Strange but true: Groucho Marx and T.S. Eliot were pen-pals. Their correspondence began in 1961, when T.S. Eliot sent Groucho Marx a fan letter. It continued for several years, with them finally meeting for dinner in 1964. From a recent post on Daybook:
The much-postponed event took place just seven months before Eliot’s death at the age of seventy-six. In a letter afterwards to Gummo, Groucho describes finding his “celebrated pen pal” to be “a dear man and a charming host,” though the evening not quite the literary event he’d imagined:
During the week I had read Murder in the Cathedral twice, The Waste Land three times, and just in case of a conversational bottleneck, I brushed up on King Lear. Well, sir, as the cocktails were served, there was a momentary lull — the kind that is more or less inevitable when strangers meet for the first time. So, apropos of practically nothing (and not with a bang but a whimper) I tossed in a quotation from The Waste Land. That, I thought, will show him I’ve read a thing or two besides my press notices from Vaudeville. Eliot smiled faintly — as though to say he was thoroughly familiar with his poems and didn’t need me to recite them. So I took a whack at King Lear…. That too failed to bowl over the poet. He seemed more interested in discussing Animal Crackers and A Night at the Opera. He quoted a joke — one of mine — that I had long since forgotten. Now it was my turn to smile faintly…. We didn’t stay late, for we both felt that he wasn’t up to a long evening of conversation — especially mine. Did I tell you we called him Tom? — possibly because that’s his name. I, of course, asked him to call me Tom too, but only because I loathe the name Julius.
For this week’s Longreads Member Pick, we’re excited to share the opening chapter of Jesus Land, the bestselling 2012 memoir by Julia Scheeres about her strict Christian upbringing in Indiana, her relationship with her adopted brother David, and the stint they did in a Christian reform school together in the Dominican Republic. Our thanks to Scheeres and Counterpoint Press for sharing this story with the Longreads community.
For our Longreads Member Pick, we’re excited to share the opening chapter of Jesus Land, the bestselling 2012 memoir by Julia Scheeres about her strict Christian upbringing in Indiana, her relationship with her adopted brother David, and the stint they did in a Christian reform school together in the Dominican Republic. Our thanks to Scheeres and Counterpoint Press for sharing this story with the Longreads community. Read more…
Alan Shapiro published two books in January 2012: Broadway Baby, a novel, from Algonquin Books, and Night of the Republic, poetry, from Houghton Mifflin/Harcourt. This essay first appeared in the Virginia Quarterly Review (subscribe here). Our thanks to Shapiro for allowing us to reprint it here, and for sharing an update on Nat’s life (see the postscript below).
More than you ever wanted to know about feral hogs and how to kill them. When federal agents are picking them off from helicopters, there’s obviously more at stake than just nuisance. Between the millions of dollars in damage and the idea of the creature as an ‘invasive species,’ I was tickled to death by the serious problem (and solution) posed by these animals, who are smart but ugly, therefore fair game for mass eradication. The issue is beautifully explained by Gwyneth Doland. This is, to me, a classic, successful alt-weekly story — take something that’s under the snout of normal people, zoom in, examine. ‘Some species just don’t play nice with others.’
Also, after a week of layoffs from some of the country’s bigger newspaper chains it is worth saying — support your local alternative newsweekly!
Every week, Syracuse University professor Aileen Gallagher is helping Longreads highlight the best of college journalism. Here’s this week’s pick:
Last February, a Washington Redskins executives said on a team talk show that 70 different high schools across the country share the NFL franchise’s controversial name. University of Maryland journalism graduate student Kelyn Soong did a little fact checking. His curiosity led to an impressive piece called “The Other Redskins.” Soong found that not only do 62 high schools still use the term, but also that 28 other schools had changed their team name in the last 25 years. In his reporting, Soong interviewed alumni, school officials, Native Americans, activists, and supporters. He also used data—with the help of interactive designers Sean Henderson and Angela Wong—to place the story in a larger context. The result is a well-reported, well-presented #college #longread.
Luis Octavio López Vega, who worked for both the Mexican military and as an informant to the DEA, is now in hiding:
“The reserved, unpretentious husband and father of three has been a fugitive ever since, on the run from his native country and abandoned by his adopted home. For more than a decade, he has carried information about the inner workings of the drug war that both governments carefully kept secret.
“The United States continues to feign ignorance about his whereabouts when pressed by Mexican officials, who still ask for assistance to find him, a federal law enforcement official said.
“The cover-up was initially led by the D.E.A., whose agents did not believe the Mexican authorities had a legitimate case against their informant. Other law enforcement agencies later went along, out of fear that the D.E.A.’s relationship with Mr. López might disrupt cooperation between the two countries on more pressing matters.”
How Copeland went from European basketball unknown to 29-year-old rookie for the New York Knicks:
“You are never fully at ease, but you begin to transition. Maybe you date a local girl, or even marry her. You begin to buy tighter jeans, learn some of the language and before you can blink, you are in the twilight of your career. Eventually, you do move back home and tell anyone that will listen that you did, in fact, play pro basketball. You try to find a 9-to-5 job while fighting off the inevitable depression that comes from losing the only thing you’ve ever truly loved, and, over time, you forget you ever had a dream in the first place. It’s a good life, at times an amazing life, filled with peaks and valleys higher and lower than you could ever imagine. And then, it’s over.
“For Copeland, however, there remained a gnawing inside his gut. No matter how well he did, it wasn’t quite enough. ‘I was feeling sad even though I was having a lot of success. In my head,’ he said. ‘I just still believed I could do better. I knew if I didn’t make it, I’d look back with a lot of regrets.'”
This week, we have a Longreads Member Exclusive recommended by one of our members, Boston Review Web Editor David V. Johnson. His pick is Richard White‘s ”Deconstructing Mare Island: Reconnaissance in the Ruins,” published in Boom: A Journal of California. Here’s an intro from David:
Eureka! Boom: A Journal of California launched in the Spring of 2011. The quality of writing and artwork has been absolutely superb. There are so many articles I could recommend, including one by the aforementioned Solnit, but I was especially captivated recently by ‘Deconstructing Mare Island: Reconnaissance in the Ruins,’ a piece on the Carquinez Strait by American West historian and MacArthur ‘Genius’ Grant recipient Richard White. Before reading the story, I had experienced the Strait exactly the way White says most Californians do: by driving over it. Little did I know that in that body of water and its environs you can trace the rise and fall of California and the nation.
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