Sailbourne

(Crossposted on Daily Kos and should appear on Facebook as well.)

As I write this, it looks like the BP – Deepwater Horizon oil spill may actually be coming to an end. The actual spillage, anyway. Despite the White House’s claim that three quarters of the oil spilled is now gone, the effects of this spill will last a very long time, and affect a countless number of lives in and around the Gulf of Mexico, and the whole world beyond. The ecology of the sea and the land around it has been changed, possibly forever, definitely not for the better.

I’ve been thinking for a few weeks that it would be worthwhile to put this incident into a greater context by telling the stories of other cases in our history of industrial disasters, toxic spills and mass pollutions. The truth is that nothing that’s happened in the Deepwater Horizon case is really new.

We’ve spilled it all before.

I’ve decided that before I start writing I would ask of anyone who is reading this: is it worthwhile? Would you be interested in finding out a little more about some past disasters, the lessons we could have learned from them, the motives that led to them which are not so different as those which inform BP’s actions before and after the Macondo well blew out? Or maybe someone’s already done this, and so there’s no need for me to cover that ground again. I admit, I think it would be great if that were the case.

Some of the incidents I’ve thought about covering:

• the molasses flood in Boston, January 1919: though it sounds like a joke, it killed more people than died aboard the Deepwater Horizon

the tragedy of Minamata, where a large corporation denied and covered up the truth of its deadly pollution for decades

• the toxic gas leak in Bhopal, December 1984: thousands died and the court cases drag on, one of them ending only this year

And plenty others besides. Sadly, there’s no shortage.

So please. Speak up in the comments and let me know what you think. Is it time for a history lesson?

“It seems no one reads Santayana any more. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be over there, getting drunk with the rest of the aliens.” — Susan Ivanova, Babylon 5

Got this one because someone thinks I’m a literary geek.  As I go through the questions, I’m beginning to wonder about that, I’m afraid … I’m only tagging folks I think might want to see my answers.  No one’s on the hook here — this took me forever to answer, so I won’t subject anyone else to the time sink. The original also said not to bother with italics … so I’m not.

1. What author do you own the most books by?
Strangely, I’m going to say Terrance Dicks.  We have a ton of Doctor Who novelizations.  Not counting that, probably Harlan Ellison.

2. What book do you own the most copies of?
As far as I know we only have multiple copies of one book at the moment: Conservatives Without Conscience by John W. Dean.

3. Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
Not in the least bit.  (Hearing Douglas Rain’s voice there.)

4. What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
At least three but none of them have been widely published as yet.

5. What book have you read the most times in your life?
Probably The Lord of the Rings.  With The Hot Zone a close second.

6. What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
The Enormous Egg, by Oliver Butterworth.

7. What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?
I haven’t read any books I’d consider genuinely bad in the past year, so I’ll take a pass on this question.

8. What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?
Don’t know if it’s the best, but Against All Enemies by Richard A. Clarke is probably the most important. And I definitely enjoyed reading it.

9. If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
I wouldn’t want to force anyone (because who would enjoy the book then?) but I think if you read either The Wild Trees by Richard Preston or Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson, you would not be disappointed.

10. Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I have no freaking clue.  Honestly I don’t read much of the literature that gets one awarded a Nobel Prize.

11. What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
The Wild Trees, by Richard Preston — but only if done as a documentary, not fictionalized.

12. What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
The Prisoner: Shattered Visage, by Dean Motter & Mark Askwith. This story does just fine in its original form, and some “franchises” should just be left alone.

13. Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
I’ve had a couple where the point of view shifted between myself playing an RPG and the actions of the characters in that game as it was being played. Pretty wild stuff.

14. What is the most lowbrow book you’ve read as an adult?
I have read a handful of Harlequin romance novels. For research. Seriously.

15. What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?
The Seidensticker translation of The Tale of Genji. Still working my way through it.

16. What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you’ve seen?
The ones I’ve seen are considered the most well-known ones.

17. Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
I haven’t read enough of either to fairly judge.

18. Roth or Updike?
Don’t think I’ve read any of either.

19. David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
I’ve had some Sedaris read to me, which I enjoyed a lot.

20. Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Shakespeare all the way. (Not that I’ve read a lot of Milton or Chaucer.)

21. Austen or Eliot?
I’ve read “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” … oh, I bet you meant George Eliot.  Haven’t read either.

22. What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
See answers to questions 17 – 21, above.

23. What is your favorite novel?
I can’t decide the answer to this. I’ve tried. I just can’t.

24. Play?
The Zoo Story, by Edward Albee. Stumbled on it by chance in high school, didn’t understand it at all then, but was blown away anyway. After having seen it performed once, and having read it a few dozen more times, I think I’m finally beginning to get my head around it.

25. Poem?
I think there would have to be at least ten of these. So for today let’s say: Grass, by Carl Sandburg.

26. Essay?
You, Too Can Speak Gaelic, by Isaac Asimov. Everything I know about pronouncing long scientific names comes from there. First runner-up: The chapter about Hillsborough in Fever Pitch, by Nick Hornby.

27. Short story?
A Quantum of Solace, by Ian Fleming. A James Bond story in which Bond is nothing more than the listener of a tale related by someone else — this story makes some very insightful points about human relationships.

28. Work of nonfiction?
The Hot Zone, by Richard Preston.  It’s approaching LOTR for the book I’ve read the most times, and it still manages to scare the snot outta me.

29. Who is your favorite writer?
Joe Medina.

30. Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
J.K. Rowling.

31. What is your desert island book?
Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast trilogy.

32. And… what are you reading right now?
Thank You, Mr. Moto by John P. Marquand; The Secret Life of Houdini: the Making of America’s First Superhero, by William Kalush and Larry Sloman; Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II by John W. Dower; several RPG rulebooks

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This was one of the three quotations on Google’s Quote of the Day gadget today:

Everywhere I go I’m asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don’t stifle enough of them. There’s many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.
- Flannery O’Connor

Never were more apt words spoken in the age of Twilight.

I am not a violent person, but if I hear one more gush about the books or the movie, I’ll break something.  If I see one more clip from the movie with dialogue that would make Ed Wood say, “Uhm, not so sure that’s gonna fly,” I am going to scream.

No, I haven’t read the books.  No, I won’t.  I’ve seen enough reviews from a wide enough variety of people, and seen enough passages from the book excerpted in those reviews, to know that I’d be wasting my time and raising my blood pressure for no good reason.  The only reason I can see for bothering would be to know how not to write bad romance.  And I have read enough other bad romance to already know what to avoid.

My advice to the Twilight junkies: Go read Chelsea Quinn Yarbro‘s Saint-Germain books.  You’ll get vampires that can walk in daylight (without sparkling!), amazingly researched and historically accurate settings, romance that is rooted in the way people really relate to each other, and horror that has a lot more to do with what human beings are capable of doing to one another than anything else.

Please.

“People do not deserve good writing, they are so pleased with bad.”
–Ralph Waldo Emerson

Seems like this quote, which illustrates one of the things the union is up against, is about as close as I can get, for the moment, to showing my solidarity with the hardworking folks of the Writers Guild of America. Stand strong!

I had a rather unusual experience today. I was spreading out newspapers to carve our Halloween pumpkin and the spread was on the obituary page for about ten days ago. Along with the standard form listings, there were a number of display ads, placed as memorials to folks who have gone, sometimes a year or more ago. I was just struck by how much was really said, not only about the person who is gone, but those left behind who placed the ads.

Here was one:

In Memory of My Beloved Son
Jason Edward Alan Aldritt
Dec. 5, 1974-Oct. 19, 2003

Beloved son you were a kind, gentle, and generous young spirit, whose heart and soul had been shattered. Your world had become a place of torment and despair. Anger and fear had taken up residence in your mind and your heart was not strong enough to see the deception. You lost the battle against self-condemnation. You accepted everyone for who they were, even their darkside, but you couldn’t show or feel the same leniency towards your own shortcomings. You chose to live in silent desperation without anyone understanding the depth of your despair. Forgive us, and especially me, beloved son, for not giving you enough love and strength to overcome your demons. I continue to welcome our dream-time together and in quiet sorrow, impatiently wait for the time when my broken heart will be mended upon our meeting in Nirvana, when joy will once again reign.

With Much Love,
Mom

And then, telling a very different story:

RAYMOND A. TOWN, JR.
November 13, 1932 – October 19, 2001

SCENE: A stag party in 1955 at a Grange Hall, deep in remote Clackamas County. Someone at the poker table shouts, “RAID!”, and out the ladies restroom window we go. Whew, just made it!

NEXT DAY: Four inch headlines in Oregon Daily Journal Newspaper, “CLACKAMAS STAG PARTY RAIDED.” Drat, there we are on the front page … we forgot about the sign-in sheet at the door.

PENANCE: Twenty three years old and grounded by our parents.

Everlasting Memories, Bud.

I was just so struck … these are real people, with real stories. So much more real than what passes for “reality” programs on TV. I’m beginning to wonder if there isn’t a book in here, somewhere …

A few days ago I decided I’ll try my hand at the National Novel Writing month project, after Ali pointed it out. I’ve got it narrowed down to four ideas that I think I could have a go at, and I’d be curious to hear from any of you about which might be the best one.

So here’s what I have, working title and very short synopsis.

My dreams have been getting kind of weird lately. I finally decided to capture a couple of them and some of the feelings they’ve evoked in a poem, which I posted up on Poetry.com. If you’d like to read it, you can do a name search on Jamie Lawson and then click on the title, “Forever Dying, Long Since Dead.” As you will see, there are quite a few Jamie Lawsons on the site, and even two other Jamie L. Lawsons. Go figure.

As you might guess from the title, it’s pretty grim, so if you’re not in the mood to deal with that sort of thing, please feel free to skip it — you won’t hurt my feelings.

But I think I do feel better for having written it and gotten those feelings to the outside.