WHAT A CREATIVELY WRITING OLD COOT READS

The following is a selective list of books I've read over the last  two years. I'm an eclectic reader. I don't understand all that I read, but I do credit myself for trying! Some are rereads:

Franny and Zoe by Salinger
Breaking The Spell by Daniel Dennett
An American Trilogy (all three novels in Philip Roth's trilogy, the 60s so real)
Foundation by Asimov 
Deeper Into Movies, Pauline Kael 
Axis sci fi by Robert Wilson
She Left Me In The Middle of Nowhere great poetry by pal Geoff Peterson (on Amazon)
The Drunkard's Walk, science by Leonard Mlodinow
"Evolutionary Social Psychology" in Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology, ed. by David Buss
365 Days by Ronald Glaser (Vietnam vet personal history)
The Falling Man by Dan DeLillo
Greatest Show On Earth and Ancestor's Tale by Richard Dawkins (both evolution) 
Pentimento, An Unfinished Woman and Scoundrel Time by Lillian Hellman (memoirs and interesting insider look at the McCarthy Era)
Slaughterhouse Five by Vonnegut 
Feathers by Thor Hanson (a book about the evolution of feathers) 
The Darkness Around Us Is Deep (poetry of William Stafford)
Darwin a bio. by Desmond and Moore
Harmony scifi by Project Itoh
Idoru  scifi by William Gibson
The Emotional Brain and The Synaptic Self  both by Joseph Ledoux (neuroscience which has influenced my writing and my understanding of the human condition)
Einstein: his life and universe by W. Isaacson (excellent book which capsulizes his theories as well as Einstein's bio)
 

The writer among his books

That last Einstein book is very representative of how reading works for me. For a fraction of a day, I almost grasp his theories. By the next day, the knowledge is lost among the synapses. The older I get, the more advanced is this process of forgetting, and I do not like it one bit!  

As I said...if I remembered a fraction of what I read, I'd be a man of wide and deep knowledge, a man for all seasons, but, genetically, that was not to be my fate, so I read and recall mere fragments and am forced to build my flawed picture of the Cosmos and my place in it from scraps and personal suffering. When I was younger my most anguished moments of self-knowledge came when I knew I would never have the understanding or reputation of a genius. Laugh at me—I finally did—but when I was a youth and often in my cups, that knowledge was a source of ceaseless anguish.

THE ANGST OF BECOMING KNOWN

Recently I submitted a piece of writing to a local paper. It was rejected. That's okay. Any writer gets used to that, but I had asked that if they used my piece would they please mention my blog and/or my publications at Amazon. The editor in an email said that the paper would not advertize my books or this blog if they ever did use a piece of writing by me. I have no argument with the editor, but a little recognition wouldn't hurt. 

What really bothers me about all of this is how I now feel SHAME that I should even have asked someone to give me a little help in my effort to sell a book before I die. It's my problem, of course, not that particular editor's, but I don't know how people can shamelessly advertize themselves or their work whereas I am unable to do it. I picture shame as partly genetic and it's a mechanism by which some of us monkeys hold back while others climb to the top of the heap.

My shame is difficult to deal with. I'm sure it's at the root of my hard drinking in the past. Why should anyone feel shame just because he wants to become known and sell a book? It certainly doesn't hold back the silver-back gorillas among us who do become known or rise to power. I also believe that shame is what causes some celebrities to act out so badly when they do achieve recognition. They feel they don't deserve it.

Perhaps I need to change the title of this blog to THE SHAMEFUL BOOMER!

THE SILENT BOOMER BEGINS 3RD INSTALLMENT OF MARTA

Me at 25 

"Not long after the incident with the boys in the Winton barn, Marta first heard her name and Melvina’s name mentioned in the same breath. The girl was walking home from Crossroad High on an unusually warm spring afternoon when two junior high boykins shot past on bikes, shouting at her—Melvina Marta! Melvina Marta! They laughed loudly, their grinning mouths hidden as they looked back over their shoulders at her. The mean laughter confused the girl because she had no context for understanding where these taunts came from or how her name had suddenly come to be connected with Melvina’s name and shouted at her in the streets of Crossroad by two boys on bikes. No response entered her thoughts that she could shout back at them. Frustrated and feeling shamed for no reason, she watched the two boys bike speedily off and disappear around the corner."

So begins the third installment of the sexual adventures of a precocious young girl in 1940 Iowa. If I don't lose interest, these stories could be the backbone of a new novel, but who knows? At my age, things often change. I lose interest quickly. It seems I am often charged up by some idea, then I commence to carry it through, then I lose interest. I've written enough novels to understand that the initial impulse toward a book is usually intriguing and exciting, but the effort to carry it through to completion is a whole 'nother ball of wax! The very first book I finished, I was still a typist. No personal computers yet. To make copies you used carbon paper. What a process! The photo above represents roughly what I looked like when I began to think I'd be the next great American novelist.