Google pays homage to Anatomy of a Murder

admin — Wed, 08 May 2013 21:09:29 +0000

Google Doodle today paid homage to Michigan author Robert Traver by showcasing the graphic, advertising the movie “Anatomy of a Murder” on their homepage.

By any measure the career of John D. Voelker who wrote under the pen name Traver was a phenomenal success. He was a successful author, having written the bestseller “Anatomy of a Murder” (later made into a movie directed by Otto Preminger and starring James Stewart, Lee Remick and George C. Scott) and he was a member of the Michigan Supreme Court.

The entire “Anatomy of a Murder” was shot on location in the Upper Peninsula around Marquette, Big Bay and Ishpeming. The graphic for the movie posters was designed by Saul Bass, a legendary art designer who was born today in 1920. Read about the Google Doodle here.

Anatomy of a Murder may have brought Voelker fame and fortune but as a younger man, the author heard a story about an Indian woman who had, against all odds, taken on the white power structure of the Upper Peninsula’s mining industry while seeking what she thought was compensation owed to her family.

Voelker had always wanted to do a fictional treatment of this real-life case, but the success of “Anatomy” and his job as a justice had kept him too busy.

In an address to the Michigan Historical Society in 1970 he said his “neglected Indian story receded even further into the background.”

In a brash move, Voelker decided he was fed up and had enough of the “baying dogs of success” — he quit his job.

In his letter of resignation to Gov. G. Mennen Williams he wrote, “While other men can write my legal opinions (although I would debate that) they can scarcely write my books. I am sorry.”

Voelker retreated to the Upper Peninsula, where he would spend two winters writing his Indian story. “Laughing Whitefish” was published in 1965, but soon went out of print.

Michigan State University, working with the Voelker family, has reprinted the book with an introduction written by MSU College of Law Professor Matthew Fletcher, who heads the Indigenous Law and Policy Center.

In describing his book, Voelker always said it was “a basic story … rather simple” and “it was about iron ore, Indians and the infidelity to one’s own promises.”

The book tells the story of a young Indian woman, Charlotte Kawbawgam (her real name was Kobogum), who seeks compensation for her father. He had been promised a “wee fractional interest” after leading a group of mining executives to the world’s largest deposit of iron ore. Kawbawgam hires lawyer Willy Post, a newcomer to Marquette.

Although the real-life case was extremely complicated, Voelker simplified it for the book; in essence, it shows how tribal law has supremacy over state law in domestic disputes.

Fletcher said the book, which provides great context for state/tribal relations, still can be used as a textbook in Indian law. In his introduction, he puts the book into the context of little-known aspects of Indian law. “Whitefish” also explores little-known tribal customs and laws, including the practice of polygamy.

Voelker, who spent most of his life in the Upper Peninsula, also creates a window into the customs and language of the Cornish mining community around Ishpeming, where he lived. He often said he used the keen ear he developed sitting in his father’s bar listening to miners in order to recreate a lifestyle that has all but disappeared in the western Upper Peninsula.

Although Voelker stayed as true to the facts as he could in writing the book he did change one important item — otherwise, the book might’ve been named “Carp.” He said he chose not to name the Indian girl after the river she was born next to (Carp) but opted for the “more romantically named river (Laughing Whitefish).”

In 1989, two Michigan lawyers who had developed a friendship with Voelker approached him about establishing a foundation to raise money to make a film based on the book.

Voelker had another idea. Voelker, who was very close with the Indians who lived nearby him and aware of the many injustices played out against them, decided he wanted to raise money to send Indians to law school.

Since 1989, the Voelker Foundation (which has more than 400 members) has provided scholarships to 16 law students: 15 have graduated and one is still in school. The foundation also recognizes another of Voelker’s passions by awarding a writing prize of $2,500 each year for the best short story on fly fishing.

The myth of Voelker continues to loom large in the western Upper Peninsula, perhaps rivaled only by the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Tourists still seek out the haunts and sites where “Anatomy of a Murder” was filmed, and make pilgrimages to the grave of Voelker.

Because of “Anatomy,” which was on The New York Times best seller list for 65 weeks, Voelker is often credited with creating the modern legal thriller. But he openly admitted “Laughing Whitefish” was the hardest book he ever wrote.

Fletcher said that since “Laughing Whitefish” has been republished many readers have told him that it would “make a good movie.” Fletcher said he could see the plot set in the modern era, keeping all the facts, but treating it as if there had never been a Supreme Court decision.

“All the underlying concepts are the same,” he said.

Baseball, books and veggie dogs

admin — Sun, 05 May 2013 15:33:23 +0000

In short order (today Sunday May 5 at noon) EveryBody Reads, an independent bookstore in downtown Lansing, will celebrate its seventh anniversary with a baseball-themed party featuring a number of baseball writers and analysts.

To celebrate this milestone, In addition to the exceptional baseball writers there will be free veggie dogs, popcorn and Cracker Jacks. there also will be baseball memorabilia for display and purchase.

here’s the ALL STAR LINE-UP:

• Peter Morris (debuting Cracking Baseball’s Cold Cases: Filling in the Facts About 17 Mystery Major Leaguers )
• Jess Goldberg-Strassler (of the Lansing Lugnuts)
• Tom Stanton (2008 winner of the Michigan Author of the Year Award )
• Gary Gillette (former ESPN writer and SABR leader)
• Jeremy Deloney (minor league baseball analyst)

PETER MORRIS:
Morris was honored as one of the first nine winners of the Henry Chadwick Award in 2010
A Game of Inches
Baseball Fever
But Didn’t We Have Fun?

JESSE GOLDBERG-STRASSLER:
The voice of our Lansing Lugnuts and author of
The Baseball Thesaurus

TOM STANTON:
A finalist for a Publishers Weekly Quill Award and a Reader’s Digest pick of the month author
Ty and the Babe
Hank Aaron and the Home Run that Changed America
The Final Season

GARY GILLETTE:
A baseball author and editor. He is also co-chair of the SABR Business of Baseball committee
ESPN Baseball Encyclopedia
ESPN Football Encyclopedia

JEREMY DELONEY
First book of its kind to fully integrate sabermetrics and scouting,
2013 Minor League Baseball Analyst

Author pedals Detroit to write about it

admin — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:31:48 +0000

Mark Binelli

Mark Binelli author of “Detroit City is the Place to Be” will present Thursday May 2, 7 p.m., at the Capital Area District Library in downtown Lansing ( 401 S. Capitol Ave). Binelli is on a tour for the Michigan Notable Books.

When he was researching his book, “Detroit City Is the Place to Be: The Afterlife of an American Metropolis,” Rolling Stone contributing editor Mark Binelli wanted to see a different side of Detroit than the one portrayed in popular media — a side even some of us “locals” have only seen by expressway on our way to see the Tigers, the Lions or a show at the Fox Theatre. To accomplish this, he spent a year in the city, exploring the streets by bicycle.

His unusual approach seems to have worked; Binelli’s book was recognized this past Saturday at the Night for Notables at the Library of Michigan in Lansing. “Detroit City” was named as one of 20 Michigan Notable Books, and at the event, Binelli joined 17 of the other authors. Local honorees including East Lansing author Laurie Kay Sommers, who was honored for her book, “Fishtown: Leland, Michigan’s Historic Fishery,” and J. Alan Holman, Michigan State University professor of geology and zoology, who will be recognized posthumously for his book “The Amphibians and Reptiles of Michigan: A Quaternary and Recent Faunal Adventure.” His son, Ray Holman, will accept the award. The keynote speaker filmmaker and author Michael Moore, whose memoir, “Here Comes Trouble,” was one of last year’s Notable Books kept the audience awake with his musing on politics, freedom, libraries. He called librarians “the most dangerous people in the world.”

Binelli’s book surpasses in clarity and fairness the plethora of the other cottage-industry books written on Detroit this past year. Binelli, 42, isn’t exactly a cheerleader for Detroit, but he avoids the literary “ruins porn” cliches evident in those other books and documentaries.

“Like Detroiters, I’m sick of the images and even offended,” he said in a recent phone interview. That’s one reason he opted to rent an apartment near Detroit’s famed Eastern Market in 2009 to research his book. He said outside reporters would typically fly in, spend a few days writing a story about dystopian Detroit and leave.

“It was journalistic malpractice,” Binelli said. “I told myself, I can’t become a cliché. I wanted to have more sensitivity and bring more history to the table.”

Binelli said that even the venerable Time magazine, which bought a home in Detroit and set up a team of “MTV-style” writers in 2009-‘10 to cover Detroit, couldn’t pull it off.

“Ultimately, they were writing articles for Time, so a profile of Dave Bing would run 800 words,” he said.

Binelli said that Detroit has become “the all-purpose metaphor for a dying city.” Early in his book, he writes, “It might very well turn out to be the story of the last century, the death rattle of the twentieth century definition of the American Dream.”

He said he patterned his writing after two authors he greatly admires: the late New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell and Ian Fraser, author of the book “Great Plains.” He said both writers “create an illusion (in their writing) that they are just going out for a walk.”

He said it was important to him to tell the story of “the 700,000 people who live in the city,” which is why he set out on his bike. He wrote about what he ran into, such as a group of kids wading through a river of shoes laid out by noted Detroit experimental artist Tyree Guyton, whose urban artwork was once ordered to be bulldozed by then-Mayor Coleman Young. When Binelli asked the kids what they were doing, they told him they were after free shoes — but added that it’s hard to find a matched pair that fits.

The author provides a beautifully condensed and integrated history of Detroit scattered among the pages of “Detroit City.” He reminds us of many of Detroit’s “firsts”: the first wave of owner-occupied single family homes in the country; the first shopping center in the country; and, perhaps, the first major city to go belly up.

Binelli doesn’t find alligators in the sewers, but he does find a biting irony in the things around him, like the return of beavers to Detroit, once the epicenter of fur trapping in the 18th century. Or in the Latin motto on the city flag: “We hope for better days; it shall rise from the ashes” And certainly there are ashes all around him, in the form of 90,000 abandoned buildings.

Binelli recently wrote an op-ed piece for The New York Times in which he pilloried the proposed takeover of Belle Isle by a group of wealthy libertarians who wanted to turn it into an Ayn Randian free-trade zone. He said the he is “really sick of the relentless, one-note success stories coming out of Detroit.”

He also said he rails against the moral way in which the city is described, which he says is as a “sinner that needs to suffer.” In his book, Binelli writes, “People also love stories about Detroit because there’s something inherently pleasing about having one’s plot expectations so consistently fulfilled.”

A Brit is talking Nazi Noir

admin — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 23:42:34 +0000

Nazi Noir writer Philip Kerr’s will talk about his newest book ”A Man Without Breath” 7 p.m., Wednesday, April 17 at Schulers in Okemos. Kerr who writes in a variety of genres including children’s literature has developed a successful series featuring a German policeman during the height of Nazi Germany.

The detective, Bernie Gunther is a hard drinking, skirt chasing cynic as he pursues his duties of solving unpleasant murders against the backdrop of Nazi Germany. It’s not lost on Gunther that while he’s solving individual murders often committed by Nazi officers everyone seems to not notice the larger crimes of the Holocaust. Kerr’s Gunther books have stretched from the 1930s to postwar Germany and are not written in chronological order. In the latest book, he is sent to investigate a mass killing on the Eastern border right before Russia begins its major counteroffensive. Most of those close to Hitler know for all practical purposes the war is over and Gunther who is not a party man crosses paths with a few officers who are attempting another plot on Hitler’s life.

As usual the suspense is at its highest level in a Kerr book as Gunther once again realizes that solving the murders may result in his own death. Kerr’s book series which began in 1989 is an unusual success story since after writing three Gunther novels in succession he took nearly 16 years off before writing his next five crime novels.

Kerr is Scottish and after reading law at a British university he took extensive post graduate work in German 20^th century history specializing in you guessed it -the Nazis. It’s this background that makes his crime novels so real and atmospheric. You almost feel that there was a Bernie Gunther and he left a diary behind.

In addition to his crime novels, Kerr has written a fictionalized version of the life of Sir Isaac Newton, several screen plays including a feature film on Diana and eight children’s books as P.B. Kerr. Kerr who now lives in London does most of his primary research for his Gunther novels at the Wiener Library, a well-worn but little-known library (outside of select circles) specializing in first-person accounts of anti-Hitler resistance and anti-Semitism.

Kerr was quoted in a recent interview in the Daily Telegraph that “after finishing each book I felt I needed a shower.”

Although much more dark, Kerr’s books have been compared to Allan Furst’s atmospheric historical spy thrillers which revolve around the run up to World War II. Those lucky enough to have HBO may have caught the recent two part mini-series “Spies of Warsaw” based on Furst’s book of the same. Nazi Noir seems to have found an avid fan base and the writings of both Furst and Kerr are reminiscent of the greats Graham Greene, Eric Ambler and John LeCarre.

The following is a Question and Answer by email with Gunther from London:

Q. How do you and where do you do your research to create the “sights and sounds” the-deep atmosphere of your Bernie Gunther books? Do you visit the actual locations or has the web made that unnecessary? Was there ever a character similar to Bernie in the German milieu? Or could there have been? He is so believable. So much has been written about the era by historians; who do you trust the most?

A. I try to visit the locations wherever possible and read as much as I can about the period. Sometimes I can’t do more than find an old map and some old photographs. With A Man Without Breath (AMWB) I was lucky in that I found an SS map of Smolensk from 1943. The Germans had renamed all of the streets – German names, of course – so this made my job a lot easier. It meant that the Smolensk I was writing about would be almost unrecognizable to someone from Smolensk today. For all of the research that I do the most important thing is the research that I do in my own head; in other words, with my imagination. Over the years I’ve learned to trust this and whenever I’m researching something I put my own imagination in there too, in order to try and feel what I’ve learned, a bit like a DeNiro figure, method-acting.

Q. Was there a Bernie? Probably. Himmler certainly employed a private detective when he suspected his sister was being cheated on. And certainly Berliners have the black sense of humor shared by Bernie. He’s a kind of Flying Dutchman figure really.

A. With history I try to work between the lines of know history – in other words I only make up what isn’t known. I wouldn’t ever make up something that contradicted the known facts. Historians are limited by facts. I am liberated by their absence. For my money the best account of the Battle of Waterloo is a novel and not a work of history: that book is Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. Sometimes the best ‘history’ is that which has been imagined.

Q. In addition to your academic background relating to the rise of Nazism have you talked with Germans who lived through that era? When doing your research is there one piece of discovery that stands out among all others? One piece that was so serendipitous that you just couldn’t believe you were discovering it?

A. I’ve talked to many Germans and receive many emails, too. I travel to Germany a lot. In the past twelve months I’ve been to Berlin once and Munich four times. Everytime I research a new book I come across something that surprises me. The period is full of surprised; as a great American President Harry Truman used to say ‘There is nothing new in history, there is only the history we don’t already know.’ With AMWB I soon discovered that the man who was officially credited with the discovery of the bodies of Polish soldiers in Katyn Forest had tried – twice – kill Hitler in the previous four weeks. That seemed like serendipity and still does. Too good a discovery not to use.

Q. Bernie seems to be a metaphor for Germans during ww II who faced often terrible moral decisions. Was that one of your goals in creating Bernie? Is part of Bernie’s message to us not be so self righteous about war and that we don’t know what we would do until we are there?

A. Exactly. I like to paint Bernie- and by extension myself – into a corner in order to ask myself what would I have done? That is the overriding question with all the books: what would I – could I – have done? It’s an easy question to answer if you are an insurance salesman or a shop clerk. It’s not s easy to answer if like Bernie you were a cop. And a good cop, too.

Q. Do you have time to read any American crime fiction? Who, if so?

A. I used to read quite a lot of it. Chandler of course. Hammett. James M.Cain (much underrated). Donald Westlake and Elmore Leonard of course.

Q. What’s your take on the status of children’s books (picture); are they overall better worse or more creative than they were a half century ago? You seem to write your children’s books for the sheer pleasure of it. Is that correct?

A. I love writing for children. It’s pure creative writing – the chance to let go and allow one’s imagination carte blanche. I’m not sure if they are better today because I don’t read any children’s literature, ever. I have children of my own and what I’ve written was originally an attempt to connect with them. It’s the most important writing that any writer can do and the emails I get from kids – especially boys – that say I turned them onto books are some of the most important achievements of my writing career.

Look forward to your visit and enjoy yourself. University of Michigan has a great children’s book collection and MSU Library has maybe he best collection of comic books in the world. Did you ever read comics growing up.

I read a lot of comics from the age of about 5-12. British comics that you would never have heard of. Then Fantastic 4 and the Avengers for a while. Alan Moore was at the same school as me – a couple of years older. I am a great admirer of his. I especially admire his ferocious independence and contempt for ‘the career novelist’.

Lansing Rally of Writers will draw writers from across the state

admin — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 20:14:27 +0000

The Rally of Writers kick off tonight Friday April 12 with a session by three notable baseball writers at Schulers Books in the Eastwood Towne Center. Then thriller writer Karen Dionne who will keynote the 26^th annual “A Rally of Writers” will provide some practical advice on how writers can advance their careers.

In an email from her home in southeast Michigan Dionne said “I hope to show attendees how connecting with the writing community, whether in person or online, can make all the difference in the world.”

A Rally of Writers will be held from 8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m., Saturday, April 13 at Lansing Community College West Campus.

Dionne who began writing 12 years ago while living in St. Ignace didn’t know any other writers living in the area so she took it on
herself to start the successful online writer’s organization Backspace which now has 1,900 members in a dozen countries.

She said the membership includes New York Times best-selling authors as well as authors who are just starting out.

“I’ve watched and listened and learned as literally hundreds of aspiring members became published Dionne said.

Dionne was one of those writers who found a path to publication and has since published three novels including the environmental
thrillers, “Boiling Point” and “Freezing Point”. The author who is noted for her meticulous research including a visit to an active volcano in Chaiten Chile for the book “Boiling Point” will be joining 15 other authors including several Lansing area writers in a day-long session on writing and getting published.

Local authors include Andrea King Collier, a non-fiction writer and essayist; Lev Raphael, a mystery writer and non-fiction writer; Mike Stratton, a fiction writer; Peter Morris, an award-winning baseball writer and Allison Moulton, a fantasy writer.

Breakouts include sessions on writing for children, interviewing, fantasy writing, humor techniques and self-publishing.

A special Rally Warm-Up 7 p.m., Friday, April 12 at the Eastwood Schuler Books will feature three-noted baseball writers who will
discuss writing for the baseball genre. Peter Morris, who has won the Seymour Award for the best baseball book of the year twice, is joining Tom Stanton (“The Final Season”) and William Anderson (“The Glory Years: 1920-1950”) both who write about the Detroit Tigers.

Morris’ new book “Cracking Baseball’s Cold Cases,” is about his 20 year pursuit of old-time major leaguers who vanished after their careers were over. He will also present on what he calls “organic writing” or how to write the book you were born to write.

In addition to the keynote, Dionne will also conduct two breakout sessions: one on getting noticed and another on “balancing beautiful language with storytelling.”

“Writing and publication is a tough business, but it isn’t a zero game. When we help each other, we all do better than if we go it alone,” said Dionne.

For more information on the Rally go to www.arallyofwriters.com. The event registration fee is $85 at the door; students pay $65 at the door.

MSU grad and Pulitzer winner Richard Ford to speak at MSU graduation

admin — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 23:24:25 +0000

Ford and Oates in New York City

A reoccurring theme in the novels of Richard Ford is fate and how it intervenes to change our life. A case in point is his most recent novel “Canada” wherein a family’s life is turned upside down when the parents rob a bank.

As an undergraduate at Michigan State University in the early 1960s, Richard Ford’s career plans changed dramatically when fate intervened.

Ford whose grandfather ran a hotel in Arkansas chose MSU for its School of Hospitality, but it wasn’t long before he was attracted more to words than he was to table settings.

He was also attracted to another undergraduate Kristina Hensley who he met in the Mason Hall cafeteria while bussing tables. Both his love of words and Kristina have endured and prospered to this day. The graduation speaker at Ford’s commencement in 1966 was Vice President Hubert Humphrey; now Ford will be in that role as the 2013 speaker for MSU’s advanced degree recipients. Ford will speak at 3:30 p.m. at the Breslin Center and also will receive an honorary doctorate of fine arts.

Ford’s selection as graduation speaker is singularly unique since he is the only MSU graduate who has won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction writing to address a graduating class. It might be some time before someone else gains that distinction since he is the only MSU grad to have won the Pulitzer fiction award.

The author won the Pulitzer for the 1995 book “Independence Day” (it’s not about aliens) about a middle age real estate salesman who is confronting the demons in his life.

Ford’s novels and his short story collections are about life: life gone astray; life gone wrong and life confronting death. Ford is a master of condensing complex storytelling into a long weekend or a short business trip.

“Independence Day” was the middle book of a trilogy following Frank Bascombe from a young man in “Sportswriter” to and an older man in “The Lay of the Land.” Ford is a meticulous researcher and often an idea for a novel derives from an experience in his own life. As a young writer, Ford took a job with the sports magazine “Inside Sports” until fate intervened and it folded in 1982. It was then he returned to writing fiction full time.

Ford’s papers are held in Michigan State University’s Special Collections and provide great insight into how a writer goes about writing a novel.

Actor and director Tim Bussfield (Revenge of the Nerds, West Wing) will speak to undergraduates at 1 p.m. convocation ceremonies. Tickets to graduation are not required and are free to the public.

New book on the mother of the Civil Rights Movement

admin — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 00:25:33 +0000

I thought by now most of us knew that Rosa Parks’ act of civil disobedience in 1955 was done not because she was tired; not because of happenstance, but rather based on careful planning and execution by a long-time veteran of the Civil Rights Movement. That’s what I thought until I heard President Obama cite the same lame old reason for Parks’ refusal to give up her seat on a bus to white person (“just wanting to get home.)”

A new book “The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks” by Jeanne Theoharis makes the case clear that Rosa Parks was working with a plan to undermine the commonplace Jim Crow laws which required blacks to give up their seats to whites. Her action led to the 381 day Montgomery bus boycott which also brought Martin Luther King to the forefront.

Parks’ role in the momentous changes that were about to begin was mostly overlooked as Theoharis tells in her new book. She relates that Parks’ was not allowed to speak at a meeting called to rally more than 15,000 supporters. When photos of the organizers were taken Parks was nowhere to be seen.

A short while after her refusal to leave her seat she and her husband relocated to Detroit where for nearly a decade the family lived day-to-day until she landed a job with Representative John Conyers where she worked from 1965 until 1988. Much of the biography is focused on her life after she moved to Detroit and came in close contact with Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, and other Black Power proponents. I recall seeing Rosa Parks at the Million Man March in Washington D.C. and she was quite the hit being short and to the point while Louis Farrakhan went on for hours. Parks always knew how to make a point without a lot of words getting in the way.

Visit the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn and check out the bus which carried Rosa Parks into history.

The Antiquarian book show is better than Christmas for bibliophiles

admin — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 21:19:34 +0000

Matt Meyer book dealer

The 57th Michigan Antiquarian Book and Paper Show sponsored by the Mid-Michigan Antiquarian Book Dealers Association is once again hosting the Midwest’s largest book and paper show (Sunday, April 7, Lansing Center). The show which features more than a million old, rare and collectible items is organized by Ray Walsh, owner of Curious Book Shop, and is coming to Lansing Sunday April 7 at the Lansing Center in downtown Lansing. The show, the largest of its type in the Midwest, brings together more than 75 dealers from across the U.S., but especially the Midwest.

According to the show’s founder and impresario Ray Walsh who also owns two East Lansing book stores there will be one million collectible books, paper items and post cards for sale. If you are looking for a book on flying planes or an autographed Hemingway novel you are likely to find it at the show. The show is open from 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m. and admission is $4.50. Check out this week’s Lansing City Pulse for a complete list of dealers. Read more about the show at the Curious Book Shop blog.

Each show sees different dealers but loyal customers of Matt Meyer’s This Old Book (Booth #54) may have wondered why this long-time bookseller didn’t exhibit at the last Antiquarian Book Show in October.

He blames it on the weather. Meyer, who does about 12-14 shows a year, many of them outdoors, had set up at local antique mall in the Chicago area when word was passed that a big storm was going to hit. Meyer covered his book shelves with tarps and got set to wait the storm out.

“I was ready, but not for 60 mile an hour winds,” he said. Meyer said 90 percent of his stock was lost when the tarps took off like kites and the book shelves toppled exposing his books to the torrential rain.

“Most of the stock went into the dumpster,” he said. That was the downside, but Meyer said there was an upside since he admits much of his inventory was “old and stale.”

“I was able to clear out the old inventory and I’ve been hunting ever since,” he said.

Meyer, who began selling at the Michigan Antiquarian Book & Paper Show more than a decade ago with his mother, Dorothy Meyer, said “I learned from her.”

“It’s a hobby and a passion for me.” In addition to the large collection of children’s books, he will be bringing a general line of books to the sale in categories as varied as military, historical, sports, hunting and fishing and sports.

Meyer said he stays away from general fiction since he’s noticed in the last few years that buyers are attracted to more specific interests.

This Old Book is known for what Meyer calls “books in good condition and priced to sell.” He said he sells most books in the range of $8- 10 and wagers that “he sells more books, by volume, than any other bookseller there.”

Meyer said when he reads it’s mostly in the categories of Civil War and the American West, but once he’s done he sells them. He said he does have a small collec tion of books that have what he calls “great dust jacket art such as Zane Grey’s ‘The Young Pitcher’ and Edgar Rice Burroughs’ old Tarzan books.”

The Brookfield Illinois bookseller said even though he does some highly rated shows throughout the year he said the Lansing show is much better than all of them.

“It’s very well attended and the attendees have a passion for books.”

Meyer still enjoys “the thrill of the hunt” and says that the Chicago area is a good place to do it.

Also this year the Book Show is sharing the Lansing Center with an annual anime convention and sale which should make for an interesting highlight reel.

Get behind the wheel for Poetry/a/Day

admin — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 22:07:15 +0000

Lansing Online News is celebrating National Poetry Month for the fourth year in a row starting Monday April 1 and once again we’ve lined up some amazing poets. Each day in April we will be posting a poem/a/day from local, Michigan and national poets. We are still slotting some poems in so if you would like to submit a poem of any style or theme get cracking.

The Poem/a/Day project was started not only in recognition of National Poetry Month, but also to honor Michigan poet and journalist Edgar Guest who during his 40 year career at the Detroit Free Press wrote more than 15,000 poems for publication in the daily newspaper. He never missed a deadline and apparently never had writer’s block.

You can submit your poem to Lansing Online News by emailing castanier AT sbcglobal.net. Please put the word poem in the subject line. By emailing a poem to us verifies that we have the rights to publish the poem online and to illustrate it.

Also include a short (three or four line) biography of yourself, include your website URL or Facebook page if you would like a link included. You may also provide artwork or a photograph to illustrate the poem but that is not a requirement.

Artists photographers and illustrators may also submit artwork to illustrate poems. Email us with POEM ART in the sibject line.

And get ready to tweet at #LONPoem. You can submit as many 140 word tweet poems as you wish and also comment on poetry in general. Poets to your meter, get ready, get set, go.

Grab life by the throat

admin — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 23:45:24 +0000

April is National Poetry Month, and, like the flowers it often celebrates, poetry is about to spring forth all around town. Michigan State University’s Residential College in the Arts and Humanities’ Center for Poetry has several activities planned for the month, including three poetry readings, a poetic chalking of a section of the Lansing River Trail, Poetry in Motion, which is hitching a ride on local CATA buses for the second year in a row and Lansing Online News third annual Poem a Day.

Stephen L. Esquith, dean of RCAH, said that the poetry reading workshops and other activities bring community members outside the university into contact with students, faculty and poets.

“It is distinctive in terms of engaged learning,” he said. “The workshops allow poets to be candid about how poetry is conceived, the struggles of being a poet, and to reflect on the craft of poetry. It enriches our common good and makes us think carefully and slowly as the world goes by.”

Chicago poet Li-Young Lee, the son of exiled Chinese parents who moved to the U.S. to escape the anti-Chinese attitudes of Indonesia, will take the first turn on RCAH’s podium at 7 p.m. April 3. Lee has written four books of poetry focused on what has been described as the “beauty of humanity.”

Next up is University of Michigan Professor Laura Kasischke, who will read from her work at 7 p.m. April 10. Her poetry explores her personal life and basic human desires. Kasischke recently won the prestigious National Books Critics Circle Award for poetry for her book, “Space, in Chains.” She also has written eight novels, including four that have been made into movies; her novel “The Life Before Her Eyes” was made into a movie of the same name starring Uma Thurman. Kasischke, who grew up in Grand Rapids, will talk about her philosophy for teaching and writing poetry.

“Poets can’t think of anything they’d rather do than write poetry,” she said. “I am someone who believes that writing brings on inspiration.” She said that this is in contrast to the belief that you have to be highly inspired by something to write.

Kasischke teaches in the fine arts program at U of M, her alma mater. She said today’s students are more ambitious and better organized than she and her contemporaries were. She attributes much of that to colleges’ costing three times as much.

“There’s a little more fear about the economy,” Kasichke said. She said she strongly believes that the world needs poets.”

“Poetry expresses the human experience in ways people need to be less alone,” she said. “The brevity is powerful.”

Over the years, she said she has changed her own poetry and now finds herself working in shorter lines, using less narrative. Another change she’s noted is that she finds modern writers are less embarrassed to identify themselves as poets.

The final visiting poet Carl Phillips, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis. His work, which is greatly influenced by his love of classical languages, mostly deals with the sexuality of gay males, morality and spirituality. Phillips has won numerous awards such as the Theodore Roethke Memorial Foundation Poetry Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award. He will be at the RCAH Center for Poetry at 7 p.m. April 17.

In addition to poetry readings, each guest poet will meet with students and community members at 3 p.m. on the day of their appearance to discuss poetry. All poetry readings and community conversations will be held in Snyder Hall on MSU’s campus.

Starting in April, CATA buses (mostly on major routes and serving campus) will carry 12 different poetic posters celebrating poetry for Poetry in Motion. The posters, designed by MSU graphic design students, contain quotes from notable poets, such as an excerpt from Amy Newman’s “Dear Editor”: “Let my words be acceptable to you / to magnify and be magnified / In order that we may one day be fully aware of whatever gift has been sent our way / even though it’s obvious to me there isn’t anything to see / to actually see.”

On April 15, the section of the Lansing River Trail just off Farm Lane will be chalked for the seventh year in a row with poetry and art. Stephanie Glazier, acting director of the Center for Poetry, said the chalking is a way of repurposing the space, which has a less-than-glowing public image. Glazier, a 2008 MSU graduate and a 2012 Antioch graduate in poetry, said the poetry month celebration’s goal is to serve the larger community.

“Poetry is the missing piece in arts education,” she said.

MSU has a rich poetic history. Noted Michigan poet Theodore Roethke taught at MSU in 1935-‘36 when it was still called Michigan State College of Agriculture and Applied Science. He once climbed out of window and onto a ledge at Morrill Hall as a means to motivate his students. He was fired soon afterward, but went on to win a Pulitzer and two National Book awards. The outspoken poet who grew up in Saginaw once described poetry as “our defense against hysteria and death.”

But just maybe he was inspired by another “Michigan” poet, Robert Frost (he spent two years at the University of Michigan), who famously wrote: “Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.”

And please visit Lansing Online News each day in April to read a poem by a Michigan Poet.