62.13

CHEATERS EVER PROSPER AN UNFILTERED LOOK

I

BRIAN ALAN LANE

am a tenured professor at California State University Long Beach. Through the Department of Film and Electronic Arts, I teach creative writing for all media, at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. I was just named Most Valuable Professor in our College of The Arts, and I get lots of other positive attention here. Prior to becoming a teacher, I was a full-time Hollywood writer and producer, and I got lots of attention there too. For the Writers Guild of America I am one of a small group of members honored by earned invitation to serve on the television credits policy committee, where I function as a legally-recognized expert reader and consultant on matters of authorship crediting. Before turning professional, I earned a BA and an MFA in theatre/film from UCLA, and a JD from USC (yes, I am a practicing attorney as well). So, I should have nothing to complain about and no axes to grind.

Right.

Every semester, I hand each of my students a course syllabus. It contains the University’s no-nonsense policy on cheating and plagiarism. We don’t much tolerate cheaters. At least when they’re students.

However, when professors cheat, it’s a whole different story.

The internet has now made it possible to vet the credits of everyone, students and teachers alike. You can directly confirm or disprove claims, and you can find listings of multiple sources for personal contact and inquiry so that proof is beyond any reasonable doubt.

The results are terrifying, deplorable, unexpected, and embarrassing. For the last two reasons, the University seems unprepared and unable to deal with it, and our teachers’ union prefers to blindly protect the professor, as if this were an adversarial situation between employer and employee rather than a matter of integrity and truth.

Right now, on our Film Department website and

VETTIN’ TO THE OLDIES

FACT-CHECKING PROFESSORS’ CLAIMS AND CREDITS MATT DUPREE

Illustration ANDREW WILSON

Upon reading Brian Lane’s article, I have to admit I had my doubts at first. Certainly no professor would be so brazenly foolish to believe that they could get away with passing false credits off in the internet age, and especially not in their internet bio, right? Now for certain departments it might fly since who knows how well the credits and achievements of the more shadowy arts and sciences are documented on the internet. But film?

I don’t know if you’ve taken a look at IMDB (Internet Movie Database) lately, but that shit is exhaustive.

So obviously, since I wouldn’t have written anything had this not proved interesting, I decided to let my fingers do the research and popped just one name into the search bar at IMDB: Alan Jacobs. Though his bio says that Jacobs “has produced, directed and/or edited over 20 films…” even a cursory glance at his posted credits only brings up a grand total of 7 credits. Now Mr. Jacobs never claimed to be a mathematician, but certainly even a first-grader could see the problem here. The bio claims that he has a production company called “The Film Foundry, Inc.” but again a quick search reveals that The Film Foundry, Inc. is a North Carolina-based company UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

that was founded and is run by CEO Rick Eldridge. A double life perhaps? unlikely. What’s more likely is that this was simply the most convenient typo at the time, and that whatever the truth may be, it is’nt as prestigious and impressive as this mistake. Oooh, here’s a fun fact: The Moscow Film Festival doesn’t give out a “Best Foreign Film” award, no matter what Jacobs’ bio would leave you to believe about Only The Beginning.

Should you believe that this is just some rogue making himself look good in front of his peers, allow me to introduce you to another less-than-sparkling bio by Michael Berlin. In fact, I don’t even need to point out the problems because Berlin backpedaled when he heard about this article and went online to highlight the fake stuff for me. Comparing his bio on the school website as of today to that which was available yesterday (and is still available on the CSU Summer Arts website), you’ll find he no longer takes credit for having an MA or for being a psychologist. He also conveniently dropped any association with the television show “Walker, Texas Ranger,” and swapped out the word “produced” for the less quantifiable “worked on” for his involvement with television program “The Outer Limits,” likely because his

other official CSU websites are biographies of our faculty.

In addition, some of these faculty have their own personal and business websites. In the public record—in various forms—are the curricula vitae for these faculty. You can find all this information in a heartbeat, if you have the mind to. And if you do, you will find that at least three of our Film Department’s ten active tenured and tenure track “job for life” faculty are staking their careers on outright lies and misleading statements of fact.

These are professors taking credit for awards and honors that they did not receive—even for awards that do not exist or awards that were actually given to others. These are professors taking credit for work they did not do on films and creative projects that were in fact the works or primarily the works of others. These are professors who are lying to your face about prior professional AND academic employment.

Worse (if such a thing is possible), at least one of these professors claims a post-graduate degree she/he does not have, a matriculation at an important University she/he never actually attended for degree credit, and she/he has unilaterally and retroactively changed the discipline of another degree to a subject area that seems more prestigious. All it took was a few computer keystrokes to invent a new history that students, their parents, the University and the public are told to buy, buy, buy.

In any other industry—including Hollywood—when cheaters are “outed”, they are met by security officers, handed boxes of their personal possessions, summarily marched off the grounds, and told “sue us, if you dare”.

Not at CSULB. Whistle blowers here are told to “quit being departmental police”, and, when retaliated against, further told to “keep quiet, take it, and be resilient”. Meanwhile, the outed cheaters avoid answering the charges by bellowing about bias and discrimination, rabidly backed by one of this State’s most powerful unions.

Months go by, years go by, and lies take on the glint of truth by dint of repetition. Then, emboldened by not getting caught, the liars lie more. And, once tenured, they get to rule on hiring and tenure for the next generation of

CONTINUED ON PAGE 4... involvement according to IMDB was as a writer for 2 episodes and an executive script consultant for 10 episodes. It’s hard to award-drop the show’s Cable Ace award when you’re not in any sort of production capacity I suppose. Most notable of the changes however is Berlin’s involvement at Columbia University. Whereas previous to this morning his bio called him a “graduate from Columbia University’s Master’s Program,” the new bio only states that he attended courses in a shared program with Yeshiva University.

Now if only he had put these changes in in the first place, it might not look like academic fraud.

But in case that’s all leaving a sour taste in your mouth, perhaps you’d like a more humorous example, such as the bio of Sharyn Blumenthal. If you were to type her name into IMDB, you’d find only a writing and directing credit for 3 episodes of “Women: Stories Of Passion,” a showtime series that melded psychological erotica with the perennial appeal of female nudity. These are mentioned in her faculty bio, but make no mention of their softcore tendencies. And, displaying her superhuman ability to be someone completely different, she credits herself with a Dramalogue Best Director award for her film for the Cal Rep production of Living After Midnight. Unfortunately, it was Ron Lindblom who won the Best Director award for directing Living After Midnight, since Dramalogue awards are for plays and not films.

OPINIONS

NOTES OF A DIRTY YOUNG MAN

DEREK CROSSLEY

THE DECLINE OF AMERICAN BOOK READING CHRIS BARRETT

I

n the study “To Read or Not to Read” released last year by the National Endowment of the Arts, it was revealed that leisure reading is in a sad state in America.

Some of the many conclusions of the study are that twice as many (21%) high school seniors rarely or never read books for fun when compared to 24 years ago, despite no significant change in the amount of reading required by their classes; and that college seniors are actually twothirds more likely to not read books for fun (35%). By the end of the year, less than one in four college seniors finishes more than five books for fun. This decline in leisure reading has led to drops in reading proficiency across all levels of education. College graduates, including graduate degree holders, are 20% more likely to not be proficient at reading when compared to fifteen years ago. The result is that nearly three out of five people with graduate degrees fail to read proficiently.

I could keep going—holy shit, people who read are two-thirds more likely to exercise regularly—but you can look up the rest on your own. Besides, I take a different stance on the issue than the NEA. Where they see a sky falling I see the nearing of a new frontier. This is due to my own experiences with education.

Last year I was honored as the Outstanding Graduate of the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, receiving departmental honors from the Physics Department and the distinction of Magna cum Laude. Prior to that, I had placed in the top 500 worldwide in the Putnam mathematics competition on more than one occasion, and received many competitive scholarships. Since then I have had physics papers published in multiple academic journals, will be finishing up a masters in pure math this semester, and I recently had the luxury of turning down an offer from Cal Tech for $60k a year just to continue my education there.

I say all of this not to brag, but to punctuate the following fact: I have never read a book in my entire life.

As is the case for many, public education is largely responsible for me not reading. To me it presented reading solely as a timesink for stuff I don’t care about.

Without any life experience or education in philosophy, the meaning in books was simply beyond my grasp.

Growing up I learned to watch television and play videogames for entertainment. By the time I finally took an interest in my own education, I primarily read about math, science, philosophy, and news, never developing an appreciation for literature.

The reasons why I continue to not read books are that I feel I don’t have enough time, that I deem it to not be an effective form of entertainment, and I feel that books have been marginalized in their usefulness by the development of alternatives. When being educated simply meant that you read lots of literary works, it was mostly because there were few alternatives. Recently we’ve developed such things as technical writing, academic papers, and reference texts. Though these diminish the entertainment value of material, they also allow an author to precisely and completely explain their point without burying it in a hundred-page anecdote or worrying about the artistic or stylistic merits of their work, i.e. stuff that might not even interest the reader. This also provides a way for the audience to quickly find and absorb important information, which traditionally might be buried within a tome.

Although I don’t read books, I do spend over three hours a day reading online, and thanks to these options I feel that I am able to learn far more than I would reading books. I know many people that are like this and I don’t particularly feel that we are ill-educated.

This all brings me to my conclusion, which is simply that book reading may be a dying pastime in America, but that it’s not something we should fret about too much. Though people read less over time, they don’t appear to get that much dumber, which means they are simply getting informed and entertained through other sources, and isn’t that the point of inventing the other sources in the first place?

UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

ANDREW WILSON

...AND WHY IT DOESN’T WORRY ME

Illustration

CASHING OUT There are all kinds of addictions. I have a few vices to my credit but some of my friends are even more exciting in their pursuits at hitting bottom. My roommate is straight-edge. Instead of sitting at a bar all night long, she enjoys sitting in a circle. Besides, bars are only open until two.

Casinos are open all night. She plays poker.

Texas hold ‘em.

She has lost twenty-two-hundred dollars in the last two days. She is living the dream.

Three days ago she was up eighteen-hundred.

Now she’s down.

There is something special about casinos.

There’s the noise, the smell, the chattering in seemingly exotic tongues, and, more importantly, the desperation.

Gambling is the American dream—to make money without doing work., even though any serious poker player will tell you that winning is work.

My roommate wants to become a professional gambler. She wants to take people’s money for a living. There is a moment when you stare into another gambler’s eyes and see that you are taking money from them they shouldn’t be losing. But, then again, if you can’t pay your mortgage or feed your kids should you really be gambling?

That is the beauty of the gentlemanly game of poker. It is not pulling a lever and hoping three sevens all line up and quarters shoot out at your waste. It is not hoping that the lucky carbon-monoxide blown onto dice by a silicone beauty will keep you from rolling a seven. It is a game of skill, a game where you aren’t trying to beat the house: it’s a game where you are trying to beat the person across the table from you.

If you think that poker is all about the cards you are dealt, sit down with fivehundred dollars at a no-limit table and watch your nest-egg shatter.

I’m naturally attracted to a game where lying is at the very center of winning. It is all about perception. Clues are given by body position, facial movement, betting, and the way you touch, or don’t touch, anything.

Poker is sociology with a cash prize.

Gambling sets off a release of hormones into the brain. Winning sets off more hormones, losing sets off even more. This is the reason some people, even if they would never believe or admit it, love to lose.

There is something powerful about putting down money and being given the chance that when you pick it up there will be more. But, like with any gamble, you may be left with nothing, trying to pick up a handful of green felt.

So, if you are looking for an addiction, remember that no matter how much cocaine you do it will only steal your money. But if you put it on the table and take a chance you may walk home with something in your pocket, or, at the very least, lose it to my roommate. She has to cover rent.

OPINIONS TAKE YOUR GRAPHIC NOVEL AND SHOVE IT WHY YOU’RE NOT COOL JUST BECAUSE YOU’VE READ WATCHMEN

JAMES KISLINGBURY Free Comic Book Day was last week. The day operates on the theory that, if you enjoyed this Hellboy short-story for free, then you’d be willing to pay for a bigger one later on. Once, years ago, there was a time when a single issue could sell millions of copies nation wide. Since the boom of the 1990s, the comic industry has fallen on hard times. Nowadays, the number one issue nationwide might crack one hundred thousand copies. Free Comic Book Day, movies and re-launches are all a part of the industry’s attempt to bring in new readers, which I’m all for. But there’s another way that the comics industry has tried to grab new readers, and that is by re-dubbing comic books “graphic novels.”

The phrase appears in movie trailers, on posters, and, apparently, even in class. I’m irritated because it’s a movement that has come from marketing, not from the readers and not from the writers. Some slick guy

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2... liars coming up. Lies thereby become encouraged, rubber-stamped, one person’s fake PhD covered by someone else with a fake MFA. One liar giving an award to another liar in one year, and then a return of favor the next. All as unwitting wives and husbands and children and friends and colleagues and lovers know only the lies as if they were truths.

So, I’m guessing Hillary will be carrying Barack’s love child before we get rid of our known cheaters at my University. Want that doctorate? Say it and it’s so. Want to have worked as a professor at a famous Ivy League school?

Harvard or Yale, your pick, not theirs. And no postage necessary. Just take credit, clunk your heels together three times, and type it into your c.v. or bio. No one will check.

And, if they do, and if they find you’ve lied, then they won’t know what to do, because they are not equipped to deal with liars, because “the academy” is supposed to be filled with honorable people for whom truth matters above all else.

Which is why one of the most fascinating things I found in reading our various employment contracts, the Collective Bargaining Agreement, CSU Chancellor directives and CSULB Presidential policies, Academic Senate statements, and other official University manifestoes and

Illustration ANDREW WILSON UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

in marketing figured out that comic books was a term associated with lots of ugly things—pocket protectors, tights, virginity—and that John Q. Public just wouldn’t be interested in that kind of thing. Graphic novels, though, has a ring of sophistication. You can hold a graphic novel in one hand and a latte in the other and not feel like a nerd.

I imagine that the American Indians had the same reaction when the pilgrims tried to co-opt the things they knew and loved.

“Man, this is pretty good. What do you guys call this?”

“Maize.”

“Nah, too ethnic. We’re gonna call it ‘corn.’”

Except I wasn’t wracked with small pox when this happened.

The term is also a disguise. It says, “Okay, read Watchmen, it isn’t a comic book, it’s a graphic novel.” The story hasn’t changed since it came out in ‘85, but now that it’s a graphic novel, maybe people will to take it seriously. It’s a disguise because, as I understand it, graphic novels can be “literature” where as comic books are just “genre.”

Raymond Chandler and Kurt Vonnegut made their

entire careers writing “genre” literature. Even Cormac McCarthy is best known for writing a imx between a western, crime thriller, and post-apocalyptic drama. If you go back and you look hard enough you can write any author off by calling their work “genre.”

Poe wrote horror. De Sade made porno. Homer wrote alternate history. The category a piece of work falls under shouldn’t determine whether it’s a good story or a bad one.

I realize that “graphic novels” have been around for years. Originally, it referred to a kind of comic that is published as one volume instead of serially. Where my problem comes from is that the prettier, more marketable term is obscuring what a comic actually is—which is kind of the point. It’s not an entirely honest move, but maybe calling comics something else is what the industry needs. Thinking like that might even lead to an industry where people buy comics simply because they enjoy them.

What a world that would be. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have to go see Charlie Chaplin dressed as a robot fight The Dude.

pronouncements, is that there are lots of flowery preambles and golden-hearted rules espousing virtue and scholarship and rah-rah-sis-boom-bah, and no procedures to urgently handle situations when the rules are broken. We’re like deer in the headlights when things—and people—go bad.

Yet, all that begs the question: why do things go bad?

Why would anyone break rules in an ivory tower? How is it that we wind up with liars in a place where truth is extolled for its own beauty and you get paid to pursue it?

Simply asked: Why do some of our professors cheat?

And the answer is: Because they can. Because they can.

Because we’ve made it easier to cheat than actually do the work and earn the credit. Because easy trumps truth. Because belief trumps knowledge. Because our best and brightest aren’t the best and the brightest anymore, they’re just ours and not much more.

And so who is really being cheated by the cheaters?

The students, the taxpayers, the public trust in education, and us. All of us. A people and a society and a country.

We are not what once we were and it’s because we cheat ourselves by expecting less of each other. We should be ashamed. We should be embarrassed. We should get “mad as hell and not take it anymore”.

Now, back when I was in law school and I was

researching whether our legal system promoted order and justice at the cost of truth, I wrote a satirical piece for class. The piece was sub-titled “How To Tell Lies For Fun and Profit”. In it I suggested that there were rules that successful liars knew well to follow. One of them was only to lie about things that involved dead people, because they were no longer around to dispute it. Another was never to lie about winning an award, but always lie about coming in second, because no one remembers who came in second, and second still means that you were better than everyone else except the one person who came in first.

See, you just have to presume that sooner or later somebody is going to check out your claims—and that the digital age will make the vetting easy—so you need to be doubly smart if you are going to lie instead of actually achieving something.

And maybe that, more than anything, is what’s bothering me about my mendacious colleagues, that they have manufactured phony credits that any idiot could catch.

But, then again, here at CSULB, if you’re brazen and loud and insist you’re a talented victim rather than a career criminal, you can be as deceitful as you want and get away with it for years and counting. It’s not that no one cares, it’s just that no one cares to do anything about it.

ISSUE 62.13

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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

THE STATE OF THE WORD

RYAN KOBANE

D

uring my intro to creative writing course here at CSULB, Prof. Steven Cooper started the first class by asking a question, “What do all good writers have in common?” To which he received twenty-five blank stares (keep in mind this is intro to creative writing, people).

My mind began to race, quickly surveying every author I deemed worthy of the title, “good.” Let’s see, Hemingway was a man’s man; burly, bearded, loved to fish and drink. Kerouac was a traveler, a poet, a lover, and a drinker.

Hunter S. created his own form of writing, took his drugs and drinking seriously, and wore really short shorts.

A good minute passed before someone had the balls to offer up an attempt, “They... write a lot?” And as Prof. Cooper always does he retorted with a reassuring, “Well that is true, but... that’s not the answer I was looking for exactly.”

I laughed in my head as I saw the dejected student slump back into his seat.

“Come on Kobane,” I thought to myself, “What do all of the people I read have in common?” The best answer I could come up with was that somehow

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UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

RYAN KOBANE

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written word. I was buying books with money I previously used for other, “cooler” things.

I was enamored with how simple yet powerful Hemingway could write. I found Hunter S. way too young... we’ll leave it at that. And the list goes on and on. I read more books during my freshmen year than I had read my entire life combined, and it just kept getting better. That’s when I found magazines.

I’ll admit, my consumption of words in book form has dwindled somewhat in the last few years, but my love for the written word has not. I cannot think of a better way to spend a lazy morning or afternoon than drinking coffee and reading a feature in GQ, Rolling Stone, Esquire, Wired, etc. This is, in my opinion, where some of the best contemporary writing is happening today.

You may be surprised, within this very magazine there is some writing that dare I say borders on greatness.

Now it’s my turn to ask a question of you, “Have you ever read the Union Weekly cover to cover?” My bet is that a very small majority of you have, but if you haven’t, this week would be a good one to start with.

For the first time ever we have dedicated an entire issue to one theme, and that theme is, “The State of the Written word.” We encourage you to read. Read books, magazines, newspapers, pamphlets, and blogs.

You have choices now, no one is forcing you anymore. Just read. Period.

Cover Photo

RYAN KOBANE Editor-In-Chief ERIN HICKEY Managing Editor MIKE PALLOTTA Associate Editor MATT DUPREE

Associate Editor RYAN KOBANE Business Manager

it seemed they were all heavy drinkers, or, they all used moleskins, I couldn’t decide. But surely alcoholism couldn’t be the answer Cooper was looking for.

After a few other awkward attempts to no avail, Cooper looked at us, somewhat flabbergasted, “All good writers READ a lot!” To which he received a comprehensive exhale from our class, and a bunch of, “I totally knew that’s.”

You know why that answer completely neglected to enter any of our minds, because no one fucking reads anymore. Or should I say no one reads enough anymore.

Sure, we read blogs, skim over headlines, and “read” textbooks, but let’s face it, the word is dying. If it weren’t for Harry Potter I bet half of you haven’t read a complete book in the last few years for pleasure. And that’s another problem; what we’re forced to read usually sucks, therefore taking the “pleasure” out of reading.

I’ll be honest, if it weren’t for Sports Illustrated for Kids, Where the Wild Things Go, and The Hardy Brothers I probably would have went my entire childhood without reading, period. I know, it’s sad, but being inside just wasn’t my thing (and no, I didn’t play copious amounts of video games either).

Brave New World saved me freshmen year of high school. I had one fantastic English teacher and everything changed. We had choices, we could explore our own literary tastes.

This is where I found a love for the

SPORTS

FINAL FOUR HEARTBREAK FANS SHOW UP, 49ERS DON’T IN NCAA SEMIFINAL LOSS TO PEPPERDINE

BY SERGIO ASCENSIO

T Photo RUSSELL CONROY

he voice on the other end of the phone said “Dude, I can’t believe I scalped a ticket to get into a men’s volleyball game.”

But this wasn’t your ordinary men’s volleyball game. It was Long Beach/Pepperdine, part quatro. A Final Four match up for a shot at Penn State in the national championship. A chance to prove which volleyball team off Pacific Coast Highway is the best.

For now, it’s Pepperdine. Just like their previous two meetings, the ‘Niners were swept by the Waves, 30-26, 30-21, 30-26.

And yea, it hurt.

“The group had a tremendous season,” said head coach Alan Knipe. “Far exceeded most people’s expectations of where we’d end up—other than maybe our own.”

And the Union Weekly’s.

Long Beach State finished the season with a 23-7 record and a handful of individual accolades. Senior outside hitter Paul Lotman needs to make some room

on his shelves as he was named National Co-Player of the Year, MPSF Player of the Year and was a first-team All-American.

Middle blocker Dan Alexander is an All-American and was the team’s only sophomore to earn first team honors.

Dean Bittner rounds up the front line assassins and was selected as a Second Team All-American.

Bittner and Alexander will be back in the gold and black next season. Lotman will likely make some dough playing pro volleyball and expect the former walk-on to don the red, white and blue too.

“As far as my career, I don’t regret anything,” Lotman said. “I’m glad I came to Long Beach, I love playing for Alan and the coaching staff. And I think we have the best coaching staff in the nation. It’s kind of sad we didn’t win the whole thing but I wouldn’t take anything back.”

Lotman had 14 kills in the semifinal match-up and Bittner chipped in with 12 of his own. But they also combined for 15

Mike Klipsch (5) and Paul Lotman react to the point that ended the 49ers’ season, and their national title hopes.

attack errors on the night. Senior hitter Adam Schlesinger came into the match in the mid-second set and was good on 6 of his 7 kill attempts.

The Waves’ strategy of serving to Lotman to take him out of the play was not as effective this time as it was when the teams met in the conference playoffs. It seemed every time Long Beach State needed a point to get back into it, Lotman would come through—like he has all year.

“There are not a lot of secrets when you get to a game like this,” Knipe said.

“You’re going to dance with the one who brung you here. Paul is the player of the year in conference and co-player of the year in the nation.”

The game began almost identically to Long Beach’s loss to Pepperdine just one week prior. The Niners and Waves engaged in a point-for-point battle that

kept fans from both schools on their feet.

But just like before, Long Beach State played catch-up the entire match, only leading once—a 1-0 advantage to start the first game.

“I was really frustrated,” Lotman said.

“It’s not everyday you go up against two guys that are as big as Jon (Winder) and Paul (Carroll). Every time I got set, it felt like I’d just see a wall on the other side.

So I tried to deal with it as best as I could, but obviously I hit out a couple of times and got blocked and it’s frustrating to me, and I tried not to show it and let my teammates see that.”

The Waves made easy work of Long Beach State, flawlessly setting up their offense to get big shots, taking advantage of open looks, coming up with the big blocks—basically doing everything the ‘Niners weren’t. Collectively, the Waves hit .500 in the match (Long Beach State hit .250) and finished with three players with double digit kills.

But as a former Union sports editor said before the press conference, “You couldn’t beat a group of nuns if they hit .500.”

Speaking of nuns, the crowd was packed and not for the easily offended. Long Beach supporters literally came out by the busloads and packed the North end of the venue. They came in black and gold, speedos and sports bras—they came hungry for a win. Feeding the frenzy was the fact that the students were removed from their original colonized student section on the bottom section, 50-yard line. But it didn’t matter, as the crowd was loud from beginning to end—even when security guards (who obviously have never been to a sporting event) ordered the fans to sit down, while police paced the section stairs in case fans got out of control and, ya know. started cheering.

“We’re a sophomore and freshman dominated program right now,” said an optimistic Coach Knipe. “So I think we’ll have an opportunity to get back here and play a little better.”

Next year, make sure you get your tickets ahead of time.

THE SLOW DECAY OF SPORTS JOURNALISM RYAN ZUMMALLEN It’s been said that sportswriting is both the easiest and the most difficult form of journalism to master. The easy part is obvious: a game begins, it ends, write about it. The hard part is making something as silly as grown men and women playing games appear culturally relevant and important. Sports have a life and death aspect that the best craftsmen are able to seamlessly incorporate into any story, but these days we are seeing less and less of it.

The most famous sports lead in history would not even have gotten past its editor in modern times. Grantland Rice’s 1924 account of Notre Dame’s victory over Army likened the Irish defensive line to the four horsemen of the apocolypse, and didn’t mention the score of the game until the third paragraph (today, he would’ve been fired UNION WEEKLY 7 MAY 2008

on the spot for such audacity). But the story has lasted more than 80 years because of its powerful imagery and description beyond the box score—a skill sorely lacking in today’s sportswriting world.

Many have pointed to Sports Illustrated as an example of the quality drought, and rightfully so. The once golden standard for sports literature has devolved into an athletic US Weekly that panders to the four major sports and occasionally saves room for golf and NASCAR. An increasing East Coast bias was displayed last November with four consecutive covers featuring the Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics and Patriots one more time.

S.I. somehow managed to top that travesty by making 12 of the next 13 cover stories about football. Is this what the American sports fan wants? An extreme concentration of coverage that blatantly ignores the dozens of sports

that the mag once featured prominently?

Perhaps: a masterful account of a 500-mile pigeon race across the Nevada desert published in January was blasted by readers who would’ve rather read the latest about Tom & Giselle.

So a reader seeking the enrichment that sports provides won’t find it in the modern Sports page, in this age where the LA Times’ “Text Messages From Press Row” and S.I.’s “Pop Culture Grid” pass for sports journalism. For every Reilly there is a Simers, a Mariotti for every Albom. Sports blogs are fascinating tools for sports fans, but real sports journalists are devolving to match their lazy style, forgetting that room still exists for quality constructed sports literature.

Until its return, we wait patiently through the dumbing-down of the American sports fan for Rice’s horsemen to appear, outlined on the blue-gray horizon.

haven’t read the script for The Ten Commandments, but imagine if the four (count ‘em, four) writers of the film tackled the pivotal moment of the Red Sea’s parting with the line “The RED SEA parts.” Surely there wouldn’t be such a bare-bones description for an effect that probably cost Paramount a hefty fee, but it happens. Some writers want to have as big of a hand as possible in the direction, while others would be happy to give a director free reign for interpretation.

Q

uick, think of your favorite movie. Mine’s probably Almost Famous, but it fluctuates semi-annually so I wouldn’t quote me. What about the movie you chose turns you on? Almost Famous tickles my fancy because I feel it perfectly captures the essence of an era through story, music, and great characters.

For you it could be the plot, a certain performance, the dialogue, or even the camera work. Excepting the latter, though in some cases it’s still applicable, everything in that list comes from one thing: the screenplay.

There isn’t any one thing that makes a good screenplay. Some vividly explain camera angles, strange alien life forms, and locations—right down to the cracking wallpaper next to the AC unit.

Others have a much more minimalist approach to their exposition. When he penned Zodiac, James Vanderbilt took the time to painstakingly describe every detail of the grisly double murder the film opens with out of necessity; Zodiac is a true crime story, so details were a must. Now, I

The relationship between film and screenplay is never stable from project to project, or even person to person.

People like Kevin Smith, Wes Anderson and Quentin Tarantino direct their own features. When you take a gander at the script for Smith’s Chasing Amy and then watch the movie after, it’ll bore the shit out of you. His movies have always been dialogue centric and until recently have lacked a stimulating visual style, so reading the screenplay is a similar experience to the one you’d have while watching the movie. I’d say that it’s a fair statement to make that writer/directors are a tad over protective of their work—Kevin Smith is known to do multiple takes until an actor says a line how he envisioned it spoken (unless they can bring something better than what he imagined).

There are the screenplays that don’t matter all that much. Assholes like Michael Bay (Transformers) and Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) are strictly visual spectacle people that will get people in theater seats with the promise of a popcorn movie. Granted, Bay more than likely thinks his screenplays are the shit—this is the guy that directed Pearl Harbor after all, and usually when someone puts out a film high

AN INTERVIEW WITH A FIRST TIME SCREENWRITER MIKE PALLOTTA In order to get into the mind of a screenwriter, former Union Sports Editor, J.J. Fiddler, chatted with us about finishing his first script (titled Growing Up) and enlightened us about the literary side of entertainment.

Union Weekly: Why did you choose the medium of film to tell your story instead of writing a novel?

Illustrations ANDREW WILSON

J.J. Fiddler: Well as a person who has called himself a writer for a long time, I’ve written in a lot of different mediums from short stories, novellas, and things like that.

And I’ve always had the vision of what I wanted to see in the story before I even knew what I wanted the message to be or what the characters were going to say. So I knew it was going to be a hard story to tell in the “novel” way because there’s so many different characters that you can’t just leave it to one person. I wanted to do a screenplay, or a script really, because I feel that that’s the best way to get across the unorganization of real life—the unorganized reality of college. The script is kind of all over the place but that’s really how college life is you know?

UW: When you were writing what was the hardest part?

What didn’t you expect to come across?

JJ: I think a script is probably the hardest thing that I’ve ever tried to do. Granted I’ve never tried to write an entire novel and I’m sure that’s extremely difficult, but when you’re writing a script you can’t write what the person sees or how the UNION WEEKLY

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person moves or any body language or non-verbal communication. Through dialogue—which is very difficult—I had to find a way to give people personality so I used a lot of the same words for people, a lot of people used the same turns of phrase a couple times and I feel that it’s hard to create a vision, create a theme, without actually telling someone what the scene looks like. I think that’s the hardest part.

UW: And you wrote a 188-page script. This is your 1st draft, but with the 2nd draft do you already have in mind what you’re going to cut?

JJ: I definitely have a good idea what needs to be cut, but Quentin Tarantino once said that if you have a good idea for a script, use ‘em all, don’t save any of them for your next one. So I tried my best to put all the best ideas that I had in there and then once I revise, I’ll cut it down to all the best parts hopefully.

UW: How or where are you going to start in the process of editing and revising the 2nd draft?

JJ: Probably the first thing would be to pull scenes. I think it’s very easy to shorten scenes and just cut them down and still make the point and still drive the plot and still keep people interested. I think the first thing I’ll do is cut full scenes, scenes that weren’t well received by the people who read it, some of the scenes that people don’t talk about at all that I felt were important, maybe I can move them.

I’d probably cut scenes first and then go back to the other

on the melodrama they think they’re churning out Oscar gold.

Dialogue can range from the tersest sentences imaginable (David Mamet) to long-winded monologues (Quentin Tarantino). Dialogue, unless improvised, is always directly from the screenplay. Sure, actors can put their own spin on the deliveries, but without a screenplay not much would be accomplished; there would be a lot of long-winded monologues and terse sentences that don’t even serve to advance the plot in the slightest.

Dramas are usually based around a five or three act structure. In a five act story arc, the drama follows a pattern of exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution, whereas things are streamlined to setup, confrontation, and resolution in the three act structure. Traditional screenplays are written in the three act form and the majority of films you see in your lifetime are going to be organized as such. Five act stories are usually the product of a natural progression during the writing process; if a story needs to elaborate on certain elements it’ll expand accordingly.

Films (and other story-based media) follow some sort of structure usually because they’re tried and true—if you have a solid plot and compelling characters it’s pretty hard to fuck it up, but that’s all contingent on your abilities as a writer being up to par. scenes and shorten them up. Swingers apparently was a 200-page script before it got cut down and that was basically just a bunch of guys sitting around and talking, so those scenes are the easiest to cut and shorten. My script is all of those scenes [laughs], it shouldn’t be that hard.

UW: Any tips for anyone writing their first screenplay?

JJ: Don’t get frustrated. It’s hard creating a vision. It’s hard when you can’t just tell someone what they’re supposed to see. It took me 2 months to sit down and not have anything else going on and just work on my screenplay all day, everyday. If you have an idea, start small and then build up to writing more than a hundred pages of dialogue. If you just start writing with the goal of one hundred pages it’s going to be tough getting over that 50 page hump. It’s really easy to start and never finish, but in a script a lot of people have their beginning, middle, and end, so it’s easy to get bogged down. At the same time it can be the most rewarding of all things because you know when you’re going to reach the end and you know how you’re going to get there. Just writing the words “The End” was one of the best days of my life.

You know you’re going to finish it, but until you actually do you’re never quite sure. If I could just say one thing to anyone thinking about writing, it’d be don’t stop. Even if you hit a dead end and you don’t know where your scene wants to go, skip it, keep going, just don’t stop writing because it’ll work itself out, especially if you’re writing a movie. With a novel you have to go chapter by chapter, but with a script you can jump from scene to scene and write whatever you want. It’s more alive, it has more of its own personality than a novel or short story or any creative fiction like that. You can really change the entire feel with just a scene or two.

Words by Steven Carey Photos by Ryan Kobane Additional interviews done by Kathy Miranda and Darren Davis

I

n the far corner of Borders, rows and rows of chairs are full. People are standing or sitting, quiet as the shelved books surrounding them, leaning for a better view of this curious man in an old baggy t-shirt and Birkenstocks. And a few nearby shoppers are caught off guard as Gerald Locklin’s low, crooning voice erupts into song. “Send in the clowns,” he sings, raising his arms, and everyone in the audience is laughing or singing along.

It instantly becomes obvious to anyone who hasn’t seen him before that Gerry is no ordinary poet. As he begins reading “Tap Dancing Lessons,” a wonderfully light-hearted poem about growing up taking tap classes, he stands to demonstrate the different dance moves he knows. After skipping past the table, showing off his “Shuffle-Off-to-Buffalo,” he interrupts the poem to explain that every time he attempts the next step, the “BellStep,” it could be his last. Then he jumps joyously, clicking his heels mid-air.

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That was almost one year ago and, over the course of his forty-three year career here at CSULB, Gerald Locklin has touched thousands of students and poetry lovers.

In those years Gerry has become a staple of this campus and Long Beach in general. As his son Zachary said, “He’s been a major figure in Southern California poetry and especially, obviously, in Long Beach poetry. You can’t throw a stone without hitting one of his students.”

In fact, a good deal of the English Department’s faculty is comprised of Gerald’s old students.

Ray Zepeda is one of the many faculty members who took Gerry in the past and now has been teaching with

students, and even a few big names like Bukowski could be found in there. The small group was very tight and very talented. “We weren’t the toast of the town by any means,” Zepeda said. But, they did help bring to light what is known today as Stand-Up poetry, a style that is sexy, humorous, and exciting.

One thing was certain, though. They weren’t talking about literature. “That was about the last thing we talked about,” Gerry said. “Yeah, we were writers, but we were sports fans, and just talked or played pool and just had fun.” Zepeda remembers how they’d move from the 49er Tavern to the Reno Room, the Interlude, and Belmont

“I’D BE GOOD IN A MOSHPIT ” him for 34 years. Ray took Gerry for a literature class and remembers being referred to him by a friend who said, “Hey, you oughta take this guy Gerry Locklin. He’s a good guy and you can go out and have a beer with him.” “So,” Zepeda said, “I went to his class, and we ended up being friends. I mean, he had a lot of friends that came out of his classes.”

And after classes, if they wanted a beer, they went to the 49er Tavern to mingle with the sports fans, the steamplant workers, and the riff-raff that blew in from Pacific Coast Highway. It was a mixed crowd speckled with the best writers in Long Beach. Gerry and the faculty, a few

Saloon drinking beers. “Everybody met on Thursday nights and we’d drink a lot, and we wouldn’t talk about poetry at all,” he said.

But these days, he’s being celebrated by Long Beach students, faculty, and friends for his dedication and extensive contribution to this campus and contemporary culture. This year marks his retirement from teaching at CSULB and, during the West Coast Writers week, an exploration, celebration, and discussion of poetry, he will be honored by his colleagues. Not only does this week bring the release of Gerry’s new collection of poetry, “Gerald Locklin: New and Selected Poems,” but also a

Not-So-Dumb Blonde The guy my age with the beergut all Too similar to my own Tells the incredibly slinky blonde barmaid, “I’ve got a blonde joke for you: a smart Blonde, a dumb blonde, and Santa Claus all Spot a hundred dollar bill on the sidewalk.

Which one snags it?”

The incredibly slinky blonde barmaid Thinks it over for a long time before Answering, “Santa Claus?”

“Nah,” the beergut guy exults: “It has to be the dumb blonde Because the other two don’t exist.”

“Oh bullshit,” retorts the incredibly Slinky blonde barmaid.

“Santa is real.”

Toad’s Handicap As a result of lung problems Toad discovers he has Reduced oxygen capacity.

Pissarro: Still Life, 1876 There’s wine in this capacious pitcher.

The loaf has been cut into, Is already partially consumed.

The tablecloth is tight to the surface, Not decoratively flounced.

The spread is nutrition, not eye candy.

The bowl may already have been eaten from.

What ample ladles: meals for more than one.

This is an artist who enjoys his art, But not to the exclusion Of his other, more mundane appetites.

The most serious consequence Seems to be that it’s more difficult To run away from his responsibilities.

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festschrift, an old German tradition published to honor a professor. Old students of Gerry, faculty and friends alike, have written poems dedicated to him and their unique relationships to him.

Paul Tayyar, a professor and publisher of Gerry’s two most recent books of poetry, spent months pouring over Gerry’s poems to provide a comprehensive view of a man who’s voice is as individual, varied, and complex as the grooves of your fingertip. During an interview Tayyar explained, “I really wanted this book to emphasize how many different voices he can employ. You know, earlier in his career he really started out as a much more formal writer with sonnets and I wanted to make sure that was represented in addition to his conversational and funny poems.”

Gerry has the ability to take hefty intellectual topics and make them enjoyable to any reader. “People like his writing because it is accessible and has a real emphasis on clarity and being able to connect with an audience,” Tayyar continued. “So much of modern poetry becomes terribly elite that you feel like you need to crack a code, like Eliot’s ‘Wasteland.’” Instead Gerry’s work is tactile and full of vivid imagery and, opposed to what some people may assume about poetry, it is easy to read and spliced with humor. Like Zachary said, “read even his art poems, which cover very heavy topics and deal with very important works of art, and he’s talking about testicles for half a beat.” It’s that angle that makes his work so fun to read.

Don’t think for a moment, though, that Gerry has forgotten poetic convention or that he’s naïve to the long history of literature that comes before him. As Tayyar said, “There’s a lot there when you take time with the poems. There is more subtext then actually meets the eye.”

During the early years of Southern California poetry, publishers had that kind of misconception about Long Beach’s small poetic community. Zepeda recalled those

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days saying, “The press thought, ‘Oh well, they’re a bunch of drunks. They’re not serious. They’re not literary.’ ” But, upon stepping into his office, with it’s huge bookshelves littered with hundreds of books that have the appearance of having been read again and again, it is ob-

He even knows the contemporary music scene and we discussed his early music heydays. “I did open for Jane’s Addiction when they were a young band,” he said. During the 80s he was closely connected with some people at Triple X Records who would set up shows for him to

WEREN’T THE TOAST OF “WE THE TOWN BY ANY MEANS” - RAY ZEPEDA

vious that Gerry is a man who knows and loves the written word. Zepeda continued, “If there’s anybody who’s literary, its Gerry…He reads everything.” If you ask him about poets he could fill a thousand bookcases with discussions on a litany of writers.

Still, Gerry knows how to have fun and not be bogged down by what people expect from a poet. He finds inspiration in the world around him. “I’m a ham,” Gerry said.

“I like to sing and I like to dance.” That point is obvious to anyone who’s ever had him in a class. It doesn’t take much suggestion to get him to sing or dance around the room.

“I find the thinnest excuses to break into song,” he said.

He began singing and dancing at his poetry readings around twenty years ago, though, at a reading in LA. “We were all asked to do something weird, either look weird or do something weird,” he said, “and I sang.” And it must have stuck because since then his performance has become renowned for that kind of festive youthfulness.

And it worked. The audience reacted.

So he continued his dancing and singing mainly, in his words, “because I like doing it and because the more I did it the more I liked it. And because no one would ever pay me to do those things. I wasn’t good enough to be a professional dancer or singer. But I can get away with it by working it into a poetry reading.”

Thus, his readings have become something of an experience that is quite unlike quietly reading a poem to a group of people. He engages the audience in a way that is unique and exciting. “He views reading as separate from poetry,” his son Zachary said. “He views performance as separate from the actual poem.” The poems that are printed on the page are different from what you see when he reads them. He makes the work come alive in the audience, makes it real to them. That dialog that happens between the written word and the performance is what makes his readings so fun and interesting.

Gerry’s spirit is obvious when you talk to him. He is a man who has not abandoned his youth. “I love to dance, just regular dancing, but nobody dances anymore,” he said. “I like sort of freestyle, just kind of rocking out. I’d be good in a moshpit.”

Yes. Gerry seems like the kind of guy who would fit into the rough front row crowd of an arena stadium. You wouldn’t know it by looking at him. But, once you get to know him, you could picture him with his arms raised singing the lyrics amongst the throngs.

open for bands. It was through his former student Dave Alvin that Gerry was introduced to the LA punk band X. “They were the best LA punk group by far, the most talented by far,” he said. “A lot of the LA punk groups were comic…they would just fall around the stage. But I liked X a lot.”

After all those years, though, Gerry is finally retiring from CSULB. That does not mean, however, that he’s slowing down in any way. “When you’re a writer,” Zepeda said, “it’s almost impossible to retire. You have the writing habit. It’s part of your personality.” When asked about his plans Gerry pointed to a large bag of books and papers. “I’ve got all kinds of writing backed up. I’ve got all kinds of typing backed up,” he said. “I’ve got all kinds of manuscript submissions backed up.”

Gerry is currently working with his son Zachary as poetry editor of the Chiron Review, a literary magazine out of Kansas. “I want time to write,” he said. “I don’t want to be sitting around watching TV, except for the Lakers and the Yankees.” No. It doesn’t seem that Gerry has any plans of slowing down. And for that, I suppose, we should be grateful.

Gerry is even working diligently on the foundation of a literary scholarship. The new Gerald L. Locklin scholarship will support young, skilled writers of all kinds. In its infant stage the scholarship will focus on the Special Collections area of the library, a rather lofty collection that includes years of Gerry’s contributions including his small press, magazines, and the many correspondence letters between him and Charles Bukowski.

“I’d like it to be a competition,” he said, “where anybody could write whatever they wanted, poem, essay, or a short story.” Zepeda said, recalling the days when he was Gerry’s student, “If he could help any one, he’d help them.” And Gerry’s influence can be seen in the writing of thousands of his students throughout the past forty years. But, with the foundation of this scholarship, his gift for reaching students and guiding them through their writing careers will continue indefinitely into the future generations.

“Gerry’s a dynamo,” Zepeda said, and that’s one thing that is for sure. His writing is human. If anything, it is his humanity that makes his poetry so easy to love and so easy to relate to. “He’s able to be honest,” Tayyar said.

“In a sense he’s able to articulate his failings or flaws. But, at the same time those flaws are always trumped by how big a heart he has.”

Gerald Locklin is the epitome of real, honest writing.

He assumes nothing and divulges everything. No subject is too taboo or too mundane to turn into something humorous and beautiful. We can all look forward to more years of his writing as he continues working. And we can all wait for that moment, when he’s halfway in the air, clicking his heals, hoping not to fall. But, something makes me think Gerald’s always gonna land on his feet.

Barbara Kingsolver is a woman, but that’s pretty much irrelevant.

More importantly and impressively, Barbara Kingsolver is a best-selling creative non-fiction author with something unique to bring to the table. In literature, greatness seems to pour from the wounds of a great many authors, but this kind of fresh originality cloaked in sincerity, you see that a little less often.

Kingsolver has a knack for taking a moment, describing it beautifully, tragically and creating something greater and more relevant, and better yet, massively appealing.

Don’t listen to your religion teachers. A statement that stands alone, but specifically, don’t listen to adulterated interpretations of Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible. The novel, while structured like a Bible with books serving as sections and beginning with Genesis, beyond that, bears little religious relevance. The introduction to each book written by the wife of an evangelical Baptist minister, Orleanna Price sets a backdrop and timeline against which, by turn, each of her children describe their transplanted life in the Belgian Congo. The girls, Rachel the self-centered prima donna, Leah, her father’s most loyal follower, Adah, Leah’s deformed, mute and introverted twin, and Ruth-May, the precocious five year old, each offer a new perspective on their forced adventure. One narrator alone would have been sufficient for a fantastic read but the added pleasure of being allowed an unadulterated look into the minds of our narrators makes it something special. The novel shows off Kingsolver’s ability to create compelling and passionate characters, complete with delusions and dysfunction.

Homeland is more indicative of Kingsolver’s usual beat as a collection of overlapping short stories of inspiration, heartbreak and finding peace. Her only weaknesses are slightly unwelcome talk of her children, and her innate love of nature can get tiresome. Underneath this human flaw is beautiful and poetic writing. Comforting and heartwarming? You got it. Chicken Soup for the Soul? Definitely not.

Marguerite Duras was born in French Indo-China in 1914.

Her family there lived in relative poverty for French colonials, immediately creating a complex relationship between Duras, her family, colonial culture, and local culture. This back-drop created one of the most emotionally honest and socially perceptive authors of the French nouveau roman tradition and of Western literature in general.

She is responsible for having written countless works during her long adult life in Paris (having left Vietnam at an early age to study mathematics), wrote screenplays, and directed several films. Her style seems to be in the same vain of Tim O’Brien—with a certain eloquence that a translation from French will lay on an English text—and attacks the problems of relative reality. In doing this, Duras exorcises all manner of personal demons in the most intimate and candid way; not alienating the reading, but liberating her or him from isolation.

In many of her works, the forces of desire are explored, such as her semi-autobiographical novel The Lover (1984), which follows her first relationship in Vietnam with a Chinese businessman. As both narrator and main character, Duras discusses not only the causes of, but also the implications of desire, personally and socially. Where certain philosophies (i.e., existentialism) seek to explain away man’s self-destructive nature, Duras’ screenplay of Hiroshima Mon Amour shows that that very irrationality is what makes us humans, what makes us lovers.

There is a special type of mystery that is present when reading Joan Didion. Joan Didion, famous American writer and journalist, has mastered a journalistic approach of writing that has painted remarkable images of the ‘60s, a picture that is true to her own captivating memories of California counterculture and her enduring love for the American West Coast.

Most famously, she has demonstrated in her memoirs a talent that drives a pure and haunting narration of real events, executing a certain subtlety in her writing that allows for meticulous honesty in stories that are convincing page after page. What’s more is that Didion’s writing consciously invites the reader into glimpses of her own life, creating the mysterious and everlasting bond between author and reader that is often difficult to preserve.

In her collection of essays, The White Album, Didion says, “we tell ourselves stories in order to live...We live entirely…by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images, by the ideas with which we have learned to freeze the shifting phantasmagoria which is our actual experience.” There is a special quality about Didion’s literary style that embodies simplicity but still yields powerful meaning. Her images cater to the particular; her descriptions are sharp but filled with incessant insight and compassion for the people and places that inspire her writing.

She isn’t afraid to expose the sacrosanct moments of grief and vulnerability that most writers fail to appreciate, and for this she is highly revered. Didion is a unique model of the classic American writer because she is determined to achieve an understanding of social and cultural relationships in a writing style that is honorably her own. Her courage in willingly offering a piece of herself in her writing bares a product of contemporary journalism and memoir writing that is rare: the delicate truth.

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LYRICS

A SALUTE TO THE BEST

Associated Acts: Solo Artist, The Band, The Travelling Wilburys Best Album: Blood on the Tracks (Solo) Choice Quote: “You just kinda wasted my precious time

But don’t think twice, it’s all right.”

(“Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right”) Dylan is a great lyricist—anyone that says otherwise doesn’t deserve an opinion. Whine about his voice all you want, but give credit where credit’s due. Everyone knows the man’s got talent, but it’s a lot harder to pin down why his lyrics are so phenomenal.

Some would argue it’s his latent literary references (“Situations have ended sad/Relationships have all been bad/Mine’ve been like Verlaine’s and Rimbaud”). Others swear it’s his storytelling (“One of Us Must Know” is practically Hemingway). Many cite his structure (“Isis” follows the form of a Shakespearian sonnet), his unabashed statements of the obvious (“The hanging judge was sober/He hadn’t had a drink” or “When something’s not

BOB DYLAN ERIN HICKEY

right, it’s wrong”), his clever one-liners (“Don’t ask me nothing about nothing/I just might tell you the truth”), or his romantic edge (“My thoughts of you don’t ever rest/They’d kill me if I lie/I’d sacrifice the world for you and watch my senses die”). All of those aspects combine to make Dylan a brilliant lyricist, but what makes Dylan unique, what makes him the best, is the emotional response that his songs elicit. In fact, Dylan’s lyrics are best described by Dylan’s lyrics: “Every one of them words rang true/ and glowed like burning coals/Pouring off of every page/like it was written in my soul” Oh yeah, and he has a fucking Pulitzer.

Beat that, Morrisey.

LOU REED

Associated Acts: The Velvet Underground, Solo Career Best Album: The Velvet Underground and Nico Choice Quote: “Tongue of thongs, that belt does await you

strike, dear mistress, and cure his heart.”

(“Venus in Furs”)

VINCENT GIRIMONTE

You can’t write about Lou Reed without sounding flaccid, like a goddamn prom night failure, due in large part to his pal and mega-critic Lester Bangs’ ramblings from The Velvet Underground’s greenroom, at the end of a needle filled with New York gutter juice, we can assume.

And it’s that whole cool-guy syndrome, too: You can’t analyze lyrics about homosexuality, transvestites, drug-addiction, S&M (hooray “Venus in Furs”), and downright sorrow without sounding a little square. So be it, Lou, your band never sold anyway.

Associated Acts: Black Flag, Rollins Band, State of Alert Best Album: Damaged (Black Flag) Choice Quote: “Knowledge without mileage is bullshit to me.”

(Provoked with Henry Rollins)

Henry Rollins is as unlikely a man as you’re likely to ever find. He’s out of place in the punk world as he writes poetry and records grammy-winning spoken word albums, and he’s out of place in the intelligentsia crowd for his intense activism and easily-accessible sense of righteous rage. He began his career as a singer after storming the stage at a Black Flag concert shortly before their regular singer decided to devote himself to the guitar. On stage he was a monster, stalking back and forth and grinding his teeth at the crowd like a leashed animal. He would often appear in only shorts, and on several occasions would be physically assaulted by fans (to which he

And maybe that’s what made his lyrics so incendiary.

You must remember The Velvet Underground’s history was brief and remarkably un-lucrative. The band did manage to snag Andy Warhol as a pal, amounting long nights in The Factory and ultimately, Lou Reed leaving the band in 1970. He was never forced to cope with execs auditing his words, and when he did record a hit, the raunchiness was veiled and too clever for you and your friends, as was the case with “Walk on the Wild Side”—a song about a chick with a dick, essentially.

HENRY ROLLINS MATT DUPREE

would obligingly repay them). In his writing however, he was desperately poetic. Even in his memoir Get in the Van, which chronicled the meager existence that the band assumed during Rollins’ tenure, his exuberance for music and his soulful tenacity shines through. His novels, collectively known as the Black Coffee Blues trilogy, also detail his feelings of otherness, the tortured superhero fighting for the little guy, painfully aware of the little guy inside of all of us. Although he has since moved on to more direct forms of activism to address the issues his prose raised, his literary works still carry his hardcore aesthetic, and the deeper calling that set him apart.

ISAAC BROCK

Associated Acts: Modest Mouse, Ugly Casanova Best Album: The Lonesome Crowded West (Modest Mouse) Choice Quote: “I’m gonna look out the window of my color TV RYAN KOBANE

I wanna remember to remember to forget you forgot me.”

(“A Different City”) Isaac Brock has never professed to being an unhappy well you can mask misery with a fake smile Mr. Brock. individual; his lyrics have done a bang-up job of that for He isn’t a poet, but he does possess the uncanny ability the last decade or so. But when Isaac sings (or whatever to describe human emotion in a way that makes it imyou would like to call that thing he does) I listen. He forc- possible not to feel akin to. Isaac Brock is like that older, es you to peel back the layers of pop melodies and incom- alcoholic brother that still lives at home, but every time prehensible shouting before you can hear his delectably you go to him for advice he sobers up just long enough to user-unfriendly lyrics. drop some serious wisdom on you to the effect of, “The Accompanied by upbeat whistling and delicate guitar universe is shaped exactly like the earth, if you go straight in “The View” come the lyrics, “As life gets longer, awful long enough you’ll end up where you were.” Now who feels softer. Well it feels pretty soft to me. And if it takes couldn’t use a brother like that, I’m just saying. Just don’t shit to make bliss, then I feel pretty blissfully.” Oh how expect him to do it with a smile; he doesn’t like you.

UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

MUSIC NOISE BOYS ROCK STARS IN THEIR OWN WRITE RACHEL RUFRANO

W

hen was the last time you hurriedly flipped through a music magazine to read a critic’s recent ravings? When was the last time a critic made you laugh, made you feel violated, made you question the core of your being? Before the drooling robots of Pitchfork sensationalized mediocrity and gave two thumbs up to any artist as jaded as them or drained the joy and umbrage out of music altogether, there was Lester Bangs, Richard Meltzer, and Nick Tosches. First and foremost they were writers—critics only second. They shoved two fingers down the throat of rock ‘n’ roll and our gag reflex is still twitching today. Sure, they were alive during a seminal moment in music, but only barely. Somewhere between the love-doting hippies of the sixties and the sock-stuffed cashhappy seventies, there was an unadulterated era of visceral music glorified only through the languid words of this Holy Trinity of writers and the headphones of those who had the gall to really appreciate it.

Lester Bangs identified with rock music at an early age.

Claiming to be a “perennial misfit,” most of his peers, too young to latch onto Elvis Presley or Fabian, had become dubious of the progression of rock, and Bangs connected immediately with the introduction of The Beatles and The

Stones. In his high school newspaper he wrote, “The music of the future will capitalize on a blend of forms and cultural outlooks, mating every sort of diverse form to give birth to the greatest musical age the world has ever seen. Rock ’n’ roll—that enfant terrible, that ugly child, that bad noise, that raucous wilderness of amateurs grabbing a shifty buck, yes baby, rock ‘n’ roll has jumped up out of the manhole like the Shadow himself and bombed us all with its own brilliant musical innovators, and it’s about time we got the Black Mass and desert whirlwinds and northern lights and apocalyptic dragon fires back into the music of our time.”

It’s this idiosyncratic, unruly writing style, also evident in Tosches, and Meltzer’s reviews, that dubbed these critics “The Noise Boys”—rock stars in their own right. Before Rolling Stone converted their format to toilet paper, there was Creem magazine—a short-lived, tongue-in-cheek, sardonic music publication in Detroit that heralded the most audacious writers. Like the Beat writers from the previous generation, they fed off each other’s talent and challenged one another to be even more brazen than the month before.

This competition often involved Quaaludes, copious doses of cough syrup, and hard alcohol. They were thriving on a rock star’s diet and were just as passionate about the new style of writing as they were about a new brand of music. Like Townsend’s knuckles bleeding over his faithful guitar, The Noise Boys bled their own kind of music from a pen to paper. Having a superior opinion was never the point and there was nothing elitist about it. People read the trio’s mad ramblings for the way they expressed those opinions. The language was so dense that halfway through a sentence you may have lost the meaning altogether, but were floored nonetheless.

Tosches was born into the wrong era, usually writing

with nostalgia for a time that he never lived in—only for.

He was a jazz fan and a poet and you could hear it in his rhythmic writing style. He wrote about a performance

by Patti Smith, for Creem in 1978, “Patti Smith—who wreaks her poetry in the New Jersey voice and rattedhair rhythms which belong solely to those girls who, in the awful and mystic surety that there never was, is not, and never will be anything else to do, spend their dreams on violently nondescript boys who sit, like stains on the shirt of wonderment, endlessly drinking in bars with blue linoleum floors—is one of that scoundrel, immortal elite.”

Meltzer was the senior citizen who started writing for Crawdaddy! in 1967, and was clearly the most narcissistic of three. Most of his writings opened up with verbose rants in which he played the starring role. Even now, years after Bangs’ death, he asserts his individuality amongst the Creem threesome. In a recent interview, when asked how he felt about the public associating his writing with Bangs’, he said, “It’s funny. Lester was my friend and my buddy.

Me, Lester and Nick Tosches were like three drunken louts. But I never read all that much of his writing.”

How much of this is true, we may never know.

How much of anything The Noise Boys wrote was true, especially in lieu of the drug use and sensationalized success of rock critics, will also remain a mystery. Bangs has said, “I have always believed that rock ‘n’ roll comes down to myth. There are no ‘facts.’” This is the elusive aura of the greatest American writers to write almost exclusively about music. And to anyone who dares to follow in their footsteps, to anyone who is mauled, infected, and inspired by their maniacal rants, prepare to be left frothing at the mouth like a mad dog. They have captured the zeitgeist of an unparalleled generation better than anyone else ever will. The gospel of Noise has spoken.

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UNION WEEKLY

4/25/08

6:04:54 PM

7 MAY 2008

I

COMICS You’re STUCK Here! by Victor! Perfecto

Crayon Box by David Faulk

yourestuckhere@gmail.com

Crossword puzzles provided by BestCrosswords.com. Used with permission.

www.myspace.com/crayonboxbyfaulk

Across

OMKAR- The Barbarian by Travis Ott-Conn

Drunken Penguin Presents... by James Kislingbury

penguin.incarnate@gmail. com

1- Biblical abode of the dead 6- Nonsense 10- Attention-getter 14- Military chaplain 15- Capital city of Western Samoa 16- Purina competitor 17- Set straight 18- Take a break 19- Not strong 20- Short note 22- Croissant emporium, e.g.

24- Inert gas 25- West Indian musical style 26- Missing 29- Album unit 30- Heavy hammer 31- Self-taught person 37- Pack leader 39- Pinch 40- Sorrow 41- Domain subject to a suzerain 44- Vexation 45- Baseball glove 46- Dinner course 48- Toward the shore

52- Duo 53- Hinder 54- Absurd 58- Affirm solemnly 59- Public disturbance 61- Adversary 62- Bound 63- Poems, often used to praise someone or something 64- Lowest point 65- Catch sight of 66- Bouquet 67- Ignore

Down

1- Duration 2- Nimbus 3- Prepare a book or film for release 4- Cell organ 5- Pre-Easter 6- Member of the nobility 7- Amenable 8- Spanish ayes 9- Ribbon about the crown of a hat 10- Cunning 11- Bed down 12- Fights

13- Capital of Japan 21- Very small quantity 23- Chilly 25- Integrate 26- Latin I word 27- Capital of Azerbaijan 28- Egyptian canal 29- Episode 32- Join 33- Dogmatic 34- Banned apple spray 35- Central part 36- Family portrait?

38- Defense covering 42- Paradrop 43- 365 days 47- Creed of Christianity 48- Angry 49- One of the Leeward Islands 50- Precipitous 51- Sturdy 52- Scapegoat 54- Enemies 55- Basic monetary unit of Ghana 56- In the center of 57- Harp relative 60- Promising words

FEEDBACK!

e-mail editor Victor Camba: yourestuckhere@gmail.com Or drop off comments at the Union office Student Union Office 256a

ANSWERS Caramel>You by Ken C.

UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

CREATIVE ARTS A DRESS THAT PLAYS SEDUCTION LIKE A SAXOPHONE SLAM, BAM, THANK YOU MA’AM; SLAM POETRY BABY KATRINA SAWHNEY

I

f you’re of the camp that believes the best poetry has already been written, you must have missed salvation at Out Loud’s three-day run. The evening was one of a quick clip. It was a fast paced, tongue-tying, heart wrenching, passion orgy of energy that positively and in no uncertain terms oozed with sweet satisfaction.

Slam Poetry, is usually a team sport of the theatre persuasion, a heart-baring competition of performance poetry where the audience serves as judge. Not always embraced by the more stuffed shirt fellows of the poetry community, this once ugly step child of the creative world has found a cozy niche in the capable hands of our theatre department.

The poetry, both borrowed and brilliantly original was performed beautifully and with an impossible to ignore integrity. I had no idea what I was walking into, Slam Poetry was a tossed around term that I had only casually heard. I have come to know it as a pulsating art form that will knock the wind out of you.

The performance has elements of a musical without the larger than life exaggeration that often leads to the inevitable loss of dignity that is par for the course. Instead, the dance, song and word blends peacefully without forced transitions and fluidly translates to the raw and impromptu nature that is this new brand of jazz.

A jive woven by the fibers and brute of pure emotion composed of the finer points of Jewish summer camp’s sex ed, plums and their implications, the song of celery, messages on gum wrappers, love notes not sent and cheap whiskey with Bukowski.

Eric Morago was kind enough to share his perspective on performance poetry from the other side of the stage. He would be the one to ask, he wrote many of the poems he performed and a solid portion of those performed by his cast mates. This is not the juvenile attempts of an angst-ridden college student either, as a graduate student majoring in creative writing he shared that, “What you see here is a little different from what they teach.” And let me assure you, if this is what the creative writing training breeds, I like what

they’re brewing. So you may wonder what keeps someone coming back to such an athletic and tiring vein of poetry. Morago offers, “Human connection. I really believe this form of poetry is really the embodiment of that. I do it because I believe it’s important—it’s art.”

The slam poetry brigade has officially stolen the hearts of all who were lucky enough to enjoy their sincerity.

They had me at first shout, but I was sold at “she walks through my door in a dress that plays seduction like a saxophone.”

The snake answered by saying, “Yes… It is a race that has been set into motion—a race to discover the nature of man, which no animal can fully understand.

A Bobcat and Coyote tread this path alone.” These were two beautiful animals that pervaded still around the pods and hadn’t joined the Society of Death because they didn’t mind eating a little trash now and then.

“Why are there so many sets of footprints if only two animals have run by?” Asked Pren, looking up from the snake as a phantom rustling sound approached.

The Kingsnake continued humbly as his natural nervousness started to grow, “The Bobcat is Philosophy; the Coyote is Psychology. They have run the same path several times, each trying to win the right to explain what drives humans. There are many trails because…” and as he spoke, the two creatures, sleek and purposeful, bolted past, Bobcat and Coyote, matching each other’s footprints—like finger prints— in strides of tired, sinewy limbs, “… they and their administrators keep disqualifying races for this and

that reasons, adding conditions and artificial systems of interpreting the race.

“Most people agree in general that they’re working towards the truth, although no one knows when they will end their run. Some say it’s a pendulum; some say it is evidence that we create perfection rather than perfection creating us and that, while we think we are exploring new worlds, we are really inventing new worlds. But, all in all, no one seems too interested in the race anymore… I don’t know if they ever were.”

Then he slithered away through the dead leaves and small sprouting plants that were as bright green as the katydids under their soft, young leafs and petals. Snakes always feel uncomfortable in long conversations and would even rather avoid human contact all together. They avoided the pods as well, which were considered by most wild animals to be islands of meaning in the meaningless ocean that remains as big as the world.

Michaël Veremans UNION WEEKLY

7 MAY 2008

Photo

In a few days wandering through the wasteland that surrounds the pods, Pren found a place where someone—and not something—ancient had set a great race into motion. Pren had passed through the mountains of the east where he’d been able to see that the world was as big as the ocean, or bigger.

An immense, curving expanse that had clouds and water and pods and pods and pods littering the distance. But he turned from his view and walked into the forest that some podpeople only saw in their childhoods.

He eventually came to a wide clearing with a straight and narrow dirt road running perpendicular that he could see from some meters away. It was just a long stretch covered in mammalian paw prints and shodfur, disappearing into the trees in either direction.

Neither beginning nor end were within easy sight.

A Kingsnake coiled by the side of the track in the clearing and the sun shined down happily on his dark, banded scales. Pren asked the harmless snake, “Why is there a track here?”

courtesy of: Shout out loud

Podland Speagle Pt. 4: The Bobcat and the Coyote

17

CULTURE T

HUNTER S. THOMPSON

KATHY MIRANDA

Photo KATHY MIRANDA

he idea of a poetry festival was somewhat mystifying to me upon first listen. For some reason, I imagined what a festival commonly looks like: a row of booths covered with brightly colored tents, families hand in hand, and an arch of balloons with the sign “Orange County Poetry Festival” floating over me as I walk in. But instead, I walked into this festival and encountered a warm and mesmerized crowd keenly listening to the poetry of CSULB’s own professor, Paul Kareem Tayyar.

The festival celebrated authors from four independent presses, Tebot Bach, Moon Tide Press, World Parade Books, and West Coast Bias Press. I was delighted to hear the poetry of Long Beach’s own Gerald Locklin, former CSULB professor and celebrated poet (who is also highlighted in this issue’s feature), Donna Hilbert, graduate of Long Beach State and abovementioned CSULB professor Paul Kareem Tayyar, editor of World Parade Books. I appreciated each performance equally, as all the poets presented their own unique style of reciting, continuously leaving the audience anxious to hear more. If I had to choose one memorable moment, it would probably be Gerald Locklin, who single-handedly wooed the crowd with not only his genuine and humorous poetry but his vocal stylings and dance numbers, as well. I walked away from this festival with the insight and candor of a group of people that truly appreciated the arts, revealing a characteristic of poetry that often goes overlooked—genuine commitment and Paul Kareem Tayyar and Gerald Locklin. overwhelming admiration for the spoken word.

It’s difficult to tell what about Hunter S. Thompson is true and what is simply the product of mythical exaggeration or self-imposed distortion. Either way, he’s a character lesson in the American ideal and rugged individualism, and he’s the best guy ever.

Thompson was the consummate outsider: after being abandoned in jail by his rich friends, he was sent into the air force and floundered until becoming the sports editor for the air base’s newspaper. His highly erratic behavior kept him constantly in need of new employment, and his writing style became frantic: the product of his loose adherence to the truth and his trouble keeping up with deadlines. Eventually he started faxing torn pages of strange notes into his editors, and the gonzo ethic was born. His prose was electric, a resonant diatribe on the perils of polite society and the absurdity of it all. He categorically exposed the fallacies of the countercultural movement as well as the squares in his breakthrough Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.

But his message was never about despair; it was a celebration of individualism and freedom. And in a final bout of iconoclasm, he fired a bullet through his own head; leaving behind a typewriter with the word “counselor” typed on a sheet of paper and a suicide letter delivered to his wife four days earlier: “No More Games. No More Bombs. No more Walking. No More Fun. No More Swimming. 67. That is 17 years past 50. 17 more than I needed or wanted. Boring. I am always bitchy. No Fun—For anybody. 67. You are getting Greedy. Act your old age. Relax—This won’t hurt.” It was titled “Football Season Is Over.”

MATT DUPREE

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The Grunion

Volume 62 Issue 13

Disclaimer: This page is satire. We are not ASI, nor do we represent the CSULB campus. Send rags to EarlGrey@lbunion.com

Wednesday, May 7th 2008

LBUNION.COM

Facebook Profile Successfully Intellectualized with Addition of Oscar Wilde Quote

BY SKIP ENCARNACION GRUNION BLEEDING HEART

A still unnamed faculty member rallied for an epic Yankee steamer in the Brotman Hall bathroom (above).

MFA student Margaret Tanner (above) is all optimism about her career option after she graduates this year.

Poetry Student Looking Forward to Teaching Poetry to Poetry Students

BY EARL GREY GRUNION DEMAGOGUE As another Spring semester comes to a close, second year graduate students prepare to open a new chapter in their lives, and are faced with a number of difficult and exciting career decisions.

For Cal State Northridge MFA student Margaret Tanner, that number is two: Apply immediatley for a part time teaching positition, or take a year off in order to more thouroughly fail at publishing her own work before returning to teach.

“It’s really up in the air at this point,” said Tanner, who is about to receive her Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

“It would be smart to start the long and arduous tenure-track sooner rather than later, but it will also be nice to sit around

for a year, send out a poem here and there, build a good collection of rejection slips, you know, self-loathe for a while. I think I’ve earned that. ” Regardless of how she eventually gets there, Tanner is “looking forward” to eventually teaching poetry to poetry students, and hopes that these poetry students will learn the craft well enough to go on and teach poetry to other poetry students.

“I’d like to think I could make a difference. Maybe I will spawn a whole new generation of poetry teachers, who knows?”

Tanner’s masters thesis, a collection of prose poems entitled “A Collection of Prose Poems by Margaret Tanner” is on display for the next two weeks on the 2nd floor of the campus’ Language Arts building “It’s just a really exciting time for me.”

Despite rampant repetition within college networking websites, Billy Peters, a second-year international studies major, managed to successfully infuse a hint of culture to his otherwise pedestrian Facebook profile with an Oscar Wilde quotation.

“I just love his use of wit,” said the elated Peters after receiving comments, many yielding “mad props,” addressing the late-Victorian Irish writer’s masterful use of succinct humor and charm. “‘I can resist everything but temptation’ is just a brilliant commentary, you know? It’s me to the bone.”

Not an avid reader himself, Peters was looking for the subtle dose of class lacking just beneath his anemic “Favorite Books” section, in which he lists Chicken Soup For the Teenage Soul as vital for “getting through the shitty days.” He settled on Wilde’s remark due to its connection to the life of Peters’, self-described as lived near the edge.

When asked whether or not Wilde’s work had made an impression on his life, Peters was decidedly ambivalent.

“Truth be told, I found the quote from a Google search after typing in ‘witty quote,” said Peters. Delving further into his motivations, he admitted his desire to copulate with “those chicks down the hall listening

A little 19th century literature quotation can go a long way, especially in social networking sites, as is evident in Peters’ Facebook profile (above).

to Feist and shit like that.”

Candace Milkingtoots, a friend and fellow dorm-resident of Peters’, was delighted to see the Wilde quote on his page—the very same quote tattooed on the wings of a butterfly resting just about the curvature of her buttocks. “I don’t know Billy very well but he’s seems like one of those different guys,” mused Milkingtoots in her flannel pajamas, recalling Peters’ gentle disposition throughout a game of beer-pong.

In tandem with the Wilde quote’s revelation, Peters has moved to update his music section with lesser known bands, now including such acts as Vampire Weekend and Swedish singer-songwriter Jens Lekman.

After two weeks of considerable hiptitude, highlighted by his purchasing of a orginal scroll replica of Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Peters took down the quote upon the realization that Wilde “loved the cock,” which, according to Peters, “is fucking gay.”

INSIDE President Alexander Having Trouble Holding in Laughter at College of Liberal Arts Graduation Ceremony.

F. King Alexander is trying very hard not to burst into violent, unabashed laughter while giving his commencement speech to journalism students.

“Congratulations,” he says. “I hope you all put your [stifled chuckle] B.A. to, to good, ahem, to[cough] to good use. I’m sorry. I can’t. I just can’t do it.”

PAGE H8

Middle-Aged College Student Read 1984 Prior to 1984.

Sandra Grossberg, mother of three, recently pulled out her old edition of George Orwell’s distopian classic 1984. It was buried in a box in her garage along with ballet trophies, faded senior prom pictures, and PAGE O2 an asthma inhaler.

GRUN POLL WHAT ENGLISH MAJORS ARE DOING RIGHT NOW

Sleeping 47% Being Told By Their Father To Learn a Real Trade 9%

Applying To Bartending School 20%

Contextualizing 24%