Welcome to the human heart! Isn’t it knottier and more slippery than you expected, with so many more than four chambers that you’ve had to stop counting? There are enough Snoopy valentines for the whole class, but the ones I cut and glued myself are for
Donald Antrim, whose essays about his fabric-wild mother and bed-mad self have made life both easier and harder to bear, and who is welcome to visit the kissing booth when I am working it; and for
Lorrie Moore, whose stories in the magazine and elsewhere have made all of us stop breathing as Billie Holiday did for the 5 SPOT listeners in Frank O’Hara’s poem, and who is always surprising us again with her bravery (“The Juniper Tree” being only the most recent example). Her stories are news, and not because they remind us of who’s richest and most popular in the fiction game, but because they affect things—the way art is said to, but sometimes doesn’t. I like this anecdote:
“You’re Ugly, Too†was the first of many of her stories to be published in The New Yorker (and then to be reprinted, with regularity, in annuals such as The O. Henry Awards and The Best American Short Stories), but, in 1989, it was a controversial piece for the magazine. “All through the editing process, they said, ‘Oooh, we’re breaking so many rules with this.’ †Robert Gottlieb had taken over as the editor, but the turgidity of his predecessor, William Shawn, still gripped the institution. “I could not say ‘yellow light,’ I had to say ‘amber light,’ †Moore remembers. “And that was the least of the vulgarities I’d committed.â€
A candy heart of lust and admiration to Steve Martin—with whom I fell in love at a birthday party in 1984 on first sighting of his silver hair and wistful-seducer eyes in All of Me—for giving a million bucks to the Huntington Library in Pasadena, one of the prettiest places I’ve ever been and beloved by scholars. Martin (who, fittingly, designated the money for the American art collection) says, “The Huntington is clearly interested in … bringing significant works of American art to light, contextualizing them, and helping visitors become better acquainted with the artists, the techniques and the significance of the pieces.” It’s not enough that this man made all those movies that make us happy—he writes fiction, Shouts & Murmurs, and plays, and throws money to art into the bargain. Steve, you’re great. And even more handsome than you were, somehow.
Two more hearts wrapped in wrist tape for Edwin Pope and William Nack, who just won A.J. Liebling Awards (to be presented on May 6) for excellence in boxing journalism. Maybe they could do double duty as film critics during this trying time, when Clint Eastwood has duped an entire nation into believing, among other unlikely things, that a gorgeous young waitress who boxes in all her free time would never have the slightest temptation to try out some of her fellow trainees. I’m just sayin’. Movie man Gene Seymour agrees with me, and he’s no mollycoddle in the critical ring.
And to you, reader, who ask so charmingly for more and make me want to give it to you. You know who you are. Thank you.
About Lorrie Moore: A Profile [Ploughshares]
Moore’s Better Blues [Dwight Garner interview, Salon]
Steve Martin donates $1M to support U.S. art [CBC]
A.J. Liebling Awards [East Side Boxing]
The Edwin Pope Collection [Amazon]
My Turf: Horses, Boxers, Blood Money, and the Sporting Life [William Nack, Powell’s]