My Long Journey with The Grapes of Wrath

I’ve just been informed that I’m to portray Ma Joad in Prescott Center for the Arts’ upcoming production of THE GRAPES OF WRATH.  John Steinbeck’s book had a seminal effect on me when I read it in my early teens.  It asked of me that I step outside myself and really see a wider world, one that I could only visit through the covers of a book.

At the end of the novel the Joad family has met with disaster after fleeing the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma to go to the promised land of California.   Rose of Sharon's baby is still born, the rains come and they move to higher ground and shelter, where Ma Joad and Rose of Sharon discover a man too sick from starvation to eat solid food. And so Rose of Sharon offers him the milk from her breast. That image shocked me as a teen--the baring of a breast, the offering of it not to an infant but to a grown person, a stranger and finally a man.  How stripped of our trappings of civilized society must we be to commit such an act!  How desperate must our starved body be to overcome the usual dictates of the mind.   In time I understood some of the levels of meaning in the image--the sacrifice of convention for survival, the basic human need to replace loss with renewal and the sometimes surprising and ultimately inspiring act to extend our humanity to include the stranger, the Other.  So it may well be John Steinbeck provided my earliest inspiration to look beyond the universe of the Self.

It’s interesting to note that reading the play in preparation for the audition was my inspiration to focus on The Immigrant Experience for The Artist’s Path 2016 Festival.  I realized that these good people driven out of their homes by Mother Nature, a failing economy and sometimes ruthless bankers were immigrants.  While not moving to another country they were seeking a new life in a land very different from the plains of Oklahoma.  Steinbeck wrote:  “I want to put a tag of shame on the greedy bastards who are responsible for this [the Great Depression and its effects].”   Later when finished with the book, he said, “I’ve done my damndest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags.”

Wickipedia offers the following summation:

Steinbeck scholar John Timmerman sums up the book's influence: "The Grapes of Wrath may well be the most thoroughly discussed novel – in criticism, reviews, and college classrooms – of 20th century American Literature.  The Grapes of Wrath is referred to as a Great American Novel.

          

The book was noted for Steinbeck's passionate depiction of the plight of the poor, and many of his  contemporaries attacked his social and political views. Bryan Cordyack writes, "Steinbeck was attacked as a propagandist and a socialist  from both the left and the right of the political spectrum. They denounced the book as a 'pack of lies' and labeled it 'communist propaganda.  Some accused Steinbeck of exaggerating camp conditions to make a political point. Steinbeck had visited the camps well before publication of the novel and argued their inhumane nature destroyed the settlers' spirit.

I cannot help but note the parallels between the collapse of the economy in 1929 and our more recent Recession of 2008.  Many folks including this writer have not recovered from the effects of this most recent financial debacle.

But literary and political criticism aside, the book and the play give us an opportunity to celebrate the resilience and compassion of humanity.  I am grateful to be a part of this American icon.

Tickets at   http://pfaa.net/main-stage.html

On Reading

I have a habit of reading three to four books simultaneously.  Not sure how that started.  Probably wanted a book at hand wherever I might be just in case I wanted to read.  Right now I am in the middle of Rutherford’s treatment of Russian history, J D Robb’s mystery set in 2160 in NYC, Diana Gabaldon’s latest tome on the Claire/Jamie Fraser saga and Carl Hitchens’ book of poems and memoir of his time in Vietnam.

I don’t plan what I’m going to read, but I find that at the moment I am steeped in the war strategy and tactics of the steppes with horses, arrows, swords and armor, the blazing heat of the summer of 1778 when Washington attacked the rear guard of the British General Clinton’s withdrawal from Philadelphia to NYC, the mind numbing, soul shattering, slogs through Southeast Asia where luck plays fickle games with your future, and the clean wounds of laser guns that can still deal death as well as the sword on the steppes, but with less blood, all in service of the millions who try to live cheek by jowl in the New York City thirty-five years ahead in the author’s imagination. 

No wonder I retreat to Netflix to watch an episode of Monarch of the Glen—a  sweet, humorous, innocuous treatment of life in the  present day highlands of Scotland where the greatest problem is the occasional poaching of a salmon from the laird’s stream, the flooding in the wine cellar, or guessing who the young laird will choose to marry.

And yet I would not sacrifice any of these for the other.  They each give me something.  And I am so grateful to the writers who spend many hours of solitude and research bringing their creations to us.  Oh to have enough lifetimes to read everything I wish to read and see all the plays and films as well.  And then there are all the conversations to have…Ah well…Perhaps I’ll return for the moment to the cool, damp hills of Scotland.  Cup of tea anyone?  With warm scones of course!!!

Life is Like Coffee

Lost this post while editing.  Feel free to write how Life is like coffee in the comment section...

And these few precious days I'll spend with you...

For reasons that are unclear to me at the moment, I ventured into the garage today where shelves sag under the weight of hundreds of dusty but well loved books.  Of course what I was looking for was at the tippy, top.  Moving stacked books and boxes aside I placed a foot stool in the cleared space and with long tongs attempted to grab the book.  On the third attempt I wound up with the book falling on my left toe.  At least I had it.  Limping into the kitchen, I wiped it off with a damp cloth and then sat on the couch to page through my 1962 Galena Park High School yearbook. 

  

Egad 51 years since graduation.  How in the hell is that possible? As I put the book on my lap, a graduation card falls out along with a calling card embossed in my maiden name. Not you understand that I ever called on anyone, leaving a card behind on a silver plate. Did anyone in Galena Park do that in the '60's?!?  The greeting card is from my paternal grandparents. It is the only thing I have from them in their hand writing and I just found it today.

The yearbook is very heavy, about 12"x 9"x1", bound in fake white leather with gold embossed lettering.  The word Jacket is on the front because we were the Yellow Jackets, along with the school emblem and 1962 with gold rays radiating out.  I haven't seen any recent yearbooks so I don't know if they've changed much.  Mine is a treasure trove of photos of staff, faculty, students from three grades, and poor attempts at candid shots of activities and clubs.

The inside front and back covers  show a lone male student sitting on a bleacher.  Not sure what to make of that.  Of course this is Texas and football is king.  But across from the young man are the following lines  from the pen of Sara Teasdale:

Into my heart's treasury

   I slipped a coin

That time cannot take

   Nor a thief purloin--

Oh, better than the minting

   Of a gold-crowned king

Is the safe-kept memory

Of a lovely thing.

Certainly a not unfitting verse for a yearbook.   I do wonder who chose it.  I assume it was a teacher. I don't remember many, hmmm, any poets in my class, but then maybe I just never met them.  As I turn each page, I realize that so many memories from that time are gone.  Yet the book does serve to evoke some.  What has struck me also is how terribly smooth and innocent are all the faces.  Fifty-one years change us somewhat.  Gravity gains the upper hand; illness, accidents, childbirth, work shape our bodies;  disappointments and success, sorrows and joys etch our faces.  We all look so unformed then and yet at 17 or 18 we carry within us a blueprint set by almost two decades of living that has the potential for only so much change.  As my cousin said recently we can modify behaviors but not our essence.

Gail & Neal, circa 1961 when the photo would have been taken.

Prim and Proper are the words that come to mind as well as I thumb through the photos. There's not one mischievous look among the hundreds of expressions.  Bland...that's the word.  And yet I know these classmates were not bland.  Why could not the photos have reflected some animation, some angst, some self reflection, some exuberance?  It's all very careful, cautious.  I wonder what the photos from the year 1968 or 69 look like as Texas finally enters the hippie era.

When I graduated,  it was the custom to sign each other's yearbooks.  You would sit somewhere, pen in hand and sign your name over all the pictures of yourself.  Of course the popular kids have the most pictures.  The next level of autographs includes an endearment and one's name over the picture.  Then comes notes written on pages with a bit of blank area.  These notes usually tell you what the person writing thought of you and your chances of succeeding in life.  Sometimes there is a pro forma feel to these notes, like this one...'You are very sweet and nice.  Continue to smile and have fun', or this one  'You are a smart and pretty girl. It's been fun knowing you'.  I never thought of myself as sweet.  I tried to be nice.  Did I smile a lot?  Did I have fun?  My perception of myself in those years simply does not stack up against what is written.  So was I who they thought I was or who I thought I was?  Eek....

Then comes those who know you a bit better or you've had more classes with them or they are actual friends.  And then there is the best friend.  She wrote among other things, 'Here's hoping your friendship will never end but continue wherever we may be'.  And it has.  We've managed to stay in touch though we see each other infrequently.  Her life, beliefs, interests are very different from mine and yet we still share whatever initially drew two eighth grade girls together to talk hours on end about life and what it might bring.  And then there are the few notes written by teachers.  I come across one that quite surprises me as I don't really remember him.  A history teacher, he writes...

"The best is yet to be", the poet sings, And so it is.

No one wants to be detained.

All progress moves on what has been.

"The last for which the first was made."

I'm ever grateful for you.

Sincerely,

Dick Gwyn

It's lovely and I haven't read it in probably a half century.  What did I do to make him grateful I wonder?   I hope my work, my behavior validated his work as a teacher.  As a former student of the '60's and a former teacher as well, I know that we students and teachers  seldom disclose what we feel about one another unless it's in frustration or anger.  I'm grateful that Dick Gwyn wrote this so that though memory fails me I still have a  'safe kept memory of a lovely thing.' 

Finally there is near the beginning of the yearbook, a flyleaf, a blank page and at the top in my 17 year old hand writing is the word Reserved.  This is the page for the guy or gal in your life at that point in time.  In my case, his name was Neal.  I suppose he won my heart for many reasons.  Oh there were the givens.  He was handsome, dark curly almost black hair, blue eyes and a devastating smile.  But he also had a fine intellect, a beautiful command and appreciation of language.  He once hand copied one of Elisabeth Barrett Browning's sonnets and passed it to me in Mrs. Manley's junior English class.  It's the one that begins, 'Go from me, yet I feel I shall stand henceforward in thy shadow'.  Hauntingly beautiful, I was almost in tears as I read it surreptitiously.  So this page was saved for him.

It begins with 'Dearest'  and continues with a promise to always be there if needed, and ends with 'All my love'.  He signs it simply, Neal.  So many of the other notes which end with a single first name remain a mystery.  Who wrote this?  Why didn't they put a last name so I can look up their  picture and perhaps recall them.  I've not forgotten Neal's last name because a year or so later he proposed.  We married on October 16, 1965 and I've shared his name for close to 50 years. I plan to hold him to his promise.

Mr. Gwyn and Mr. Browning had it right...

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in His hand
Who saith "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!"

By Robert Browning, Opening  Stanza of "Rabbi Ben Ezra"

Neal & Gail circa 2007  Prescott, AZ

  

Gail Mangham, August 26, 2013

Take a Look at Me Now...

In 1983/84 I was teaching at Cheyenne Mtn High School in Colorado Springs. A lifetime ago. For two periods I drove a short distance to the junior high to teach two classes of Communications. One day I decided that the classes should write, produce, direct and perform a show. We began by dividing into small groups, brainstorming ideas which bit by bit turned into scenes, monologues and sometimes very brief glimpses of life in junior high in those in between moments during the changing of classes.

The students tackled all the big issues from premarital sex to suicide to what to wear or how much makeup to wear, peer pressure, virtually everything. Early on the choir wanted in on the project. And so we included music to underscore scenes or introduce them. The back drop was a series of joined flats painted to resemble lockers and recordings of the school bell punctuated the script with students running across stage during a change of class and freezing while one or two students played out a bit of silliness that took a humorous look at a day in the life of. The bell would ring and all would rush off to class and then a scene would ensue.

I decided to use Phil Collins' song Against All Odds, focusing on the imperative Take a Look at Me Now as the theme song. It was a call to parents attending the show to really look at their kids because who they were, during these moments on this cafeteria stage, was already changing and before they knew it their memory of these teen years would be faded. So take a look, a close look. Of course my own three sons ranged in age from 6 to 17, so I was feeling the galloping pace of time in my own life. But the show was also a call to the kids to stop and assess, step outside themselves if possible and see the self at this moment in time. They would never pass this way again.

I stood at the back of the cafeteria and watched the work of these wonderful young people. I also watched the parents watching their sons and daughters. Their faces were rapt. Many openly wept. They got it! It was one of my proudest moments as a teacher.
 

Recently a student from the high school from that year found me on Facebook and I wonder if there are any students from that junior high class in Communications who remember that production with the sort of nostalgia I experience and who are on Facebook.

 I remember one young man in particular. He wore a black leather motorcycle jacket, hair cut in a Mohawk, perhaps a bit quiet, but my best writer. Where is he? I hope that experience meant something to him. I hope he remembers. I hope he took a look at himself and his cohorts in creating art and found inspiration. I did.

Gail Mangham
Proud Faculty Member for too brief at time of Theatre, Speech & Communications at Cheyenne Mtn High School and Junior High, Colorado Springs.

 

Phil Collins sings Against all Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OiV_5kEt6A