Rarebit Fiends

After talking on the phone with my sweetie yesterday, I was persuaded to go out to lunch with fellow writers Terri and Rebecca. After some meandering around, we decided to lunch at Chelsea's -- a good choice! I had a great char-broiled mushroom and swiss burger, decadent onion rings, and a nice cold Bass. After walked back to the colony we decided to meet for dinner later (weekends we're on our own without Cindy's fine cooking). At least I remembered my flashlight when I walked back up. It's a dark walk back to the farmhouse.

Rebecca had brought some vodka so we had a couple of screwdrivers each, then decided we should just order in (funny how seldom alcohol and ambition go together). Of course then we found out that delivery service has yet to catch on in Eureka Springs. We finally found a pizza place that delivered, but after hemming and hawing for a while, we decided just to eat the tortilla chips we had. After all, those burgers were still very much with us.

We sat on Terri's terrace (her accommodations are not quite as spartan as mine--she's working on a cookbook in the culinary suite) and talked away for some time. At one point a bat flew down and swooped around us. Terri had never seen a bat and was a bit ruffled, but I hastened to explain how they eat moquitos. I had seen many overhead in the darkening sky, but this one had become adventurous and went round and round the table, looking like it was just having fun--a hot-rodding teenager maybe. It eventually flew off.

After a good deal of talk, I made the dark walk back to the farmhouse. Quiet as it is and comfortable as I have been at the house, somehow walking back in the dark is still a little spooky. Maybe it was the walk and the rich burger (after a week of very healthy food), but I woke up about 2.30 from a dream about zombies--relentless, mindless, swarming zombies. Ugh. Took a while to get back to sleep. I woke up a few hours later from a dream about taking a German test! Worse, it wasn't a language test, but a sort of pop culture exam. Wish I could remember what sort of questions were on it.

About 7.30 though, the rain came down, and as always I found that very soothing. I fell back asleep and didn't get up until 9, which made this morning's walk a little hot and humid. The little schnauzer still barks, but now I know he's all bark and no bite, though he won't yet be coaxed over to me. I finally saw the woodpecker we've been hearing for days, and he's the honest-to-goodness Woody Woodpecker kind, very big with the pointy red top.

I forgot to take some breakfast with me when I left the main bldg, so I only had an apple this morning with my tea. But now that I've cleared my brain, it's time to get to the real writing.

Book Review @ Matrifocus

Wow! Thanks to my good friend and fellow writer Diane Saarinen (hmmm, when is she going to get a website?) I find that there is a review of Pelzmantel at Matrifocus, the Cross-Quarterly for Goddess Women. It's a fairly glowing review -- I blushed to read it. It even quotes from the novel in a couple places and says wonderful things like, "Laity's storytelling is magic in itself. The language is beautiful and weaves vivid pictures for the reader's imagination." Thanks Dahti Blanchard for a kind and generously complimentary review!

All Kinds of Nature!

The groundhog was back today, munching right outside my window. But I got up too quickly and my haste betrayed me; she quickly scooted away and I was disappointed. A little while later I heard some rustling and thought, "A ha! She's back." Surprise -- it was a turtle. I looked it up: apparently it's a Three-Toed Box Turtle. Very colorful.

All right, back to work --

Twa Corbies

There are a pair of crows that live in the Hollow and I often see them when I'm out on my morning walk or going up the hill for dinner at 6 (our only regularly scheduled event). I hear them calling back and forth, or see them hopping around in Harmon Park. They left a feather for me, so I took a picture of it on the beautiful blue and white quilt on my bed with the stone I found that has a fossil shaped like the rune tyr.

Somehow, walking along and thinking about the crows (and all the other birds--I've seen flickers, which I haven't seen since I lived in Michigan, jays, robins, cardinals, finches, a few others I'll have to look up) led me to Flash Girls' songs. So now I have "Twa Bonny Maids" in my head (at least it finally got the Dictators out of my brain, thanks Marko). But I was also thinking about being apart from Gene so long, which put Donne's "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" in my head. I always have an uphill battle teaching Donne to my students. The first stumbling block for that poem is that they don't know there's another kind of compass than the one that points directions (my desk here faces east, home of inspiration, by the way). But Donne uses that wonderful image to assure his wife that though he travels to the ends of the earth, like the two legs of the compass they can never be parted, and the perfect circle they draw assures they will always come together again. Beautiful.

Donne, Blake and Marlowe -- somehow that triumvirate have been much in my imagination for the last couple years. A weighty trio of singular individuals who all seemed to swim against the prevailing tides; I guess I have something to learn from them.

Poetluck Reading

It was good -- but was it Branson good?

I overheard some people talking on the shuttle who said we were less than 50 miles from Branson, so they were going to drive up. If you don't know, Branson is sort of like the Las Vegas of Missouri, except without the gambling, hookers and celebrities. What does that leave? Andy Williams doing cabaret. Or so I've heard.

I was the featured reader for the "poetluck" dinner and I did actually start with a poem. Not mine of course, but the poetic chant from Æcerbot, the Anglo-Saxon charm to return fruitfulness to a field. I recited it in Old English then translated it into modern English, and explained what it was for, then used that to connect to the idea of linking to the past and its stories, as did the Kalevala and as I am trying to do with Unikirja.

I talked about the disparagement of fantasy in this country, contrasting it with magical realism--a much respected genre if you're South American. If you're Garcia Marquez, magic is wonderful; the rest of us are relegated to paperback. I mentioned the Finnish writers whose "realism" seems much more elastic, like Niemi and Sinisalo. I explained the idea behind Lönnrot's collecting of the poems for the Kalevala, that attempt to capture a swiftly disappearing heritage, and linked it to my attempt to imagine a heritage often lost even among his collections--the stories of women [those of you who have read "Kerttu" can see what I mean].

Perversely perhaps, I read from the incomplete story "Vipunen" which has only male characters, because it deals with the clash between rationality (in the person of the narrator, an MBA student) trapped in a mythological struggle between the rune singer Väinämöinen and the giant Vipunen. Well, I'm not sure how well it went over with the mostly memoirist crowd, but people did say I read very well, and at least a couple people told me they were very interested in the workshop I'm doing next week.

There were a wide variety of readers after me, including a couple of the other residents--Rebecca had some wild sexy poems that really got the crowd going, while Terri related a memory of her Cajun grandmother teaching her to cook. Other folks offered an equally diverse array: one woman's memory of being an 8 year old fleeing Germany with her mother and brother, in fear for their lives; some lively poems about the memorable little moments of life; a travelogue of Vicksburg and the caves employed during the Civil War; and the despairing thoughts of a longtime activist facing the relentless cruelty of the current administration.

A good night!

Hard to Reach Spots

By the way folks, I will be even harder to reach than usual because I have only dial-up access (the horror, the horror!) and my phone is telling me it's roaming, so I will not be using it except in emergencies. With luck, there won't be any. Perhaps it is just fate making sure I do what I'm supposed to do here at the writer's colony, but I have to admit the email is especially hard. I feel like saying, "Hi, my name is Kate and I'm an email-oholic!" I finally realise just how much emailing I do. No wonder I have those repetetive stress pains.

On the plus side, I finished one story today (yay!) and have tried to decide what to work on next. I may be reading an incomplete story tomorrow in addition to a couple short things. Haven't decided for sure, but that's me.

On the Arts Calendar

Gene actually found it first; I just found out yesterday, but I will be the featured writer at the Poetluck Literary Salon this month. Guess I better figure out what I'll be reading!

Last night I got ambitious and laid a fire in the fireplace. How wonderful to sit before a crackling fire and read Lord Dunsany. It's the perfect setting. I get up in the morning and go for a walk, looking for birds and other critters along the way, getting barked at by the little schnauzer down the street. Everything is so lush and green, and the weather has been wonderful -- of course anything less humid than Houston feels like heaven!

Well, back to writing --

Out my window

A little ground hog (cousin to the wombat!) just ambled down the path outside my window as I sit here writing. She's poking through the grass across the dirt road, near what will be the composer's cottage but is at present a shack awaiting repair. She digs a little, puts her nose up to the wind, then shifts around to another spot. Ah, nature!

Down in Dairy Hollow

Actually I'm on the side of a hill, but I'm here! Pictures forthcoming, but I am in the Iris studio in the farm house. It's halfway up a hill, surrounded by trees. I have a working fireplace! Oooh.

At the 'Zoo

This past week I made the annual pilgrimage to the International Medieval Congress held, incongruously enough, in Kalamazoo MI. This year I flew into Detroit to meet gal pal Wendy. We picked up the rental car and met my high school friend, Susan, for dinner. The only thing better than knowing witty and intelligent women is being able to introduce them to one another. We had a great conversation, then Wendy and I got on the road to Kazoo.

For once, I had to give my paper on Thursday. It was great to get it out of the way at the beginning of the conference and relax. (FYI: my paper was on the Corrector of Burchard of Worms and I got good feedback.) At the wine hour I wasn't able to locate someone I had been trying to meet up with--it gets more crowded every year! But Wendy and I met up with my co-editor Scott and off we went for a fine seafood dinner.

I played hookey Friday to finish writing an article, but still managed to run into a bunch of people the rest of the day. I had dinner with my older brother, Steve, and Wendy. It was a momentous day--the last car rolled off the line in Lansing's Oldsmobile plant where Steve works, but as a carpenter, he's not too worried about keeping busy.

Saturday was a busy time: attending panels, meeting with a publisher, running into lots of folks (including Meredith, whom I'd been searching for since Thursday). Wendy and I met up with another grad school pal, Carolyn and her husband Brian, and had a lively dinner discussion. Of course, the big Saturday night dance is the cap of the week--nothing like a bunch of medievalists dancing to disco hits and classic rock. Naturally I took the opportunity to demand my advisor buy me a beer (fortunately he complied). As always we left late, sweaty and tired.

The drive back to Detroit was pleasant, especially after we stopped for a big breakfast. It's always good to share a long car ride with a good friend, and Wendy and I had a lot to catch up on. Of course, the end of the journey proved less fun--my flight was rerouted to Dallas without notice to avoid the storms around Houston. Ugh. Four and a half hours late, we finally arrived in Houston. The Kalamazoo curse strikes again!

For this you get a medal?

I am very pleased to announce that I won the University of Houston-Downtown's Award for Faculty Achievement in Scholarly and Creative Activities (I think that's the correct name). This is quite prestigious; indeed, one of my colleagues said he didn't think an Assistant Professor had ever won it before. Wow! Better yet, our department swept the awards. My colleagues Jane Creighton and Nell Sullivan won the Teaching and Service Awards (respectively) for their work. Proud department chair, Bill Gilbert, took us out for a celebratory round of drinks at a nearby restaurant (whose service was so atrocious, I won't bother mentioning them).

I never got to make a thank-you speech before. I thanked the supportive members of my department for creating a welcoming, nurturing atmosphere; my dept chair for supporting most of my requests for travel (I even tried to capture his laconic phrasing "well, I don't see why not"); my two colleagues who have helped so much, Sandi Dahlberg, who's been a real mentor to me, and Pat Golemon, who from the very first day on campus has been a friend; of course, I also thanked Gene, as my cheerleader and reality-check, my editor and inspiration.

And I did get a medal -- and a plaque for my wall and a tidy little sum that makes the trip to England this summer (and to MKI this August) much easier!



Here's me with fellow English Babes Nell and Jane.

Another Publication Forthcoming!

I have a piece in here on discovering medieval magic texts, like the Anglo-Saxon charms and the Leechbook.

Women and the Divine

Another conference acceptance: best of all, it's in England! It was about time I had an excuse to go back. The conference is Women and the Divine. It's sponsored by the Institute of Feminist Theory and Research, co-hosted by Liverpool University and Liverpool Hope University College, and features heavy hitters like Luce Irigaray. Wow! And they're looking for non-traditional presentations, so I am really excited (and terrified!). My mini-workshop is entitled "Casting the Circle: Ritual and The Body of the Goddess" and will be interactive. Now all I have to do is write it...

Sin City: Brutal

Robert Rodgriguez continues his outlaw ways and we all benefit. It seems cruel to say I enjoyed Sin City; it's a brutal film with no winners and a whole lot of losers, but that's part of the ride. You don't tend to look for heroes among hookers and hoods. Like the best movies, though, it's true to the source -- in this case, Frank Miller's cruel and unflinching ride through the underbelly of a vaguely noirish hell drawn in jagged black and white, punctuated elliptically with splashes of garish color when that world is ripped open with bullets or blades.

The gore and grimness are lightened only by the black humor; sometimes when it's coming down so heavy you gotta wear a hat, what can you do but laugh? Fleeting moments of recognizable "good" -- like Bruce Willis' grizzled cop struggling against the odds to save one innocent girl -- get ground under the relentless heel of this corrupt dead-end town. Everyone in Basin City is suspect, from the top to the bottom, and that's a bottom that seems to keep receding farther and farther into the murkiness. So you take sides, latch onto the merest glimmer of "right" whether it's the tough crook out for revenge on behalf of the hooker who was kind to him once, or the stripper who realizes the fragile power she's carved out among the worst of the worst is about to collapse.

Willis is good, Rourke (!), too. Owen -- yeah. Rosario Dawson -- awesome. Miller's own cameo is cool.

There are grisly (and inventive) beheadings, flying bullets, lots of pointy knives and the tawdriest behavior imaginable. Images that will float up to the top of your mind in the wee hours like bloated corpses quickly become the norm. It's a travelogue of the perverse and cruel, and not for everyone -- but artistry in blood, and black and white. Go, throw back a quick scotch first if you need it, but go.

Two (Very Different) Acceptances

Two bits of good news in my email box yesterday: first, the big academic coup -- an acceptance for a paper at MLA. The Modern Language Association holds the premier conference in literature and language studies (that's why all the job interviews are done there). An acceptance there is a ticket to the big leagues! Better yet, my paper on gendering the conversion narrative in medieval Iceland was selected for the one and only panel on Old Norse Literature at MLA. Tough competition, so I am thrilled to have been selected.

The other acceptance, while less prestigious, could be even more fun: The Witching Hour is a multifaceted conference that sprang up around the Harry Potter books. I'll be talking about real medieval magic but aiming it toward a more general audience, trying to convince them that medieval studies is as fun as the HP books. We'll see if I can pull that off! Better yet, it also features people like Charles de Lint and MaryAnn Harris, who are so wonderful and were so much fun at Mythic Journeys last June. Other guests so far include editor Ellen Datlow, writers Holly Black and Nancy Farmer. Best of all -- it will be held in Salem, MA in October. Ahhhhh. I can't wait!

Beantown Rendezvous

I always leap at the chance to return to Boston, so I ended up giving a paper at the NEMLA conference (on Clive Barker and queer theory) this past weekend. I was smiling before I got out of Logan because it felt like home, as always. Riding on the T--not the most exciting thing, I know, but I really miss public transportation. And changing to the red line at Park St, I went downstairs to find a busker playing "Brown Eyed Girl" and everybody singing along. Ah, Boston.

After getting settled into the hotel, I set out for Cambridge and Somerville. My main target was McIntyre and Moore, still the best bookstore in the greater Boston area. Some interesting finds: medieval theatre of cruelty, early percussion, and a collection of Carnival plays by Hans Sachs. Of course as good as the shopping is the eavesdropping on the way there--riding the T provides a lot of interesting and hilarious conversations. I forgot what it was like to be surrounded by BU students nattering on about dorm hijinks. I have not missed backwards baseball caps!

My CT pals arrived amidst the terrible downpour (that I later found out had flooded the house my brother lives in on the banks of the Hudson), soaked to the skin and a little cranky -- who could blame them. But I was so cheered to see them all that I couldn't let my spirits be dampened: The Queen of Everything and Johnny 10X, and the Boojums: Perilous Cheryl and the Joey Zone. A great lunch at India Quality in Kenmore and soon everybody was in a much better frame of mind. A stop by Nuggets helped too--even though, for once, I didn't actually buy anything. We headed out to Simmons, where Cheryl will be starting her MLS soon, then back to the hotel for me to deliver my paper (seemed to go well, people asked for copies). Then off to Cambridge to rummage through the Coop before the cocktail hour beckoned. Not as much shopping as we could have done, but the conversations over lunch, drinks and dinner were the best part for me (even if two conferences in the space of a week left me exhausted rather earlier than usual).

I could have taken the shuttle Sunday morning, but that would mean giving up one more walk along the Charles, It's sad when the idea of being able to walk outside without collapsing from heat and humidity is so precious (still not adjusting to Houston weather). I had an early lunch at Legal Seafoods (lobster and crab ravioli and a big pot of Earl Grey) and bid Boston a wistful goodbye. Much too short a visit! Especially with friends--and I really thank them for making their way up to MA in that horrible rain to see me. Really. Thanks.

Best. Compliment. Ever.

We made our annual pilgrimage to the Popular Culture Association Conference last weekend. This year it was in San Diego, sometimes mistaken for a suburb of Los Angeles; but after Houston's first stifling signs of spring, it proved a welcome respite. Of course the best part of PCA is seeing lots of friends and we spent a lot of time talking, arguing and chasing flights of imagination in or around DW's Pub. I gave a paper this year in the comics area (yeah, even though I chair the medieval area--call me perverse). Well, not so much a paper, as a performance; I had said last year, when some one suggested an Alan Moore panel, that I would give a ritual performance in the style of Moore's workings. People thought I was kidding. I never kid (it's like that Somerset Maugham story where a woman is known as a great wit, simply because she always tells the truth, but I digress).

So I gave my presentation, "The City as the Body of the Poet: William Blake's London in Alan Moore & Tim Perkins' Angel Passage." I worked on the text, to get the rhythm right, not only of the words but of the PP slides with images of arcane diagrams, an unexpected non sequitur, and of course Blake's art. It was about ritual (one of my obsessions) but it also was ritual. I had said I would invoke the spirit of Moore and of course, eveyone thought I was joking. I wasn't. I savor the picture of Moore's body slumped in a chair somewhere in Northampton Friday afternoon.

I was a bit nervous that day. Not only was I trying something new, something the audience at an academic conference might be resistant to experiencing; but I was also on the panel with our VIP guest, Danny Fingeroth, author of Superman on the Couch and I had to go first.

I plunged into the piece, catching the rhythm and finding the right voice. People laughed in the right places, looked puzzled at the right times, and the room seemed to hum with electricity--or maybe it was just me. The last half of the performance was half Moore and half me, and I felt I had matched his eloquence reasonably well and more importantly, that the piece was rising to its climax, the final words of Moore's narration, "William Blake, amazed and unafraid." For that moment, I felt akin to the image flashed up on the screen, Blake's Red Dragon, wings spread, shoulders thrown back as he towers over the woman clothed in sun. The audience seemed to share the feeling and their applause seemed genuine. I felt the glow of success, raising an academic paper from a piacular rite to -- dare I say it -- art.

You don't get that kind of feedback writing prose alone in the wee hours, or even from one careful reader. It's the spectacle, the crowd, the feeling of response, give and take: performance, drama, ritual. And then it got even better: We turned to Danny who said (and this is burned on my brain) "it's going to be like following Frank Sinatra with 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.'" :-) What can I say? I was lifted far above the fourth floor and had to wait for my feet to again touch solid ground sometime later.

Thanks, Danny (who turns out to be the kind of guy who shares his fries, so you know he's all right).

UHD Dateline: Hunter S. Thompson Remembered

[This appeared in the March 4-24 2005 edition of the Dateline Downtown]

Hunter S. Thompson, R.I.P.
K. A. Laity

This past weekend, gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson shot himself in his Colorado home, which he often referred to as his “well-armed compound,” although he also claimed that his reputation was enough to keep people away. We may never know if it was terminal disgust with the direction of this country or the simple attrition of age. After all, he was 67, had a hip replacement and recently broke a leg. Pain might be the one drug he decided to do without. But as an outspoken critic of the “W” vision of America and the precipitous decline of civil rights, he may at last have given into despair.

Thompson will be remembered best for his self-proclaimed "gonzo" journalism, the notion that not only was objectivity not possible, but it was probably not all that desirable. To inhabit the world you studied—whether it was the Kentucky Derby, the Nixon presidential campaign, or the Hell's Angels—came with risks as well as rewards.

In a culture where paid mouthpieces help push the current administration's agenda in secret, Thompson has long been admired for being up front about his own beliefs and prejudices. While he was lionized by the 60s counterculture for the drug-fueled odyssey of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, his own views were distinctly libertarian. A lifetime member of the NRA, he was unabashedly proud of his guns as well as his notorious drug habits. Thompson has said, "I do not advocate the use of dangerous drugs, wild amounts of alcohol and violence and weirdness... but they've always worked for me."

Thompson understood the inevitability of remaining the outsider if you want to tell the truth. Yet it was this outsider status that made many celebrate him. He was immortalized as Uncle Duke in Gary Trudeau's comic strip Doonesbury. His thinly veiled alter-ego Raoul Duke has inspired two cinematic portraits; first, in the lamentable Where the Buffalo Roam (1980), a toothless party piece that had a lot more to do with Animal House than with the man himself, starring Bill Murray before he really became an actor. More successfully, the spirit of Fear and Loathing (1998) was captured in the film by Terry Gilliam, himself no slouch in the gonzo approach to creation. Ably supported by a stellar supporting cast including Benicio Del Toro and Christina Ricci, Johnny Depp eerily conjured the spirit of Thompson down to his bow-legged walk, a mimicry that the man himself admired. Gilliam’s film proved successful not just because he captured the drug-fueled chaos, but because he also caught Thompson’s despair at the death of the American Dream.

In more recent times, Thompson spoke out against what he saw as the descent toward fascism taken by the current administration since 9/11. Two years ago, in an interview with Salon, he characterized the Bush government caustically: “I believe the Republicans have seen what they've believed all along, which is that this democracy stuff is bull, and that people don't want to be burdened by political affairs. That people would rather just be taken care of. The oligarchy doesn't need an educated public. And maybe the nation does prefer tyranny. I think that's what worries me. It goes back to Fourth Amendment issues. How much do you value your freedom? Would you trade your freedom for some illusion of security? Freedom is something that dies unless it's used.”

Thompson always sought that freedom, even from his own caricatured fame, refusing to be a hero to those who sought to idolize him. A journalist to the end, information was always the key. "I've found you can deal with the system a lot easier if you use their rules—by understanding their rules, by using their rules against them." He never underestimated the brutality of the system, but he may have finally grown tired of the fight.

See the entire 2003 Salon interview at: http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/02/03/thompson/index1.html

Reviews

When you first get pubished, you feel euphoric -- until you realize the work has just begun. Getting the word out! In this information-bombarding culture, how do you get the word out without getting it lost in the shuffle? Well, blogs are one way. Reviews are another. Here's a review site that has already begun collecting reviews on Sword and Sorceress XXI. Feel free to add yours!

http://www.allfantasyreviews.com/books/bookdetail.php?bid=768

A Tale of the Bodhisattva

An ancient tale (or is it new?) of the Bodhisattva* relates how students once gathered to question the enlightened one. They all wanted to reach enlightenment too, and asked how to do so. The bodhisattva said "Enlightenment is like a thousand petal lotus. It is easy to get caught in one of the petals and dwell forever, but one should seek the center of the bud." Upon hearing this analogy, one student achieved enlightenment.

Another asked "How can one achieve enlightenment?" and the bodhisattva answered, "Enlightenment is like a lamp that always burns, yet ever must we re-light it." That student instantly received enlightenment.

A third student remained stubbornly silent. The bodhisattva picked up a tree limb and whacked the student on the head. The student fell face down in the mud and at once achieved enlightenment.

What is the aim of this story? That some must be hit over the head to achieve enlightenment? Or that a teacher must use all tools available?

*Bodhisattva--an enlightened being who has put off transcendence the better to help others reach enlightenment.