C&Pasted from the Writer's Alamanc by Garrison Keillor... I think there's
something in here for most everyone...
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Poem: "Peace" by C. K. Williams, from Love About Love © Ausable Press, 2001.
Reprinted with permission.
Peace
We fight for hours, through dinner, through the endless evening,
who even knows now what about,
what could be so dire to have to suffer so for, stuck in one another's
craws like fishbones,
the cadavers of our argument dissected, flayed, but we go on with
it, to bed, and through the night,
feigning sleep, dreaming sleep, hardly sleeping, so precisely never
touching, back to back,
the blanket bridged across us for the wintry air to tunnel down, to
keep us lifting, turning,
through the angry dark that holds us in its cup of pain, the aching
dark, the weary dark,
then, toward dawn, I can't help it, though justice won't I know be
served, I pull her to me,
and with such accurate, graceful deftness she rolls to me that we
arrive embracing our entire lengths.
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Literary and Historical Notes:
Today is a big day in the history of the English language. On this day, in
1066, William the Conqueror of Normandy arrived on British soil. Having
defeated the British in the Battle of Hastings and on Christmas day he was
crowned the King in Westminster Abby.
At the time the British were speaking a combination of Saxon and Old Norse.
The Normans, of course, spoke French, and over time the languages blended.
To the Saxon word "house" came the Norman word "mansion." To the Saxon word
"cow" came the Norman word "beef" and so on.
So the English language now contains more than a million words, one of the
most diverse languages on earth. Cyril Connelly wrote, "The English language
is like a broad river ... being polluted by a string of refuse-barges
tipping out their muck." But Walt Whitman said, "The English language is the
accretion and growth of every dialect, race, and range of time, and is both
the free and compacted composition of all."
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It's the birthday of John Sayles, (books by this author) born in
Schenectady, New York (1950). He's one of the few writers who went on to
become a successful filmmaker. His first novel was Pride of the Bimbos
(1975), about five men who make a living playing exhibition baseball dressed
as women.
He got his first screenwriting job on a horror movie called Piranha. He
said, "My whole job was to contrive a reason why people, once they hear
there are piranhas in the river, don't just stay out of the river but end up
getting eaten. That's basically what they paid me $10,000 for."
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It's the birthday of Ed Sullivan, born in New York City (1902). He was
writing a gossip column for the New York Daily News called "Little Old New
York," moonlighting now and then as a master of ceremonies at variety shows
and benefits. He was emceeing a dance contest when somebody asked him if
he'd like to try hosting a show on this new thing called television.
The Ed Sullivan Show premiered live on CBS in 1948, and within a few years
about 50 million people watched it every Sunday night. It was like
vaudeville. It had opera singers, ventriloquists and magicians and pandas on
roller skates and big stars. Ed Sullivan said, "Open big, have a good comedy
act, put in something for children, and keep the show clean."
He was a shy, awkward man, but he loved performers. He personally chose
every guest for his show. He was one of the first hosts to invite black
performers, including Jackie Robinson, Duke Ellington, Richard Pryor, and
James Brown.
Ed Sullivan: the last television host who tried to appeal to everyone in
America.
