A True International Language

For the past month almost everything once stored in our basement has been stacked in every conceivable corner

and open space in our house. The reason is that my husband and I are having the basement finished. I am sure we had good reasons for start-ing this project, but as I see the fine white dust lofting up the steps from the drywall sanding and we sit here in the heat with the air condition-er turned off so the dust doesn’t get sucked up into the duct work, I am begin-ning to have my doubts. I’ll feel better when the work is finished, but for now the basement belongs to the construction crew. It is a very interesting interna-tional group made up of American, Chinese, Korean, Mexican, and Russian craftsmen.

When the first chorus of power saws and the staccato beat of nail guns began, I wondered how the plans my husband put on paper would translate into reality as they passed through so many languag-es. On my trips to the basement to monitor progress, I heard and witnessed communications that re-minded me of music: a basic melo-dy of English intermixed with Chi-nese and Spanish nouns and verbs, punctuated by repeated pointing to the blueprints and quick drawings

Dr. Jian Leng

cities as Porto, Portugal; Helsinki; Paris; Tel Aviv; Hanoi; and Trond-heim, Norway. So this summer we explored the impact of jazz abroad by examining accounts of American jazz musicians who toured in other countries, as well as investigating jazz’s impact in two countries with very different histories: Georgia in Eastern Europe and Japan in East-ern Asia. Although we had several magnificent performances during the 2007 Institute (e.g., the Greg Osby Quartet and Red Holloway),

our international empha-sis culminated in the first International Jazz Night at the Jazz at the Bistro venue. International Jazz Night was a huge success. Still, for some in the audience who wandered into the Bistro unaware, hearing what is

considered to be a truly American art form coming from musicians who barely speak English or do not speak it at all must have come as a bit of a surprise. Although the visit-ing musicians might have struggled with the words, they did not suf-fer any anxiety about musical au-thenticity. They are aware of jazz’s origins, but they see jazz as a form or style that is as democratic as the American ideal.

on scrap pieces of wood and dry-wall. Their communication, evolved from a mixture of languages and gestures, became a kind of creole serving as the primary language of the crew. For me, in fact, it was like a jazz tune where the different parts of the languages became mu-sical instruments that would blend in and then take off on their own during episodes of communication. And like a jazz band, the individual workmen sometimes took off on their own, offering improvisations

on the basic plan, such as creating a feature wall to hide HVAC ducts, changing the design of a soffit, or shifting the way the lighting works. Of course, I was predisposed to see things this way.

The Center for the Humanities at Washington University in St. Louis held a repeat version of its 2005 NEH Summer Institute, “Teach-ing Jazz as American Culture” this summer, and one of the new topics was the impact of jazz abroad. Jazz, as musician Carlos Núñez noted, is becoming a sort of musical Esperan-to, a universal musical language be-ing taught in conservatories in such

September 2007 | Vol. VI No. 1

They are aware of jazz’s origins, but they see jazz as a form or

style that is as democratic as the American ideal.

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The Japanese musicians, Satoko Fujii (piano) and Natsuki Tamura (trumpet), a couple who split their time between To-kyo and New York, opened the evening. Their style of avant-garde jazz is intense, extreme, and unpredictable (as unpredict-able as Ms. Fujii’s English, such as when she described the last piece in their set as a “nightmare”). Satoko Fujii wrote many of the compositions and they were full of surprises, with sudden shifts in direction and mood that challenge the listener. Sa-toko Fujii often stands up and plucks or hammers the strings in the body of the piano or crashes her forearm across the keys with an explosive free-jazz energy. Natsuki Tamura uses the trumpet with a mute for growling noises as much as for the sweet brass sounds most of us expect from the instrument. If jazz is an interna-tional language, then this kind of jazz is a very abstract dialect that requires one’s full attention (my husband compared it to reading Hegelian philosophy).

The musicians from the former Soviet Republic of Georgia, Tamaz Kurashvili and Zurab Ramishvili, played a more familiar, straight-ahead form of jazz. Tamaz Kurashvili is one of the most distinguished jazz musicians in the post-Soviet states. He was probably the best

double bass player in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe during the

1970s and ’80s. During the late Stalinist period, the Soviet gov-

ernment banned the playing of American jazz. In fact, it was not until the demise of the Iron Curtain that he was able to travel abroad, performing in Western Eu-rope, Japan, and the United States. Zurab Ramishvili has played piano in the major jazz clubs of Vienna, Munich, and Mon-treaux.

They do not speak English, so their performance was a tight, well-rehearsed set with pieces that were easy to recog-nize, like Duke Ellington’s “In a Senti-mental Mood” or Johnny Green’s “Body and Soul.”

The Georgian musicians’ performance had an added dimension: they came to St. Louis without a drummer. Gene Dobbs Bradford, executive director of Jazz at the Bistro, recommended a young local drummer, Alfonzo Jones, to fill in for the performance. I could not imagine a more difficult situation than to join two estab-lished musicians who do not speak your language and have but one rehearsal just two hours before the show. But Alfonzo Jones blended in and stood out as though he had been playing with these Georgian jazz artists for years. When Gerald Early, director of the Center for the Humanities and project director of the NEH grant funding the Summer Institute, congratu-lated him after the show, young Mr. Jones said simply, “It wasn’t that hard; jazz is an international language.”

If the United States is going to be re-sponsible for an international language, then I think music is a more eloquent offering than Coca-Cola or McDon-alds. But we need to be ready for the pos-sible outcomes of such openness when we speculate on the future of jazz. Worthy successors to Louis Armstrong or John Coltrane might be improvising in a club in Georgia or Tokyo right now. And while they may not be fluent in English, they will be confident in their mastery of this international language—jazz.

editor’s notes continued

Make a Gift to The Center For The Humanities

oin with other donors and supporters to ensure that the Center for the Humanities can

continue to fulfill its mission. Help us continue to make the humanities a part of public life and yours.

Send your check, payable to Washington University, to:The Center for the Humanitiesc/o Shannon MacAvoy GrassWashington University in St. LouisCampus Box 1210One Brookings DriveSt. Louis, MO 63130-4899

J

Courtesy of Joe Angeles/WUSTL

Jian LengAssociate Director

The Center for the Humanities

Wilfrid Sheed, The House That George Built: With a Little Help from Irving, Cole, and a Crew of about Fifty

Random House, 2007, 335 pages includ-ing index, with photos

I’ d be very upset by this if I wasn’t so busy right now. – – George Gershwin, about either a busted romance or learning he had an inoperable brain tumor.

I have become noted, in my exquisite obscurity, for having said in not one but two Ken Burns documentaries (Jazz and Baseball) that in some distant future the United States of America will be remem-bered for three things: the Constitution, jazz music, and baseball. (Perhaps I even said it in that order.) Of course, to some degree I was misunderstood, as some-one might expect to be making a grand pronouncement of that sort that is taken more seriously than it should be. As I re-member distinctly the grueling interview that produced this deathless insight about American culture, at the moment when I said “jazz,” I did not mean what many people assumed I meant: Miles Davis, Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane, Lee Morgan, Chet Baker, Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, et al. (Not that I am opposed to those people being remembered; they damn well should be in a world that is worthy of their art.) What I really had in mind was Ella Fitzgerald, Anita O’Day, Billie Holiday, Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong, et al. sing-ing popular songs. In fact, in the inter-view, I had wanted to say “popular songs,” or even “popular music,” instead of “jazz.” But I changed my mind in the instant of utterance. Somehow, it seemed more suc-cinct to say “jazz” and, as it were, more American, as the word covered, more or less, what I wanted to say by being, para-doxically, more vague and more specific.

Wilfred Sheed solved the problem for me nicely in his new book, The House That George Built by referring to “jazz songs,” which is exactly the term I should have used instead of “jazz music” or, simply, “jazz.” In other words, what I meant was that in the distant future, Charlie Park-er’s virtuosic set of chord permutations on Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm” will al-most certainly not be remembered, stun-

ning as it is, but “I Got Rhythm” will be. One isn’t hummable; the other is. Sheed pointed out that English music critic Ben-ny Green, who once wrote liner notes of varying quality and no small pretension for Norman Granz’s Pablo Records, dis-dained the term “jazz song” because, as Sheed put it for Green, “jazz is a process, something you do to music, not the mu-sic itself.” This is a bit of nonsensical hair-splitting: jazz is both something you do to music and the music you get once you’re done. Jazz is a technique, content, and a theory. But jazz, as well, is even more importantly an attitude, a sensibility, a sense of life in a free land conceived by people on the margins who were cynical enough to know that nothing is free, least of all playing jazz, in this money-grubbing country of smarmy confidence men, cut-throat thieves, and self-deluded, compul-sive liars. But jazzers were also hopeful enough to realize that being free is the most compelling thing worth expressing about human life in this God-kissed land of possibility, and rebirth. In the cultural marriage of black and white in America that became known as American popular music, defined in its most simplistic terms, blacks, including their middle class as well as their hoi polloi, brought the jazz (swing, drive, and a clear-eyed, existential detach-ment that became a style of defiance). Whites (particularly, though far from ex-clusively, Jews), brought the 32-bar Tin Pan Alley song (wit, irony, conciseness, and romantic bourgeois convention that became both an expression of conformity and a form of sophistication). From this

union, twentieth-century popular culture was born, or at least a major part of it. The odd (blacks and Jews) got even.

For those familiar with Tin Pan Alley, Sheed writes about the usual suspects, and his book follows a historical arc start-ing with Irving Berlin (1888–1989) and George Gershwin (1898–1937), the two cornerstones upon whom the house of the popular song as we know it today was built. He then proceeds to figures like Harold Arlen (1905–1986), Cole Porter (1891–1964), Jerome Kern (1885–1945), and Richard Rodgers, who, together with Gershwin and Berlin, would form some-thing like Les Six of the American Popular Song. It is impossible to conceive of the Broadway and Hollywood musical with-out these men, from On Your Toes to Kiss Me Kate to Annie, Get Your Gun, and it is nearly impossible to think of jazz, from the Swing era on, without them, as they wrote most of the tunes that constitute the classic jazz repertoire that literally gave the jazz improviser his or her chords—“Begin the Beguine,” “I Get a Kick Out of You,” “Blues in the Night,” “Love for Sale,” “I Got Rhythm,” “Dearly Beloved,” “My Favorite Things,” “I’m Old Fashioned,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” “That Old Black Magic,” “Out of This World,” “Get Happy,” “My Funny Valentine,” “Be-witched, Bothered, and Bewildered,” “It’s Only a Paper Moon,” “Summertime,” and “How Deep Is the Ocean.” Sheed’s book covers some lesser known composers like Harry Warren (1893–1981), who wrote songs exclusively for Hollywood films and worked like a machine pumping out tunes like “Lullaby of Broadway,” “Shuffle Off to Buffalo,” “I Only Have Eyes for You,” “Lulu’s Back in Town,” “You’re My Every-thing,” and “There Will Never Be Another You.” Warren had the dubious pleasure of going to Broadway via Hollywood rather than the other way ’round when his 42nd Street (1933) started out as a film and then went to the Great White Way. There are strong chapters on Jimmy Van Heusen (what a gorgeous pseudonym!), (1993–1990)—who wrote songs for Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra including “It Could Happen to You,” “Like Someone in Love,” and “Darn That Dream”—and Hoagy

book of the month by Gerald Early

Carmichael (1899–1981), the Indiana jazz baby who got a law degree but never prac-ticed, who wrote such tunes as “Stardust” and “Georgia,” who appeared in a few movies, who was used by Ian Fleming as the physical model for James Bond, and who was caricatured in the first episode of the second season of the Flintstones, to the utter bewilderment of the children who watched the show. I know, because I was one of them. (Who the heck is Hoagy Car-michael?) The book concentrates mostly on composers. The only lyricist who gets considerable treatment is Johnny Mercer (1909–1976), although lyricists are talked about extensively throughout the text. I personally would have preferred a bit more on Nacio Brown (1896–1964) and Arthur Freed (“Singin’ in the Rain”) and a lot more on Betty Comden and Adolph Green (On the Town), (1914–2002).

But in thinking about the jazz song as a miscegenated art, there is a sense of imbal-ance in the book. Duke Ellington (1899–1974) is the only black songwriter men-tioned, and he seems almost shoehorned into the text because he was not, in truth, a Tin Pan Alley writer or even primarily a songwriter. Indeed, Sheed’s account of the Cotton Club is more useful for what it says about Harold Arlen and Jimmy McHugh, who both wrote music for the shows there, than for what it says about Ellington. In part, the problem arises because there is no historical account given of blacks as songwriters, no mention of James Wel-don (1871–1938) and Rosamund John-son (1873–1954), who wrote probably the most revered of all African American songs, “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” among their other work. James Weldon, along with Bob Cole, wrote “Under the Bamboo Tree,” which Judy Garland sang in Meet Me in St. Louis (1945). There was a thriv-ing black songwriting industry in New York in the 1890s and the early 1900s that featured the work of people like the John-son brothers, Bob Cole (1868–1911), Will Marion Cook (1869–1944) in Broadway shows (yes, blacks were on Broadway be-fore the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s) that starred Bert Williams and George Walker. Fats Waller (1904–1943) and Andy Razaf (1895–1973) get honorable

mention in an appendix, but they deserved a chapter. Razaf was as much a character as anyone who wrote popular songs back during the days of Tin Pan Alley, hav-ing the distinction of being the offspring of crowned royalty (the Queen of Mada-gascar) and having written the anthem for black nationalist Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Associa-tion, as well as “What Did I Do (To Be So Black and Blue)” and “Ain’t Misbehavin’” with Fats Waller. There is no mention in Sheed’s book when speaking of the nine-teenth-century popular song of composer James Bland (1854–1911), who wrote “O Dem Golden Slippers,” “In the Evening by the Moonlight” (frequently performed in the 1950s by Nina Simone), and “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny.”

Despite this shortcoming there is much to learn from reading Sheed’s book, some of which should be emphasized: that most of the men who wrote the great popular songs came from middle-class, urban backgrounds, received considerable for-mal training in music, had the instincts and compulsions of autodidacts, were gen-erally supported by their families in their ambitions, worked incredibly hard and often under considerable pressure, played golf and the ponies, and swapped creative partners frequently. It is wonderfully in-spiring just to get a peek into this slightly crazed culture of art-making against the odds; the chances that a song will succeed are slim.

Composer and songwriter Alec Wilder’s American Popular Song: The Great Inno-vators, 1900–1950, published in 1972, is the definitive, most comprehensive work

on the Great American Songbook, as it is called, that collective body of the best songs composed for Broadway, Holly-wood, and the Hit Parade from the 1910s through the end of World War II. The second best book on the subject is Max Wilk’s They’re Playing Our Song, originally published in 1973 and revised in 1986. It might be damning with faint praise to say that Sheed’s The House That George Built is the third-best book and, frankly, it may not even be that, but it is enjoyable, in-formative, well-written, engaging, and intelligent—a personal memoir combined with an elegy, another lament, alas, about mutability and metamorphosis. (How doth change the public’s taste/Dull’d senses charmed by perfumed waste) In fairness to Sheed, he does, in his chapter on Jimmy Van Heusen, warn against too much belief in a Golden Age: “You can’t receive all your inspiration from listening to old records; it’s like receiving your fresh air in cans.” The House That George Built is sweet without being cloying or sentimen-tal. It is good ole fogeyism.

It would be best for readers who know little about the American popular song to first read Wilk (oral history) and Wilder (history and analysis) because, though Sheed’s work is biographical and histori-cal, it is also idiosyncratic and probably a bit too essayistic for those that want a strict and detailed account of names and dates. But Sheed’s book is a nice comple-ment to the others just for the sheer love he displays for this music and for the in-sight that his affection for it has granted him. Great songs, of course, continue to be written. Since the 1950s we have had such songwriters as Smokey Robinson, Burt Bacharach, Lennon and McCartney, Jimmy Webb, Lauryn Hill, Paul Simon, Carole King, Elvis Costello, Gamble and Huff, Stevie Wonder, Sting, and Bjork, to name only a very few. And if a good deal of popular music seems bad today, remem-ber that a good deal was bad in the 1930s too. And what is good today is as good as anything that has come before. As the Gershwins wrote for their show, A Damsel in Distress, “The Age of Miracles hadn’t passed,” and it still hasn’t.

George Gershwin, p.38

Additions to the Library of the Center for the Humanities

Thanks to our donors, our library con-tinues to grow. We have added to several of our unique collections. Here is a par-tial list of some of the additions:

Comic Art Books

Little Nemo 1905–14, by Winsor McCayComplete color reproduction of the entire run of Little Nemo strips

Complete 3-volume set of Frontline CombatColor reproductions of EC Comics innovative war comic book series from the early 1950s

The Adventures of Tintin: Prisoners of the Sun

The Adventures of Tintin: The Seven Crystal Balls

The DC Comics Rarities Archives, Volume 1Color reproductions of the New York World’s Fair Comics series from 1939 to 1940 and the 128-page Big All-American Comic Book #1 (1944), featuring superheroes such as Won-der Woman, the Flash, Hawkman, Green Lantern, Johnny Thunder, the Atom, and Mr. Terrific

The Black Canary Archives, Volume 1Color reproduction of early Black Canary comics, woman superhero

Batman: The Dailies, 1945–46Complete compilation of the daily Batman newspaper strips from 1945 to 1946

Batman: The Dailies, 1943–44Complete compilation of the daily Batman newspaper strips from 1943 to 1944

Superman: The Dailies, 1939–40Complete compilation of the daily Superman newspaper strips from 1939 to 1940

Superman: The Dailies, 1940–41Complete compilation of the daily Superman newspaper strips from 1940 to 1941

Superman: The Sunday Classics 1939–43Complete compilation of the color Superman Sunday strips from 1939 to 1943

Batman: The Sunday Classics 1943–46Complete compilation of the color Batman Sunday strips from 1943 to 1946

The Plastic Man Archives, Volume 2Color reproductions of classic Plastic Man comics

The Plastic Man Archives, Volume 3More color re-productions of classic Plastic Man comics

The Plastic Man Archives, Volume 4More color repro-ductions of classic Plastic Man com-ics

The Wonder Woman Archives, Volume 1Color reproductions of the earliest Won-der Woman comics

The Wonder Woman Archives, Volume 2More color reproductions of early Wonder Woman comics

The Wonder Woman Archives, Volume 3More color reproductions of early Wonder Woman comics

The Wonder Woman Archives, Volume 4More color reproductions of early Wonder Woman comics

Mary Marvel Fanzine #1, #2, #4, #5Color reprints of some Mary Marvel classic 1940s stories

Children’s Films on DVDsDisney’s The Little MermaidWhale RiderDisney’s Mary Poppins (2-disc set)Disney’s Snow White (2-disc set)Disney’s Greyfriar’s BobbyThe Little Princess (with Shirley Temple)Walt Disney, Mickey Mouse in Black and

White (2-disc set)Walt Disney, Mickey Mouse in Living

Color (2-disc set)Walt Disney, Silly Symphonies (2-disc set)Walt Disney, The Complete Goofy (2-disc

set))Disney’s Lilo and StitchNancy Drew Movie Mystery CollectionThe YearlingDisney’s NewsiesThe Flintstones, The Complete First SeasonThe Flintstones, The Complete Second

SeasonJonny Quest, The Complete First SeasonDisney’s The Black CauldronDisney’s Old Yeller (2-disc set)Disney’s Alice in Wonderland

(2-disc set)

the extra

st. louis literary calendarEvents in September

All events are free unless otherwise indicated. Author events are followed by signings. All phone numbers take 314 prefix unless indicated.

Saturday, September 1LBB presents Richard Michelson, prize-win-ning poet and children’s book author, who will discuss and sign his book, Across the Alley. 7pm, Congregation Kol Am, 1023 Chesterfield Parkway East, 367-3731.

Thursday, September 6Border’s Book Club will meet to discuss Wel-come to the World, Baby Girl by Fannie Flagg. 7pm, Borders–Sunset Hills, 10990 Sunset Hills Plaza, 909-0300.

Observable Readings presents Tony Trigilio, editor of the poetry journal Court Green and au-thor of The Lama’s English Lessons, and Allison Funk, author of The Knot Garden. 8pm, Schlafly Bottleworks, 7260 Southwest Ave., 241-2337.

SLPL will hold a discussion of Ordinary He-roes by Scott Turow. 2pm, SLPL–Indian Trails Branch, 8400 Delport Dr., 428-5424.

Saturday, September 8St. Louis Writers Guild will host a workshop featuring Dwight Bitikofer, poet and publisher of the Webster-Kirkwood Times. Free for SLWG members; $5 charge for nonmembers. 10am, B&N Crestwood, 9618 Watson Rd., 821-3823.

Monday, September 10Edwardsville Public Library is open to anyone who wants to write. Bring your laptop, record-able storage, or other writing materials 6–8pm. Meeting Room, 112 S. Kansas St., Edwardsville, IL, 618-251-4063.

Join the debut of SLCL-Grand Glaize’s Book Bunch, an adult evening book club. The first se-lection is Great Santini by Pat Conroy. Registra-tion required. 7pm, SLCL–Grand Glaize Branch, Meeting Room 1, 1010 Meramec Station Rd., 636-225-6454.

Tuesday, September 11LBB presents Jack Hurst, journalist and author, who will discuss and sign his book Men of Fire: Grant, Forrest, and the Campaign that Decided the Civil War. 7pm, Left Bank Books, 399 N. Eu-clid, 367-3731.

St. Louis Writers Guild hosts an open mic night. 7–9pm, Wired Coffee, 3860 S. Lindbergh Blvd., 821-3823.

SLCL– Sachs Branch’s As the Page Turns book discussion group will discuss Master Butcher’s Singing Club by Louis Erdrich. 7pm, Adults Audi-torium, SLCL–Samuel C. Sachs Branch, 16400 Burkhardt Pl., 636-728-0001.

Wednesday, September 12LBB presents Sheldon Culver and John Dorhauer, progressive ministers and authors of Steeplejacking: How the Christian Right Is Hi-jacking Mainstream Religion, who will discuss and sign their book. 7pm, Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, 367-3731.

SLCL–Bridgeton Trails’ Book Discussion Group II will discuss 84 Charing Cross Road by Helen Hanff. New participants are welcome. 11am, SLCL–Bridgeton Trails Branch, 3455 McKelvey Rd., 291-7570.

UCPL presents “Let’s Talk about It: Modern Marvels—Jewish Adventures in the Graphic Novels,” focusing on The Quitter by Harvey Pekar. 7pm, University City Public Library, 6701 Delmar Blvd., 727-3150.

Thursday, September 13St. Charles Community College’s English De-partment & Student Activities hosts a coffeehouse open mic. 7–9pm, Social Sciences Bldg. Audito-rium, 4601 Mid Rivers Mall Dr., 636-922-8407.

LBB presents Wade Rouse, memoirist and au-thor of Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler, who will discuss and sign his book. 7pm, Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, 367-3731.

SLCL–Indian Trails Branch’s Murder of the Month book club invites all to join its discussion of Hard Evidence by Barbara D’Amato. 3:30pm, SLCL–Indian Trails Branch, 8400 Delport Dr., 428-5424.

Harvey Toons: The Complete Collection (4-disc set)

Rocky and Bullwinkle: The 1st Complete Season (4-disc set)

Rocky and Bullwinkle: The 2nd Complete Season (4-disc set)

The Polar Express (2-disc set)The Wizard of OzThe Iron GiantDisney’s DumboDisney’s Bambi (2-disc set)Disney’s The Lady and the Tramp (2-disc

set)Hoodwinked

This is a small sampling of some of our new material. In support of our children’s studies minor, we have not only launched our children’s film collection but have greatly increased our collection of chil-dren’s books, adding more than sixty this summer alone. As a result of our 2007 NEH Summer Institute for schoolteach-ers, “Teaching Jazz as American Culture,” we have greatly increased our holdings in jazz, including children’s books dealing with jazz and a number of Hollywood films and documentaries addressing the subject in some form or fashion. Among the rare and unusual films we have are Shirley Clarke’s The Connection, about drug-addicted jazz musicians and which starred actual jazz musicians, and her ultra-rare film about street gangs in Har-lem, The Cool World, with a soundtrack by Dizzy Gillespie.

It is impossible to list all the new ma-terial we have, although we will provide regular updates in these pages. If you re-ally want to learn about the library, we welcome visitors, so stop by. Please come in between 8:30 am and 5:00 pm and take a look. The library is open to the public. Some material is available for lending to the members of the Washington Univer-sity community upon request.

the extra continued...

st. louis literary calendar

SLPL–Carpenter Branch’s That’s Debatable! book discussion group meets every second Thursday of the month for a discussion of cur-rent political issues. September’s title is Lock-out: Why America Keeps Getting Immigration Wrong When Our Prosperity Depends on Get-ting It Right by Michele Wucker. 7pm, SLPL–Carpenter Branch, 3309 South Grand Blvd., 772-6586.

Friday, September 14SLCL presents St. Louis native Jonathan Fran-zen, who will discuss his new book, The Dis-comfort Zone: A Personal History. 7pm, SLCL–Headquarters Branch, 1640 S. Blvd., 367-3731.

Saturday, September 15Missouri Romance Writers hosts USA Today best-selling author and educator Julie Beard, who will discuss applying basic journalism tech-niques for book research and creating well-rounded characters. 11am, B&N Crestwood, 9618 Watson, 843-9480.

Monday, September 17River Styx’s popular reading series begins its 33rd exciting season, featuring poets Lawer-ence Raab and Chelsea Rathburn. 7:30pm, Duff’s Restaurant, 3547 Olive St., 533-4541.

SLCL–Thornhill Branch’s Thornbirds book group will discuss Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier. 2pm, SLCL–Thornhill Branch, 12863 Willowyck Dr., 878-7730.

Tuesday, September 18LBB presents Sophie Gee, Princeton profes-sor and author of Scandal of the Season, who will discuss and sign her book. 7pm, Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, 367-3731.

SLPL presents award-winning fiction writer Junot Díaz, who will discuss and sign his book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. 7pm, SLPL–Schlafly Branch, 225 N. Euclid, 367-3731.

SLCL –Bridgeton Trails Book Discussion Group will meet to discuss Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier. New participants are encour-aged to join. 7–8pm, SLCL –Bridgeton Trails Branch, 3455 McKelvey Rd., 291-7570.

Wednesday, September 19The UMSL MFA Program and the Center for the Humanities present noted fiction writers Jaimee Wriston Colbert, reading from her new collection, Dream Lives of Butterflies, and Glad-ys Swan, reading from her new collection, A Garden amid Fires. 7–9 pm, Gallery 210, UMSL, 44 East Drive, One University Blvd., 516-6845.

LBB presents Alexander Enders, who will dis-cuss and sign his book Bride Island. 7pm, Left Bank Books, 399 N. Euclid, 367-3731.

SLPL–Carpenter Branch’s African American Book Discussion-Works of Urban Writers will discuss All the King’s Horses by Sebastian Cheney. 7pm, SLPL–Carpenter Branch, 3309 South Grand Blvd., 772-6586.

Thursday, September 20SLCL presents political writer John Dean, who will discuss and sign his book Broken Govern-ment: How Republican Rule Destroyed the Leg-islative, Executive, and Judicial Branches. 7pm, SLCL –Headquarters Branch, 1640 S. Lindbergh Blvd., 367-3731.

St. Louis Writers Guild presents St. Louis au-thor John Lutz. Barnes & Noble, 8871 Ladue Road, Ladue, 821-3823.

SLCL will discuss 13 Little Blue Envelopes by Maureen Johnson. 2pm, SLCL–Indian Trails Branch, 8400 Delport Dr., 428-5424.

Join students from Harris Stowe State Univer-sity’s Entrepreneurs Book Club as they dis-cuss the book Do You! by Russell Simmons. The group meets the third Thursday of each month to discuss a book and hear a guest speak on a topic that will help participants become success-ful business leaders and entrepreneurs. 4:30pm, SLPL–Julia Davis Branch, 4415 Natural Bridge Ave., 383-3021.

Saturday, September 22St. Louis Poetry Center will host a workshop with Josh Kryah. Registration is $50 for mem-bers, $60 for nonmembers, and attendance is limited to ten participants. Members have prior-ity registration until 9/14. Lunch will be provided. For more information or to register, call SLPC at 973-0616 or email info@stlouispoetrycenter.org. Location TBA.

Monday, September 24Experimental horror fiction author Mark Dan-ielewski, author of cult-fave House of Leaves, will discuss his new novel, Only Revolutions. 7pm, Mad Art Gallery, 2727 S. 12th Street, 367-3731.

Tuesday, September 25Kristina Marie Darling and Pete Cosentino will read at the Poetry at the Point series, spon-sored by St. Louis Poetry Center. 7:30pm, The Focal Point, 2720 Sutton Blvd., 636-225-5423.

St. Louis Writers Guild presents Loud Mouth Open Mic Night. Register to read at http://stl-writersguild/registration.php. 8–10pm, The Mack (21+), 4615 Macklind Ave., 821-3823.

Wednesday, September 26Adults are invited to visit or join SLCL–Oak Bend Branch’s Bookies book discussion group. Next book is Killer Angels by Michael Shaara. 2pm, SLCL–Oak Bend Branch, 842 S. Holmes Ave., 822-0051.

UCPL’s Bookgroup will discuss Theft: A Love Story by Peter Carey. Copies are available at the checkout desk. 7pm, University City Public Library, 6701 Delmar Blvd., 727-3150.

Thursday, September 27COCA and Maritz are pleased to present best-selling writer and business guru Dan Pink, au-thor of A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future, wherein he argues that the MFA is the new MBA. Luncheon and pre-sentation, $75. 12pm, Center of Creative Arts (COCA), 524 Trinity Ave., 725-6555.

SLPL–Schlafly Branch’s Book Discussion Group meets to discuss a diverse selection of contemporary literature on the fourth Thurs-day of each month. The title for September is Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See. 7pm, SLPL–Schlafly Branch, 225 N. Euclid Ave., 367-4120.

NoticesSaint Louis Art Museum will present Beads, Beauty, and the Cosmos: Plains Indian Bead-work. Join Joseph D. Horse Capture, associ-ate curator in the Department of African, Ocean-ic, and Native American Art at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, to discuss these exceptional works made by the people of the Northern and Southern Plains between 1850 and 1890. Horse Capture is the author of Beauty,

The Center for the Humanities Advisory Board 2007–2008Nancy Berg Associate Professor of Asian & Near Eastern Languages & LiteraturesKen Botnick Associate Professor of ArtGene Dobbs Bradford Executive Director of Jazz St. LouisLingchei (Letty) Chen Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Language and LiteratureElizabeth Childs Associate Professor of Art HistoryMary-Jean Cowell Associate Professor of Performing ArtsMichael Kahn Attorney at Law Blackwell Sanders Peper Martin LLP Chris King Editorial Director The St. Louis American NewspaperOlivia Lahs-Gonzales Director Sheldon Art GalleriesPaula Lupkin Assistant Professor of Architecture Sam Fox School of Design & Visual ArtsLarry May Professor of PhilosophySteven Meyer Associate Professor of English

Angela Miller Associate Professor of Art History and ArchaeologyDolores Pesce Professor and Chair of Department of Music Joe Pollack Film and Theater Critic for KWMU, WriterSarah Rivett Assistant Professor of EnglishBart Schneider Editor of SpeakeasyRobert Vinson Assistant Professor of History and African and African American StudiesJames Wertsch Marshall S. Snow Professor of Arts and Sciences Director of International and Area StudiesEx OfficioEdward S. Macias Executive Vice Chancellor and Dean of Arts & Sciences, Barbara and David Thomas Distinguished Professor in Arts & SciencesZurab Karumidze Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia International Fellow

Non-Profit Org.U.S. Postage

PAIDSt. Louis, MO

Permit No. 2535The Center for the HumanitiesCampus Box 1071Old McMillan Hall, Rm S101One Brookings DriveSt. Louis, MO 63130-4899Phone: (314) 935-5576email: cenhum@artsci.wustl.eduhttp://cenhum.artsci.wustl.edu

Financial assistance for this project has been provided by the Missouri Arts Coun-cil, a state agency, and the Regional Arts Commission.

Honor, and Tradition: The Legacy of Plains Indian Shirts. A visit to the exhibition Plains Indian Beadwork from the Donald Danforth Jr. Collection follows this lecture. Free. Thursday, September 6, 7 pm. Auditorium. One Fine Arts Drive, 721-0072.

Join Roberta Smith, art critic at the New York Times, at the Saint Louis Art Museum for a lively lecture on the role of criticism in the art world and life in general. In her presentation, “On Becoming and Remaining an Art Critic,” she discusses her writing process and describes how her views of criticism have been shaped by publications for which she has written. Smith, an ac-claimed art critic and a popular lecturer on contemporary art, was art critic for the Village Voice and senior editor at Art in America before moving to the New York Times in 1986. She has also contributed essays to exhibition catalogues and has received art criticism grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2003, Smith was honored with the College Art Association’s presti-gious Frank Jewett Mather Award for Art Criticism. Free. Thursday, September 20, 7pm. Auditorium. One Fine Arts Drive, 721-0072.

AbbreviationsB&N: Barnes & Noble; LBB: Left Bank Books; SLCL: St. Louis County Library; SLPL: St. Louis Public Library; SCCCL: St. Charles City County Library; UCPL: Uni-versity City Public Library, WU: Washington University, WGPL: Webster Groves Public Library

Check the online calendar at cenhum.artsci.wustl.edu for more events and additional details. To advertise, send event details to litcal@artsci.wustl.edu or call 935-5576.