduced to Glen's "why not?" style of art and innovative and distinct style of using the ruling pen. His personable nature and teaching style left a lasting impression on me, and (as with all good teachers) my calligraphy has been influenced in a positive way even to this day.

Ewan Clayton, England
I have always admired Glen's work; he has a distinctive voice and visual vocabulary. It's original; it's truthful; sometimes its painful. But to me, the moment I recognize a piece is by him I want to start engaging with it: reading, looking, respecting. I know I will learn things and my feeling for life and the human condition will be enlarged,- I think of Glen as a kind of calligraphic prophet, stirring us up, pointing to truth; it's not always comfortable, but that's what prophets do, and we need them!

Jim Chin, Lemond, IL
Glen's inspiration and creativity comes through in his workshops. He allows you to experiment with new tools and to play. I really think he gets as much out of seeing what can be done with the tools as well. Glen has a dynamic element to his work. I enjoy the colors and texture that are in his work. The use of illustration along with the letterforms he uses enhance the words in his pieces. Sometime there is a rawness to the subject matter. I am glad to have studied with Glen and value our friendship.

Gwen Weaver, Virginia Beach, VA
In corresponding with Glen recently, he described himself and his love affair with the ruling pen eloquently. He said, "I use the ruling pen, no!, I hang on for dear life. It's a stallion but I've become a fine rodeo rider." I love the image I get in my mind! Glen's work is so wonderfully alive and dramatic, it does seem to gallop across the page giving the viewer an exhilarating ride! I keep thinking back to a great time in Indiana a few years ago when I first saw his Waltzing Matilda, an incredible piece of work. There's so much energy, so many different images to delight the eye, it's exhausting! Just so with Glen ... the energy! The air around him is charged so that when he leaves, you almost feel a vacuum. You sit back shaking your head and wonder what just happened! Sometimes, all that can be done is dig in your heels, hold on for dear life and enjoy the ride!

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January 01, 2007

Quotes about Glen II

Laurie Doctor, Denver, CO
Glen's work shows experience, brilliance and inventiveness; continually pushing against the edges of what is reasonable.

Gemma Black, Sydney, Australia
What can one say about Glen and his work? Witty, sometimes dark, brooding, thoughtful; he is a rare talent and a deep thinker. Glen expresses his soul, out loud! I admire a person whose work takes us beyond our comfort zone, challenges us and makes us think. Glen takes from the past and prepares us for the future yet at the same time shares with us delightful and humorous works of the "now"! Viva Glen Epstein!

Jean Formo, Rochester, MN
Iowa City contains a jewel. That is to say, Glen Epstein lives there, a bit out in the country, in a house that "says" Glen. Other people glue up wallpaper borders. Glen has lettered his own border, a parade of colorful bouncing Roman capitals, flying high up near the ceiling. On the dining room table sits his vintage typewriter, still used for personal correspondence. It is good that Glen is not in a hurry to change his typewriter ribbon, or repair the stuck keys. His text takes on a friendly, human quality ... a darker word here ... a crooked e there. Years ago, this transplanted "country man" became a bird lover. The birds know Glen's .... For every funny thing that Glen actually says, there are twenty more possibilities still stored in his brain. I wonder that his head is not bigger. Combine funny with the heart of a generous teacher, and you have Glen Epstein. Glen "pushes the envelope" as every visual artist should, always seeing new possibilities in tools, materials, words, and music. Loving an idea and transforming it to the tangible is what Glen does best. It is his most important contribution!

Anne Binder, South Bend, IN
I attended an opening of an exhibition in Chicago for which Glen had traveled from Iowa City to attend. After the reception, the curator moderated a discussion about calligraphy within the fine art world. During this discussion, Glen planted the seeds for what would become a successful event at the South Bend Regional Museum of Art. Glen's original vision was quite grand: sort of a "RiverDance of Letters." I took liberty with his vision to put together a collaborative performance of poets reading their original works while calligraphers responded on 24' x 8' white walls with music and dancers rounding out the collaboration. Glen was a part of the first "RiverLetterDance" which was standing room only to a crowd of 200. This event has become an eagerly anticipated tradition at the Museum.

Lisa Engelbrecht, Long Beach, CA
Glen Epstein is our Puck,- the one that challenges our ideas of calligraphy with non-conformity. He was and is a great inspiration to me,- giving me the 'yes' I needed to explore in my own work. He is irascible and unpredictable-and always fun to be with. His work holds many layers for the viewer to discover,- and man! his use of color! Glen's interpretations of unique texts are what fascinates me and I find new things every time I revisit them!

Tim Botts, Chicago, IL
Glen is that rare grown-up with mature artistic ability who still approaches paper with the energy and playfulness of a child.

Richard Mungall, Leawood, KS
Glen graciously offered to help us test and gain a better understanding about what our new Ziller Inks could do as we were introducing them in 1998. At the time the jars were opened, Kate McKulla happened to be in Iowa collaborating with Glen. So they did their thing: pointed pens dancing and ruling pens flying; trying to figure out what these lively new products could do. The results were astounding. Not so much because of the products, but rather because of the talent they laid down on paper. Glen said the medium was inevitable to the results." Without the input of the many at that time we would not be able to enjoy the lasting beauty that has been created since then. Thanks Glen.

Hga Sam V. Smith, Arlington, VA
By luck I came across Glen's calligraphic work on the Ziller website: the first two, one of them is "rich" and I fell in love with them. I have never liked calligraphy before (very sorry to say this to a Master of that art! Southern Vietnamese are famous for their honesty), but those two pieces are out of this world. The reason I love them is that I have always loved color and the way Glen writes is very different from the traditional way of doing calligraphy. If Glen plans to do a workshop on that kind of writing, I'll go to take that class no matter how far. Glen is going to be my teacher (so far whatever I wanted, I got it!) A Vietnamese tradition is teachers are equal to parents: the teachers mold and form our mind we choose the first teachers very carefully because we believe in the ones who are going to "open our mind" and Glen will be my first calligraphy teacher! Glen wrote about "the reems of paper trashed to find the movements that the horse [ruling pen] didn't mind, and so you begin to become half horse and the creature half you." The way Glen uses words is so colorful and poetic: I love it.

Diana Hutchison, Florida
Split Tree farm, nestled in the Georgia/Tennessee mountains, two instructors, eight lettering artists, five days. I only heard of Glen Epstein as a great and unconventional artist and he was taking a class? As I unpacked, I kept staring at a man in a nearby field staring at more fields (which I was soon to learn was the Rebel encampment prior to the battle of Chickamauga, two miles north) .... I had secured a tablemate for five unforgetable days. His reputation was inadequate. To watch him work, to glean the spirit of his letters, to feel this aura, became an absolute absorbtion. He gives of himself totally through encouragement, knowledge & sharing of spirit (and takes as graciously as he gives). His mind and hand are at once lyric and music and what evolves is visual flash dancing. Glen's heart is big, bold, courageous, spontaneous, simplistic, vunerable, endearing and enduring. Easy to love. Oh, and he slept every night deep in the woods "chatting with the troops."

Marvin Bell, Uni. of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
Glen Epstein is an original, one of those whose artistry and character defines Iowa City. Among other attributes, Glen has one of the biggest hearts and surest hands around. It is a treat to know him.

Collene Kalb, Lake Macquarie, Australia
I first met Glen through his calendars, which I received as a gift. I immediately loved his quirky humours nature, which was yelling out from the pages, his style which is unique, kinda said the word larrikin to this Aussie, and I wanted more. Through emails, Glen has continued to fascinate me, the more I discover, see and hear about this man, the more I seek his work, for inspiration. His colour sense is out of this world. Calligraphically he is a master of all he commands, what ever pen, brush or tool he has in his hand just yields to his will. He has an unbelievable generous nature sending me lots of his treasures to display at the 1st Australian MAPS Conference, held in 2002, I am thrilled that he finally has a showcase for his talents to be displayed.

Suzanne Moore, Cleveland, Ohio
Glen's bold approach to lettering art/illustration blurs the line between word and image, and offers the viewer multiple levels of information. Evocative colors and vibrant letterforms/words weave through the work, playing the starring role or a supporting one, creating works of depth and complexity.

Eliza Holliday, Fernandino Beach, Florida
Subjects that most people lightly skim over and possibly touch, Glen strips down, dives into, sucks in and spits out. Our Coyote! He of Many Roles! Editor of the Ironic, Alpha-Cowboy herding exotic flocks! Word-smith, Star-gazer, Truth-sayer, Prankster, Seducer of Princes and Princesses of the Letterform! I hear the sound of his phrentic and floating tool: zydeco washboard, fluttering dragonfly, cool jazz sax. He reminds me of a joke I heard.....a Keats-quoting wino, a serene Zen master and a horny Satyr walked in a bar......Thank You, Glen.

Jan Hurst,
"Being Glen Epstein", What a thought! Could anyone completely enter the mind of this dynamic calligraphic powerhouse? It seems to me that spending a day in the extraordinary brain of dear Glen would not be for the timid, but Oh! what one might learn there! We met first as Cyberscribes before we were fellow students at Stone Rest retreat. I learned as much from this co-attendee as I learned from the superb teachers. I would leap at the chance to enter the portal into his teeming brain for some 'extreme calligraphy'... I would just hope my brain could react quickly enough to glean a fraction of his vast knowledge.

Jill Bell, Long Beach, CA
Glen, Glen....
the musical pen,
a rhapsody and syncopation,
a friend.

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March 10, 2006

On Creativity

appreciate your terse message and it doesn't matter if it's complimentary or otherwise, but it is right on. I've always been able to "see" creative work (for better or less) but I can't ever remember my sitting down to "plan" to be creative.

"Different," (for better or less) is merely kissing the joy as it flies, or trying to. My 40-years never promise the kissing but it has put within reach the tools that are capable of touching.

To be creative or different both share experience: this is a common demoninator I assume we both share. The sliver of difference would then be in the ceremony.

I would hope to think creative is just this side of different but I am well aware that being creative is governed by "being.*

I have seen the best create. I can see the blueprints and I am not the less impressed or inspired or influenced.

Yes, Arkaya, I'll take different not because I chose to be different but because it involved itself naturally. I don't think of better than or less than but I follow the zen: I feel comfortable not "self" expressing but being a prism where I refract the nature that blows through me to colors on a surface.

Is this rhetoric? Well, I've never said it before. Thanks for making me think about it.

On the street or in class, I'm the local color. The outside rimes with the after-hours. I'm not justifying your comment because

I'm not sure what it means but, as I said, I feel your words are fair and accurate.

Warmest, Glen

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January 01, 2006

Butterfly Folded Pen

Dear,

As a mater of fact, I was the one who first introduced the Butterfly folded pen to the world of calligraphy.

Jim was my host at a CCC (Chicago Calligraphy Collective) workshop in April, 1997. He showed me these two folded pens he was making, the larger "Butterfly" and a smaller version I suggested he call "Moth." He had about six Butterflys. I spent most of Friday night in his studio rollicking with the Butterfly, just discovering the perifery of marks (from hairlines to width, from flush to spitting) and the penipulation and the rhythm. I did not attempt to create letters. All ruling and folded pens are not produced with making letters in mind. This is possible only when the practioner is fully aware of all the marks the tool is capable of producing within the limits of their unique physiology.

I fell in lust with the pen. I asked Jim if I could take four to the workshop as there were a number of calligraphers I knew would love to experiment -Rosie Kelly, Valerie Weilmunster (sp?), Karen Brooks, and several others I can't remember. Well, they turned out explosive, dynamic pieces juxtaposed with delicate, exquisite work, and even more exciting, a mixture of both. I can't remember if letters were produced but I do know these people are/were wise enough to know one first finds the marks non-traditional tools are capable of making -being honest to the shape and proportion of the marker- before they focus on lettermaking.

With the Butterfly, Moth, Ruling Writer, Matt Coffin's "Synthetic" Ruling Pen and low, longer folded pen, and all those -and there are hundreds- produced since Poppl's (including tin, aluminim (sp?), Coke, Pepsi, ad naus), I believe the full catastrophy and injustice (&frustration) to both calligrapher and tool is the visual pressure (examplars) to get at and produce what they see.

Poppl was my hero long before I ever saw or later wrote with Laurie Cook's manufactured copy of Pott's Ruling Writer (similar to Poppl's). Why I could, eventually, primal scream, is likely the result of a similar aggressiveness (physiology). Jim's Butterfly, too, is strong. However, one need not be strong and aggressive to produce magic (legible or otherwise) marks with these tools. To make the Butterfly or Moth "spit" can be a feather-light movement once you find the exact -forgive me- "g-spot" of the arc -and each Butterfly or every folded pen has its unique spot.

I believe that 100 calligraphers working ten years with the Butterfly will and should produce 100 individual alphabets, and each calligrapher having dozens of variations.

Each non-or-traditional tool, with time, practice, and awareness of both the properties of the tool and one's physiology, will produce letters and rhythms of the soul of the writer.

Calligraphy, first and foremost, is providing information through beautiful writing -Johnston's "...well-constructed letters arranged well." This is "the art of craft" and this is a summit and culmination rarely achieved.

Those calligraphers who have achieved this, whether through awareness of the unconscionable atrocities and inhumanity surrounding them or simply finding that mastering craft was a necessity, a step, toward a greater urge within them since birth, these new tools opened doors and enlightened what was always screaming to vent. Calligraphy is legible in an illegible world. It rimes with peace and the finest artists are those that reflect the times they live in. They cannot choose to remain ambivalent and these new tools have allowed them to take the music past where they found it. Not all calligraphers, but many: those many wanting their "calligraphic" work to express, like music, to those who can't understand a system of words, a particular language.

Jim Chin's Butterfly and all non-traditional tools have birthed a new freedom but founded upon the mastery of discipline, craft.

Those who attend conferences want the cart and the teachers get paid to give them the cart. Sigh, but the rent is due.

In these fast times, we have fast carts going in all directions. No horse.

The Butterfly is a horse one must learn to ride to find the paths. One can't learn from another's map because non-traditional tools have no traditional.

Finally, to cut this short, the same Butterfly will produce entirely different effects on every different surface. To see (and feel) this, you write on every different surface.

A master of the non-traditional tool is no more, no better, than the craftsman. Different.

I have choir practice. That's as good an excuse as any. I know I haven't followed your three questions but it's easy to get lost in the pastures.

Thanks for asking

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July 27, 2005

On The Butterfly Pen

The things you bring up and my relationship to them make me a tad embarrassed (and I'm not the type). I am really not everywhere at once but it must appear so to you. I did a workshop for the Chicago Calligraphy Collective in 1997 and stayed at Jim's house. After the Friday night lecture, he showed me this new large folded pen he was working on and a smaller version. He had about six. He called them Butterfly pens. Next to him, I was the first to play with them and, as with all new things, I loved them. He didn't have a name for the smaller one so I suggested "Moth." He was pretty excited with my marks and I asked him if I could introduce them over the weekend. I did and let others have at them -Rosie Kelly, Valerie Weilmunster -I never could spell her last name- and two other choice "students." This was the "coming out" of the Butterfly and the word -pun intended, I guess- spread. I guess he's added "Firefly" to his ingenious originals but I've only fiddled with that one.

I love the B'fly and use it often but also love Matt Coffin's Synthetic folded pen -a shitty name but I guess he was giving Laurie Cook's Ruling Writer its due "first"- and his lower and longer folded pen. Laurie's is stronger but doesn't have the character and unpredictability of the Synthetic.

I use the ruling and folded pens aggressively and although I've seen delicious work from ho-mem-ade (homemade) Coke cans and other lighter alums, one movement and I crush them. Paul Shaw asked a long time ago if I could show him how I used the ruling pen only to find he used the drafters silver thingy -very tediously and produced neat marks- but I could never work with that thing.

The "Never, never..." piece has been around. It's in the latest Somerset Studio with two of my long and endearing friends, Barbara Close and Louis Lemoine, and a new buddy, Steve Rapp (American Greetings). The article was written by another colleague and former student, Lisa Englebrecht. (I'm not a name-dropper, either; just been at it a long time). (Peter was my roommate at Calleidoscope, the conference in Trenton in 92 or 93).

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April 28, 2005

Misc...

Almost all of my finished "creative" pieces are on the back of others, or finished after a stalemated piece has been sitting around months. I rarely sit anymore to "begin" a piece.

If it is a commissioned (formal) piece, I do what I did for so many years: work it out on grid paper and finally do it on real paper. When it's a quote and they say do it in your wild style, that's much more difficult and rarely am I satisfied with the piece. My "wildness" is free to take off and I just hang on, but I can't fake or parody myself.

I spent years doing the free-lance work. A living. I teach the basics. A living. Workshops are different but I don't do much anymore.

Looseness is just knowing your tool and using it honestly, according to your physiology. The marks are result of the tool that produced them.

The first brochures of the ruling writer had alphabets done by various people as if there was an accepted alphabet. It is not a tool produced with lettermaking in mind. So when students tried to copy these alphabets, they became frustrated. The same non-traditional tool should have as many "right" ways as those who find their alphabet.

But looseness...It depends on the occasion, the shackles or liberties given you. Earlier, when you talked of coming out -I assumed your own venting- you first have to fine that catharsis in others' work -and I assumed you did in mine. Poppl showed me there was no ceiling. He opened to me the world of freedom disciplined, not disciplined freedom. Both are integral but depending on the occasion. I believe in the art of craft. Some people just don't have that intense need to shatter the world, to mirror the atrocities of the times. That's not a limitation; that's understanding one's limitations and craftsmanship does not a lesser person make. To others, they find that calligraphy was merely a stage they were predestined to acquire in order to springboard from a deeper need.

I don't believe you're seeking wildness for wildnesses sake. If so, it will never happen. You may be published but content? To gain the world and lose your soul will never escape your "success."

To not gain the world but spill your blood will bring you contentment.

But we want our cake and eat it, too. We are human. Looseness is not the door to success (being published). I work loose and many pieces never get out of the house though entered in many competitions.

Again, it's exposing yourself and in doing so, it's admitting that you are a part of the system you abhor.

Looseness is reaching beyond so that you trip over your boundaries, or begin to discover them: that is, discover yourself.

When you tighten up doing the final piece, I'm not sure what you mean or are referring to. Coming out? Coming out is walking the entire city to learn the shortcuts. You don't know a city by learning the map. And art is not possible without walking the craft.

I can help you if I know you. It's okay to be visually wild. It means you have seen something that rhymes with your inner throbbing. You have seen the spontaneity, the life of another, and you want to express your own. You might find that imploding color is not _your_ way of saying your say. Your shouting may be as natural as leaves to a tree, and as quiet.

Tell me what you mean by "loose." Are there other words more honest? More pointed?

I teach GIS (Guided Independent Study) year round but to college students from all over the world. And three on-campus classes which are far beneath what you are asking. I've carried on correspondance for years with the best in the world when they were not the best, or themselves yet. No need to mention names. I just happen to be able to bring out what is inside. It's a gift. But, no, I don't talk shop to those I have not met; those whose work and personality I am unfamiliar with. Or those who do not know me, for better or worse, because I am both, and you would be likely wrong to read into this. So don't.

I get into people usually on the button but am now trying to understand new visions and it is difficult, frustrating, but it always has been and I have always persevered long enough to color the predator.

As for this winter, I don't know what tomorrow will bring. I don't plan future.

I would like to see some of your work tho.

Write when you wish and come down anytime. You will love the six acres and Iowa City.

You'll enjoy my company and my local color friends. They are not calligraphers. They are, like, street people.

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February 13, 2005

On Mail Art

You're in a museum and a piece catches your eye. Gravity takes over and the closer you get, you realize you're not walking but floating.

Keat's said poetry is "...the remembrance of one's highest thoughts."

The radiance you finally behold is the presence of your highest being.

The art is your name and the beauty is a mirror.

The museum is small, as small as your mailbox, just splendor in the grass and glory in the flower.

You become King or Queen because you hold in your hand the crown of who you are. It is written.

Calligraphers have a wand to make such magic not a dream but a waking. We call it Mail Art. Verily, we keep what we give away.

I want to talk more about mail art. I want to remind calligraphers that we are chosen to blossom the flower. It's the flower that will spread the word, and while beautiful writing can do it, mail art can be far deeper: "The letter killeth but the spirit giveth life." Stay tuned.
Pellentesque a neque. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos hymenaeos. Nunc quis sapien sit amet tellus porttitor vestibulum. Quisque turpis turpis, semper a, accumsan nec, tristique ut, odio. Integer est magna, ullamcorper eu, condimentum eu, dignissim vel, metus. Sed posuere massa in urna. Maecenas iaculis dapibus nulla. Integer elementum orci eu nibh. Nullam luctus pretium lorem. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos hymenaeos. Pellentesque sagittis sagittis urna. Nunc et ligula quis diam semper pharetra. Suspendisse mi. Sed tempor. Aenean turpis. Suspendisse tristique mauris a nunc. Proin felis. Integer faucibus enim ac lacus. Ut nec magna quis purus suscipit suscipit.

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April 06, 2003

Big Al

Bg Al #2

My midget friend, Al Simonson (Bg Al, for short), was also a writer of no little reputation. He had three or four short stories published by Little Brown & Co.(Again, I could care less whether you believe me. Call Little Brown).

I don't remember the titles but one was written all in lowercase; one in shorthand, one written entirely in abbrevations, and I think one consisted only of footnotes, which I think Bg Al referred to as an homage to William Faulkner.

As I saw the books, I know what I saw. I did not see all he claimed to have published but who could doubt? I did see copies of what appeared to be legitimate -in claim. In poetry, he showed me the "first" eleven line sonnet; the first -as far as he knew- one-line couplet; a fourteen-syllable haiku, and a few one-act plays and librettos of arias.

So much more but I have little time. Speaking of opera, he was also a singer and once played Dot in Turandot. That's another story.

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April 01, 2003

Hollywood

Bg Al was short for Big Al, a midget who had a newsstand on the corner of Hollywood and Gardner. An aspiring actor and screenwriter, I moved to Hollywood in 1961, a good hour's drive from Motor Avenue in West LA. I found a small apartment two houses from Bg Al's corner business. In the beginning, I saw him a little everyday. Soon we began engaging in small talk and very soon -Bg Al always had a straight face, like a dot- I honestly began to translate "funny" into another word I hadn't letters for. He simply was not a stand-up comedian. I'll leave you with the beginning of an unusual human pun. He mentioned a few of many jobs he had had: an insurance underwriter, a short order cook, and three years a miniature golf pro at Leo's Little Links down on La Cienaga, off Pico.

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February 20, 2003

Calligraphy and the Art of Dying

Calligraphy and the Art of Dying (Chapter headings)

He thought he saw a coffin draped
With fringe, with pension plan.
He looked again and found it was
A novel still in pen.
"There's not a book unwrit," he said,
"Deserves not to be banned."

He thought he saw a swimming pool
Behind the microwave.
He looked again and found it was
A stash of numbered days.
"How strange to comtemplate," he said,
"The scraps that others save."

He thought he saw some expletives Trout-fishing on the roof.
He looked again and found it was
A mirror crying wolf.
"If this was Sunday last," he said,
"I could explain such stuff."

He thought he saw six binders climb
A snapshot of an oak.
He looked again and found it was
The punchline of a joke.
"I hate it when I miss," he said,
"The wetness for the moat."

He thought he saw some Roman caps French-kissing in a shoe.
He looked again and found it was
An Arab-speaking Jew.
"It merely goes to show," he said,
"'One size fits all,' is true."

He thought he saw a lowercase
Italic "a" undressing.
He looked again and found it was
His mom, in court, confessing.
"Is there no bottom line," he asked,
"In midget tag-team wrestling?"

He thought he saw his dream pull up
In George's army jeep.
He looked again and found it was
The pit of "Lover's Leap."
"The din of broken scripts," he said,
"Is awesome, so to speak."

He thought he saw calligraphers
Pall-bearing someone home.
He looked again and found it was
His mother on the phone.
"Our family doesn't quit;" he said:
"We go from here to Rome."

He thought he saw a paperman
Spit-shining tennis shoes.
He looked again and found it was
Noxema on the blues.
"Don't ask me what it means," he said,
"I only read the news."

He thought he saw a paragraph
Indented on the right.
He looked again and found it was
A clock left out all night.
"I shall not soon forget," he said,
"Dead clocks grow teeth and bite."

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February 14, 2003

Learning Variations

No. You can't put the cart before the horse. If the horse is before the cart, you have to be the horse, and that is not possible. The horse has to be you.

We see and want immediately the radiant and striking variations of someone's Roman cap, Uncial, Italic, Fraktur, Versal -pick any card. The calligrapher that produced the variation is likely well-known, has likely been involved with calligraphy 20-30 years, or more accurately, 3/4 of their lives. All of them studied and mastered an historical letterform, like learning sheet music -not just the notes, but tempo, rests, all the street signs. The music does not begin until the sheet music is under the bench. Only then comes the beginnings, the seeds, the merging of music with the personality of the one marking time, as it were. After some years, the musician is so attuned, there appears with a mixture of certainty and personality and fun, actual variations on the theme, sometimes just for fun but more often than not, a variation with innuendos that come closer to the innuendos, the tone, mood, conversation of the content.

Sometimes, where it may appear deliciously out of hand, perhaps even illegible, it happens for a reason, a purpose, but is possible only because of the scales learned years before. I want to write like THAT! Well, you can but your best work will be waxed fruit, flowers. You will even attract stuffed squirrels and painted birds.

It's very disconcerting in these fast times to come to terms with the confrontation of long hours, months of practice, and the few years it might take for your blood to pump the variations unique to only you. What is written is your life. We see the movement of your moment, your breathing, the air you are breathing.

There is nothing at all wrong with fiddling and practicing variations of others. It widens the perspective; it shows what is possible and even will get your work published but it will be your work that is remembered, not your heart and soul. The difference is immediate if not understood by the beholder. There is awe and there is life. Rarely is there both but rarely exists. It exists more in work that doesn't appear in museums, in books. Beautiful writing is attainable. Beautiful YOU is hard. It begins with the beginning, not in the middle.

Variations are the blossoms of others. Plant you seed, water your garden and whatever takes and roots, rises and flowers, when you're away, the rain will keep you. That's what I believe. My unreadible letters began with those spider-like symbols which were as dull as scales and next to each other sounded off-key. I spent years being beautifully off key. Somewhere down the line, we "corrected" ourselves. I teach those spiders the way I learned them.

They are, after all,the foundation. They communicate to people who can read English. Don't practice or teach calligraphy with a violin. But I digress. Some people can putt with a hammer and do it well. They started with a putter. Blogs are phat.

Carl Sandburg said it: "If I had some eggs, I'd make some bacon and eggs, if I had some bacon."

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