Splendid Visions
A father considers his young son’s life in the city of Boston, and wonders if his son would be better off with “a life in nature”:
“If it’s true that children raised in cities often grow into shrewd, incisive adults wise to the crooked ways of the world, that being exposed daily to a wealth of cultures, languages, libraries, bookstores, theaters, and museums can make impressive people, Wordsworth might argue that those individuals lack a ‘sense sublime / Of something far more deeply interfused’—that is, a sense of the unity, harmony, freedom, and ‘unwearied Joy’ exemplified by nature. Who doesn’t want ‘unwearied Joy’ for his child? Emerson might go a bit further and say that those divorced from nature have a thinking deficiency, because ‘Nature is the vehicle of thought.’ For Emerson, as for Wordsworth, Nature is synonymous with Life—our lives simply refuse to cohere outside the context of the natural world. Will Ethan the city boy forever lack something sacred in his mind and spirit? Will he lack a certain useful knowledge? When my paternal grandfather was in Korea during the war, his platoon mates from Manhattan ‘thought the crickets were North Korean soldiers sending evil signals to one another in the nighttime. They never got a good night’s sleep.”
When Drug Cops Become Criminals
An undercover officer for the Drug Enforcement Administration ends up in prison when the drug war becomes personal:
“‘A lot of people disappear in Mexico,’ he says. ‘They are buried where no one will find them. Some are eaten by tigers and some by sharks. There are also big tanks with acid in them.’ He pauses for a long time between the sentences.
“‘We didn’t manage to catch all the bad guys. In those cases, we gave the Mexicans their names and said, ‘Do what you need to do.’ The Mexicans made those people disappear.’
“Martinez sits in his car, holding the steering wheel firmly with both hands. He looks frightened by the memories of his own life. ‘Come on, let’s go to the cemetery,’ he says.”
Honor Betrayed
A two-part series on sexual abuse and homelessness among female veterans in the U.S.:
“In response to the growing outcry over sexual violence, the Pentagon last year ordered that charging decisions in sexual assault cases be determined by more senior commanders than in the past, but the directive stopped short of taking the decision out of the chain of command. Some other nations, including Britain, have taken steps to create a more independent military judicial system, but experts on military justice said that the United States has been unwilling to do so.
“‘The military justice system is not only to judge innocence or guilt, but is also designed to help a commander ensure good order and discipline,’ said Dwight Sullivan, an appellate defense counsel for the Air Force. ‘Those things sometimes come into conflict.'”
A Suitcase Named Desire
A writer spends time with Victor Campbell, a former lover of playwright Tennessee Williams:
“Outside Napoleon House the day had died and the light had shrunken into the tiny bulbs of street lamps. Campbell, who had hardly touched his beer, removed a tape player from his briefcase. Over the years, he recorded Williams reading his poems. ‘I told him a dirty joke right before I started to record, this first time, to get him relaxed before he read.’ It took some prodding, but Campbell divulged the story. He stood up at the table, placed one hand behind his back, and cleared his throat. ‘I said, ‘Hey, Tom, I was over at the pharmacy this morning and guess what I got? A penis enlarger.’ Tom looked at me, a bit shocked. He wanted to know how it worked. I said, ‘I’ll show you.’ So I pulled down my pants.’ Campbell feigned unzipping his fly and yanking down his pants. Couples sitting at two nearby tables cast furtive glances toward us. Campbell pantomimed bringing something from behind his back, holding it over his crotch. ‘Then I held up a magnifying glass.'”
The Deferential Spirit (1996)
A critical assessment of Bob Woodward’s books and a style of political journalism that prioritizes access over true insight:
“Mr. Woodward’s rather eerie aversion to engaging the ramifications of what people say to him has been generally understood as an admirable quality, at best a mandarin modesty, at worst a kind of executive big-picture focus, the entirely justifiable oversight of someone with a more important game to play. Yet what we see in The Choice is something more than a matter of an occasional inconsistency left unexplored in the rush of the breaking story, a stray ball or two left unfielded in the heat of the opportunity, as Mr. Woodward describes his role, “to sit with many of the candidates and key players and ask about the questions of the day as the campaign unfolded.” What seems most remarkable in this new Woodward book is exactly what seemed remarkable in the previous Woodward books, each of which was presented as the insiders’ inside story and each of which went on to become a number-one bestseller: these are books in which measurable cerebral activity is virtually absent.”
Something to Remember Me By
[Fiction] A young man goes on a journey:
“When there is too much going on, more than you can bear, you may choose to assume that nothing in particular is happening, that your life is going round and round like a turntable. Then one day you are aware that what you took to be a turntable, smooth, flat, and even, was in fact a whirlpool, a vortex. My first knowledge of the hidden work of uneventful days goes back to February 1933. The exact date won’t matter much to you. I like to think, however, that you, my only child, will want to hear about this hidden work as it relates to me. When you were a small boy you were keen on family history. You will quickly understand that I couldn’t tell a child what I am about to tell you now. You don’t talk about deaths and vortices to a kid, not nowadays. In my time my parents didn’t hesitate to speak of death and the dying. What they seldom mentioned was sex. We’ve got it the other way around.”
Longreads Member Exclusive: Graveyards, by Scott McClanahan
This week’s Longreads Member pick is “Graveyards,” a short story by Scott McClanahan about a family visit to the cemetery. The piece was published last year in Harper Perennial’s Forty Stories collection, and it will appear in McClanahan’s forthcoming book Crapalachia, a portrait of growing up in rural West Virginia, published by Two Dollar Radio.
Support Longreads—and get more stories like this—by becoming a member for just $3 per month.
In Search of Van Cliburn
The writer makes a pilgrimage to Kilgore, Texas, to explore the hometown and Baptist roots of the world-renowned pianist, who died Wednesday:
“After much deliberation, Richter and Gilels nervously took the prominent jury’s final vote to the politburo, the cultural minister, and finally the new premier, Khrushchev. The premier asked, ‘Is [Cliburn] the best?’ The cultural minister replied, ‘Yes, he is the best.’ So Khrushchev said, ‘In this case, give him the first prize.’ The ticker-tape parade in New York upon Van’s return to the U.S. remains the stuff of legends, and as almost every obituary published since his death yesterday at age 78 points out, his artistry was credited with helping to thaw the Cold War.
“But amid all that hoopla and Russian grandeur, Van was also a Texan, a Southerner, a Baptist, a patriot who began each concert with the ‘Star-Spangled Banner,’ a musical idealist, and a man who loved his parents, his childhood friends, and black-eyed peas as much as I do. We both grew up in East Texas behind the Pine Curtain—he in Kilgore and I in Texarkana—so I always knew that if we met, we’d have more to chat about than my own devotion to the piano, challenged though it is by my perpetual intermediate level.”
Splitting Hares
During the ’70s, a father persuades his daughter, a college-age feminist, to meet him at the Playboy Club:
“My conversation with my father been taking place on the hall phone in my dorm, Chapin Hall, which happened to be an all-women’s residence. Normally, the girls gave whoever was on the phone a lot of space, but with ‘Playboy Club’ and ‘Hugh Hefner’ springing out of the conversation like champagne corks, I attracted a crowd, a sort of Greek chorus in bathrobes and curlers. Jan, always a cut up, made bunny ears behind Jill. Linda, the biggest women’s libber on campus, raised the power salute. Karen and Nancy listened as they munched from a freshly popped bowl of popcorn. I was militant to begin with, but the more the women watched, the more emphatic my advocacy became.
“‘Dad,’ I tried to bargain, ‘why don’t you go to the Playboy Club with your friends, and I’ll meet you for dinner afterward.'”
The Rape of Petty Officer Blumer
A Navy intelligence analyst reports a rape and finds herself ostracized. She’s not the only one, and the U.S. military still has not taken serious steps to address a culture that condones sex abuse:
“The scandal of rape in the U.S. Armed Forces, across all of its uniformed services, has become inescapable. Last year saw the military’s biggest sex-abuse scandal in a decade, when an investigation at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio revealed that 32 basic-training instructors preyed on at least 59 recruits. In Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Army Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair is currently facing court-martial for sex-crimes charges, including forcible sodomy, for alleged misconduct against five women. In October, an Air Force technical sergeant filed an administrative complaint describing a work environment of comprehensive harassment – in which all women are ‘bitches’; and claimed that during a routine meeting in a commander’s office, she was instructed to take off her blouse and ‘relax’ – edged with menace and punctuated by violent assaults. In December, a Department of Defense report revealed that rape is rampant at the nation’s military academies, where 12 percent of female cadets experienced ‘unwanted sexual contact.’ And an explosive series of federal lawsuits filed against top DOD brass on behalf of 59 service members (including Rebecca Blumer) allege that the leadership has done nothing to stop the cycle of rape and impunity – and that by failing to condemn sexual assault, the military has created a predators’ playground.”
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