Denis Horgan Speaks Here February 8

For many years, Denis Horgan has delighted Connecticut readers with his mixture of gentle musings, subtle but rapier-like wit, and occasional rage against the insanities of our world. For more than two decades he did this in the pages of the Hartford Courant, providing a place you could quickly turn to for a bi-weekly fix of insight. For the past nine years this work has been online (www.denishorgan.com), and in recent times he's turned his hand to fiction.

On Wednesday, February 8, at 5:30 p.m., Horgan brings his compelling skill in relaying information to the stage at The Mark Twain House & Museum.

It's an appropriate place. Horgan combines the laidback, self-effacing qualities of Sam Clemens' neighbor, journalist and essayist Charles Dudley Warner, with the fire that led Twain himself to warm up his pen in hell.

Horgan's latest book is Ninety-Eight Point Six ...and Other Stories (Ladder Press), a collection of tales that relate to the story of human identity -- how people are "defined by happenstance, by odd decisions and accumulations in their lives." He will read from the book and speak on the subject "Storytelling: Our New Golden Age."

"Yes, I will read from the book as well as discuss writing," says Horgan: "both my own richly varied experiences and the opportunities now open to everyone that simply didn't exist a few years ago. As traditional publishing lumbers along in some Dickensian business model, the world of the Web and its razzle-dazzle gear has created a golden age for storytellers."

The event is free, and will be preceded by a reception at 5:00 p.m. A booksigning will follow the talk.

Ninety-Eight Point Six includes 13 brief, O. Henry-esque tales of human beings finding out, in odd ways, who they are -- or wondering if they'll ever know. The driver of a junker loaner car finds people treat him with a new respect, if not fear. A man meets his identity thief. A woman sets up a new life for herself on Facebook.

Says Blogger Emily Rosenbaum: "By far, my favorite story was 'The English Aisles,' the story of a grocery store manager who torments his customers by moving items all around the store. I kept trying to read lines aloud to my husband, but I was laughing too hard to do so. If I were organizing a grocery store, that's exactly how I'd do it."

Denis Horgan says he was "born in a Boston taxicab during a Thanksgiving snowstorm which didn't quite make it to the hospital on time. Whether auspicious or merely suspicious, such a beginning is likely to shape how you look on the world."

After college and the Army, he started as a copyboy at the Boston Globe, and worked as reporter, editor, columnist for publications including the Bangkok World, the Washington Star and the Courant. He is the author of the essay collections Sharks in the Bathtub and Flotsam: A Life in Debris and the novel The Dawn of Days. He has won many awards and honors for his work, and says his "principal vice is an addiction to the Boston Red Sox."

Horgan's appearance launches a spring series of events in the Writing at the Mark Twain House program. These include a novel-writing workshop by Susan Schoenberger on March 2, our popular eight-week memoir class taught by Lary Bloom and Suzanne Levine starting March 7, and a Writer's Weekend keynoted by famed Harper's editor emeritus Lewis Lapham on April 20-21. (For details on these, see http://www.marktwainhouse.org/).

THE RESURRECTION OF THE WRITING AT THE MARK TWAIN HOUSE BLOG!

Admittedly, it's been a while since this blog, created with the best intentions a while back, has been updated. But Writing at the Mark Twain House, the program that has brought classes for budding memoirists and novelists back to Nook Farm over the past two years, has been thriving. Instead of blogging about about it, we've Actually Been Doing It.

The program has grown to a point that it underwent an expansion last year (two classes in the fall). It will be expanding again this year, with a Writers' Weekend and other events adding to the ever-popular March-April workshop led by Lary Bloom and Suzanne Levine, A Class in Memoir.


The Writers' Weekend runs April 20-21 and will be keynoted by the legendary editor of Harper's magazine, Lewis Lapham, an essayist whose work has been compared to Twain's -- he has provided incisive commentary on the passing scene for many decades and fostered the work of many of America's best-read writers.

Leading up to the weekend will be three important literary events: an appearance by longtime columnist and author Denis Horgan, celebrating the stories that are in us all, innovative ways of publishing, and his own new short story collection (Wednesday, February 8, 5:00 p.m.); an afternoon-long writing workshop with novelist Susan Schoenberger on "Getting Started" and "The Big Idea" (Saturday, March 3, at 1:00 p.m.); and of course, the acclaimed memoir class taught by longtime editors, authors and teachers Bloom and Levine (starts March 7, registration deadline February 15).

Watch this space for updates and details, cal lme at 860-247-0998, Ext, 243, or email steve.courtney@marktwainhouse.org.

-- Steve Courtneyt

Susan Campbell's Non-Fiction Class

They pledged to continue the conversation online -- that extraordinary collection of writers who met for six sessions in the Mark Twain House & Museum classroom during November and December 2010. Susan Campbell, the feisty Hartford Courant columnist whose memoir of religion and feminism, Dating Jesus, has won praise and prizes, provided wild in-class writing exercises ("Write down what Elizabeth Edwards would be telling John from Heaven"), led far-ranging and passionate discussions. The participants, in turn, wrote heartfelt pieces, ranging from intimate memoirs to biography to strong expository prose. Selections from the works of these students and their teacher (who found the experience profoundly engaging and educating herself) will be appearing on this blog soon. -- Steve Courtney

Lary Bloom wins Lifetime Achievement Award from Connecticut Center for the Book

Lary Bloom, the longtime editor, writer and teacher, has been designated this year's winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Connecticut Center for the Book. Lary, of course, taught our memoir class this past spring along with Suzanne Levine, and suggested the idea of Writing at the Mark Twain House.

At the same ceremony, Susan Campbell, teacher of our fall Creative Non-Fiction Class, won the Connecticut Book Award for her memoir of fundamentalism and feminism, Dating Jesus.

Congratulations to Lary and Susan!

...and to Suzanne Levine, whose book of poetry Haberdasher's Daughter recently came out (read about it here).

...and to Bessy Reyna, whose Memoirs of the Unfaithful Lover has been out for a while now! Read about it here. To bring things full circle, Bessy, who has long provided a strong and principled voice, along with a powerful lyric style, to her poetry, was last year's Lifetime Achievement winner. -- Steve Courtney

"Play Ball" by Beverly LeConche

This post and those following are by students in Lary Bloom's and Suzanne Levine's Memoir class, Spring 2010.

The day I was born the Red Sox won a double header against the Washington Senators, 5-4 and 10-4.

About 10 years later my father started taking the family to Yankee baseball games in New York. I remember him driving through the heavy traffic and swearing at the crazy city drivers. Many times we visited Yankee Stadium to cheer on the Bronx Bombers. That was the old Yankee Stadium, the real Yankee Stadium. I’ve never been to the new one. Around the time I started high school, we stopped going to ballgames. I guess maybe the New York City traffic got to be too much for my father, or maybe he just got bored with the Yankees.

My mother tells me that, as a child, I would insist on sitting in front of the TV with my father to watch baseball. She says I asked a million questions: Why are they getting a new pitcher? What’s a balk? Why is the batter out if he didn’t swing at the ball? My mother never cared about baseball. She went to the games with us, but didn’t pay attention. She’s 89 now and still doesn’t get it.

My younger brother was born a Yankees fan. He had 8 X 10 Yankee publicity photos on his bedroom wall and made anyone entering his room memorize all the players’ names: Cletus Boyer, Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Bobby Richardson, Roger Maris, Elston Howard, Yogi Berra. If I went into his room, I had to recite their names. He collected baseball cards, too. Now he wonders what happened to his baseball card collection. He figures my mother, a clean freak, threw them out along with his Beatles cards. Fifty years later, my brother still roots for the Yankees.

My father and I, on the other hand, finally saw the light and became Red Sox fans in 1967, the year of the Red Sox Impossible Dream, when they reached the World Series for the first time in 21 years. It was impossible not to be a Sox fan after that. A few years later, I thought I was a Minnesota Twins fan for a while, because I was in love with Harmon Killebrew. I even named my first car Harmon. It was a 1970 Ford Maverick. But that affair didn’t last long. I soon switched back to the Sox.

My family spent several weeks every summer at Chapman Beach in Westbrook. We always had a portable radio with us on the beach, tuned to the Yankee games. I can still hear Mel Allen (and later Phil Rizzuto) yelling “Holy cow!” when the Yanks scored a run. Those were my favorite days. There was nothing to do on those long summer days but swim, sit on the beach, and listen to baseball.

In the Wethersfield house my family lived in for 30 years, if you looked closely, you could see where one of the spokes on the staircase had been repaired. My brother cracked it in 1960, angry that the Pirates beat the Yankees in the World Series. He still gets angry when his team loses.

In 1969, the Mets finally went from being the laughing stock of baseball to being in the World Series. That was back when they used to play day games. I was a student at UCONN and used to rush back from my last class each day to watch the Series. Some students didn’t bother going to class at all. They stayed in the dorm in front of the TV. The Mets won the Series. Everyone cheered including me. In college I met a fellow Red Sox fan. She was from Rhode Island and didn’t mind driving in Boston traffic, so she drove Harmon to Fenway Park. We saw about five or six games a year for those four years we were at UConn. Then we graduated. She got married, and moved to Virginia.

I joined VISTA and was sent to Arizona. That was 1972, the year of the baseball players’ strike. I know, because I had tickets to a game I never got to see. I mailed the tickets from Arizona to a friend in Connecticut, but I don’t think he ever used them. It doesn’t matter, though; back then it only cost $6.50 for box seats along the first base line.

I missed the Sox for the nine years I lived in Arizona, but at least I could watch spring training. The San Francisco Giants trained in my town, Casa Grande, and a hotel in town had and still has a swimming pool in the shape of a baseball bat and a wading pool in the shape of a ball. I did get to see the 1975 World Series on TV, and the famous scene with Carlton Fisk waving his arms at the ball to stay fair. That was the greatest game ever, but the Sox lost the Series. My brother sent me a sympathy card which I still have. I reciprocated by sending him one the following year when the Yankees lost to Cincinnati.

I own my own home now and have a craft room that is decorated with Red Sox banners, memorabilia, and photos, and each year at Christmas, one of my trees is decorated totally with Red Sox ornaments.

My niece got married two years ago. The day she got married the Sox were playing the Yankees. My brother, the father of the bride, grabbed the microphone and announced to all present, how happy he was on this joyous occasion, and by the way, the Yankees were whipping the Red Sox 10-3. My grand-nephew, Gabriel, was born last August 31. For Christmas he received a Yankees hat from my brother and a Red Sox layette and bib from me, both of us trying to make sure Gabe got started off on the right foot.

My father lived to be ninety years old. The night before he died, the Sox played the Yankees at Fenway. We called an ambulance to take my father to Hartford Hospital because he couldn’t breathe. As he was being wheeled into the emergency room, just hours before he died, he asked, “Are the Sox winning?”

"Unexpected Gifts" by Charlene O'Sullivan Distefano

“I wasn't there that morning when my Father passed away. I didn't get to tell him all the things I had to say. I think I caught his spirit later that same year...I just wish I could have told him in the living years.” – from the song “The Living Years” by Mike Rutherford and B.A. Robertson

I sat in my childhood home in New Britain, Connecticut, in Dad's 1960s-decorated kitchen, counting his weekly pills into morning and evening doses, and reflected that I was now taking care of Charles “Chappy” O'Sullivan, who had taken care of me his entire life. We had just returned from making pre-paid funeral arrangements for both him and Mom, whose debilitating stroke had left her in a nursing home, never to recover or return home. Dad would be waked from the Irish funeral home in town, Mom from the Swedish.

My year-long layoff from Aetna from dried-up project funding would gift me with time to enjoy Dad's company as never before.

Dad and I reviewed the contents of their safe deposit box, including details of how my birth parents gifted me to my parents, and Mom's letter to the adoption agency presciently recounting what a wonderful father Dad would make.

I took Dad to lunches, and once ordered a pricey wine just to “get his goat.” Sure enough, he said, “Are you crazy?” and then enjoyed the wine immensely. That bottle remains a treasured memento.

Dad ate suppers with us, wearing his royal blue spring jacket (as our home's cool temperature did not mix well with his poor circulation). He told bad jokes and entertaining stories, mainly about serving in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camps during the Great Depression. He had asked for a tour in the Pacific Northwest, but when the trains unloaded, the young men found themselves in Vermont and later Maine.

Dad and Dave once put lobsters in a pot, and we heard a high pitched moan. Dave and I cringed, thinking the lobsters were crying out for mercy. Dad's Irish eyes twinkled; he had made the noise himself.

My uncles drove Dad to the dog track or casino, right after he got “tanked up” from his monthly transfusions.

Dad devotedly visited Mom every day, shuffling down the hall while shouldering his portable oxygen tank. The staff gently said he did not have to come every day, but he did. The day Dad said, “I will never golf again,” I denied it vehemently, but he was right.

Six weeks before my cousin Father Mark Jette Mark married me and Dave in 1977, Dad's heart attack had sent him into disability and retirement. Doctor Takata performed five heart bypasses and assured Mom that Dad would not only walk me down the aisle, but dance at my wedding. Doctor Takata's gift was a further 18 years with Dad.

Pneumonia finally brought Dad to Hartford Hospital's emergency room, where we chatted and Dad sat reading the New Britain Herald. His congestive heart failure stemmed from years of smoking and welding around asbestos. The covering cardiologist arrived, questioned Dad's symptoms, then asked if he had a living will. Either that question confused him and triggered something in his brain, or it was sheer bad timing, but Dad never spoke coherently again. Over the next three days, the only word I could understand was “Mommy.” I asked the cardiac nurse if I should bring his clothes, and she abruptly said no.

I was not with Dad the next morning when he died. Our close friend and Dad's tenant Steve was the last friend or family member to see Dad alive. Father Mark celebrated Dad's funeral Mass, and read Chappy jokes from his handwritten joke notebook found in his bureau drawer. An Irish small farmer was touring a Texan's huge ranch. The Texan says, “ I can drive my truck all day, and only be halfway across my land.” The Irishman says, “Sure, and I had a truck like that once meself.”

A woman once asked why I seemed so sad, and I said, “I am worn out taking my Dad to all his doctor's appointments and monthly blood transfusions.” She replied “Enjoy him while you can. My dad died seven years ago today, and I still miss him.” I took her at her word during Dad's last year.

We continue to celebrate Dad's life and spirit. His blue recliner has pride of place in our living room. The hand-forged nutcracker of a lady's shapely legs reclines in the holiday nutbowl.

Dave now uses the Chappy method of fire tending, after years of overthinking. When would Chappy toss a log onto a fire to keep it blazing? Now.

We recite punchlines from Dad's bad and sometimes incomprehensible jokes to each other. “You know what the Irishman says? “I don't like to eat meat, but I love ham [pronounced hahm].”

I treasure this handwritten note found in Dad's car glovebox: “I love you both.” When did he write that? When did he think we would read it? It does not matter. Dad, I love you back always, with all my heart.

I married my father. There is no higher compliment I could give my husband.

"Bridgeport or Bust" by Allison Keeton

Two or three times a year, my parents and I took a trip to visit my father's parents in Bridgeport. As a seven year old, this was the longest trip I made on a regular basis, and I planned for days: what to wear, what to bring for the ride down and for my grandparents' tiny apartment, and what snacks to have in the back seat.

My grandparents were in their eighties. They had a nice house with a steep staircase but moved into a first floor apartment when my grandmother broke her hip. Their new neighborhood and its loud music and crowded streets frightened me. I was from Willington, a town of five thousand with quiet backyards. “The sticks” as my grandfather called it. In Bridgeport, I heard the scream of the sirens and the yelling of the neighbors. I liked the Spanish, though. It reminded me of the Shop Rite in Willimantic.

I asked my parents how many days it took to get to Bridgeport. I guessed three. "An hour and a half," my father said.

On the day of the trip, I placed one of my wooden chairs purchased at a gas station in the backseat. I wanted a good view. Seatbelt use in my family was unheard of until I took Driver's Ed ten years later. I piled up my books – two mysteries in case I finished the first one and three puzzle books – and pencils, pens, and markers. Next to the books was my own cooler with bite-sized ham and cheese sandwiches, homemade chocolate chip cookies, cut up apple sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, and a thermos of lemonade. My school bag was filled with a change of clothes and a couple of card games like Old Maid and Go Fish.

On the ride down, we practiced the state capitals from yellowing flash cards. My mother called out the state, and I named the capital. Then we reversed it. These cards were so old that they didn't include Alaska and Hawaii. Thankfully my parents knew Juneau and Honolulu. We completed the capitals by New Haven in time for me to stare at a park's statue overlooking the highway. "Someone fell off that cliff playing Frisbee," my mother said on one trip. On another, "They found the strangled body right near that statue," my father whispered. (To this day, I am still mesmerized by that statue and have never visited East Rock Park.)

If I saw the statue, it meant my father had taken the main highway through Hartford to I-95 South, which really goes west in Connecticut. I preferred the Merritt Parkway with its tree-lined drive and no trucks, but it dumped us on the wrong (nice) side of town, Pop said.

The scenery from I-95 was ugly, and, finally, after passing numerous wrecking balls at junk yards, we arrived. My grandparents peered out their front door and waved. I was glad my father parked in front—I didn't want anyone to break into the car and steal my little chair like they tried to steal someone's radio the last time we were visiting.

We unloaded groceries for my grandparents and brought in almost all of my backseat items. It felt like we spent a couple of days in their apartment, but it was only a few hours. In short years to come, my grandparents would be gone, along with the reason to make this trip, but I didn’t know that then.