JUST ANOTHER YOUNG ESSAY AUTHOR
(child experiments, early literary essays with Dana Kaufman, Other Collaborations, Great Gatsby and other high school essays, my first real criticisms, Wuthering Heights and other student criticisms in college, Quadrophenia and other ROCK essays, life after college, experience in L.A.)
Growing up, my father was a syndicated written and radio columnist for independent news outlets and National Public Radio. When he took time out of his schedule to allow himself to be reborn, he grew to become one of the top fundamentalist Christian news columnists in the country. Though his new views forced him to part ways with the liberal press, my father's crowning achievement was founding the JONESTOWN TIMES-PICAYUNE in 1978. Artistically his fame came from a 1965 article called BEACH BOYS: TODAY! (AND TOMORROW!!) which described Beach Boys leader-songwriter-arranger-producer Brian Wilson as the second coming of Jesus Christ and led to such phenomena as JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR and the rise of born-again Christianity. In fact, even though at the time he was a staunch Buddhist, my father's columns and articles were a major tool of conversion prior to the advent of Televangelism. His ability to pander to the confused Christian masses made him an incredibly popular columnist, until he stopped pandering and began to believe in his own hype. I suppose if my father had been a manager at Burger King, I would have been a frycook, but he was an essayist, so that became my goal.
Suprisingly it was my divorced mother who bought me my first typewriter at the age of 7 (in fact, it was a Selectric and she used it more than me). I practiced with it and wrote some complex haiku that would actually get some attention today (but back then there was little or no support for talented children). At the age of ten I moved in with my father's new family in suburban Des Moines. There I learned how to format an essay, copy-edit, and ensure my article met the proper "column-inches" when pressed to paper. I loved books, especially "West to Heatherborough," so when I was twelve I began writing an essay (actually more of an in-depth critical analysis) for the magical-realism experience. It was my lifelong dream to make others understand the richness and symbol-heavy brilliance of an obscure, underrated author like Greenfield McKenna. I ran out of gas at around 100 pages, and I had barely cracked the prologue! But it did inspire me to jot down simpler criticisms of books like "Fahrenheit 451" and "Breakfast of Champions" and submit them to major publications. I received nothing but rejection. It was hard going at times but, rejection or no, I managed to grind out a good number of analyses before I left Iowa at 14.
ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN (with Joseph Johnson)
TORTILLA FLAT
FAHRENHEIT 451
A SEPARATE PEACE
I moved back to Minnesota to live with my mother and go to High School. I attended Cambridge-Isanti High School, where I fell in with fellow student, Dana Stephanie Kaufman, the local journalist prodigy. After many arguments we became best friends and serious collaborators. Dana wrote essays, too, but they weren't hampered by mind-mapping or tight argumentative structure or quotations/citations or true facts for evidence. She wrote her articles free-style, in a single afternoon, often making up facts and citations she believed to be true without taking the effort to look them up. With her, I began writing better critical analyses and more of them. Our first series of real critiques were inspired by Samuel F. Pickering, Jr. They were meant to amuse and inform our audience. We used our substantial skills as journalists who would stop at nothing to make this happen.
THE STRANGER
ORDINARY PEOPLE
JULIUS CAESAR
GREAT EXPECTATIONS
Within three months of meeting one another we formed a company called KARABEKIAN PRESS and began to develop a book-length treatise based upon John Norman's "Gor" series. I used all of the professional skills that I had learned in Des Moines to do it right. We got a business license. We designed stationery. We printed return address envelopes, purchased a company stamp, and built an entire office. We even interviewed legendary actress and total babe Donna Denton (star of the "Gor" films) for insight into the novels. But in the end, we were only 14 and we couldn't keep up with the pace. We went back to the free style short essays, and didn't attempt another sophisticated project until the whopping age of 17.
Highlights (more essays with Dana)
THE TIME MACHINE
TARNSMAN OF GOR
FINGER MAN
DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?
MACBETH
THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (shot-by-shot film analysis for school newspaper)
I also wrote quite a few literary analyses on my own or with people other than Dana, which led to many arguments but hey, we're still together. Around this time, I began experimenting with merging literary analysis and beat poetry.
THE OREGON TRAIL (computer game analysis)
ASK THE DUST (in collaboration with Sarah Carter)
KATHARINE HEPBURN'S ME
FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS
IT
RIDING IN CARS WITH BOYS (in collaboration with Gretchen Lake)
SOMEWHERE IN THE NIGHT
PORTRAIT OF ELIZABETH (shot-by-shot "Rockford Files" analysis)
THE GREAT GATSBY
GREEN MARS (in collaboration with Sarah & Melissa Carter)
HATCHET
WHEN THE LEGENDS DIE (in collaboration with Jeff Weston)
As Juniors, we decided to have our first analysis showcase, a symposium of our thoughts on various classic works of literature, film, and television. We got a lot of friends involved. They allowed us to use the small, outdated "cafetorium." Actually it caused quite a stir and some people wrote letters of protest (fellow student Shanna Clausen being the most opposed to our work, which she felt reflected themes of misogyny in general and rage toward her in particular).
During junior year, things began to change. We had a number of public symposia but also began a book club/poetry slam/creative writing circle and thus a demanding audience. So we breathed life into Karabekian Press again with a project entitled WHY THE GODS CHOSE ME: ESSAYS OF EMPOWERMENT AND HOPE. For this one, we focused less on the office and the company, and more on writing and editing the absolute best work we could with what we felt was a very broad subject. In some cases, we received entries for adults, real writers. There was female nudity. After prepping for two months and sending the manuscript to the printer, we ran out of money and ran out of gas. But it was our best essay collection yet. From that point on we defined ourselves as "commentators on modern society." Our future projects had ambition, intellectual reasoning, challenge of authority, and most importantly, excessive length.
Highlights (more serious works with Dana)
WHY THE GODS CHOSE ME
THE ROAD FROM PHILADELPHIA (essays about America)
CHARNEL HOUSE: ESSAYS OF LOVE AND DEATH
EXCELSIOR (a poetry collection)
THE DYING OF THE LIGHT (essays analyzing the works of Dylan Thomas)
Beginning in our Senior year of High School and going on into the first two years of college my favorite collaborator, Dana Kaufman, wrote a number of articles which got published in the legitimate press, in which she used me as a primary source.
Essays Published by Dana Kaufman featuring me as a source
"THE CHASE DILEMMA" (published in "Slut-Wrench")
"HEATHERBOROUGH AS UTOPIA" (published in "An Anthology of Essays on Greenfield McKenna")
"TALKING IN COMMAS: AN ANALYSIS OF DIALOGUE IN DETECTIVE FICTION" (published in "The New Yorker's Literature Magazine"
"XANADU AND THE DYING AMERICAN DREAM" (published in "Atrophy Quarterly")
"CIVVIES: A GUIDE TO CIVIL WAR REENACTING" (published in "Bi-Monthly of Gettysburg")
"ROCKER'S GUIDE TO EUROPE" (published in "Hardchord")
"VENDETTA: THE SADNESS" (an analysis of the Libertarian worldview as it relates to neo-Luddites, published in "Asiatic Seamstress Monthly")
"PUSSY/SAC: LITERATILLATION" (published in "Slut-Wrench")
During my senior year I began to see myself as a young literary figure. I began to write poetry and plays. I did very well with both and I was published and produced very early in life. My literary criticism took a backseat until college. Dana and I went to LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY in Shreveport, joining their BA program which took place at THE COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES. I entered the school not on my literary criticism but on my poetry, which was impressive. After a few months of looking at nude poetesses (many of whom were driven to suicide for various reasons), I longed to criticize again. So restructured my English course structure toward the critical analysis side of things. Aside from dozens assignments, I made some very well-received academic papers including one book-length criticism on the works of Sam Shepard.
Highlights (essays at College)
THE H.G. WELLS CONUNDRUM
JOHN CASSAVETES' PRO-CORPORATE SPIRIT
MERCIFUL SARTRE
THE IMPACT OF WAGNER'S "DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN" ON 20TH-CENTURY AMERICAN LITERATURE
MARK TWAIN: LAZY-BONES
A BODY ACROSS THE MAP: THE FATHER-SON PLAYS OF SAM SHEPARD
BIBLICAL WICKEDNESS
WUTHERING HEIGHTS
VICTORIAN DETECTIVE
SLAUGHTERHOUSE-DIVE: KURT VONNEGUT'S IMPACT ON CHARLES BUKOWSKI
During my time at Louisiana State, for the first time in a very long time, I began listening to music. A lot of it. And I became obsessed with the kind of literate rock that combined musical and lyrical symbolism with storylines. Concept albums. I began to forsake my love of the written word for a new kind of love, that of narrative rock. Many of my essays and criticisms were refocused toward this new passion.
Highlights (essays on music in College)
GUNS N' ROSES VIDEO TRILOGY: AN IN-DEPTH LOOK
RADIOHEAD'S "OK COMPUTER": A CHILLING LOOK AT A FUTURE DYSTOPIA
DIRTY DEEDS AIN'T DIRT CHEAP: AC/DC UNDER THE ELECTRON MICROSCOPE
QUADROPHENIA: MISSTEP OR MASTERPIECE?
Little did I guess what an impact the Guns N' Roses video analysis would have. It garnered an extreme cult following in the not-quite-thriving (but still there!) L.A. heavy metal scene, making the rounds and becoming reprinted in local 'zines and all over the Internet. It single-handedly renewed interest in Guns N' Roses never-released album CHINESE DEMOCRACY; according to Jeff Leeds' article on the album in the NEW YORK TIMES (March 6, 2005), he writes, "Avid fans still cling to the notion that the art Axl Rose produced in Use Your Illusions I and II will carry over 15 years and millions of dollars. Many cite blogger Colby Witherspoon's long-winded analysis of the famous 'video trilogy' as evidence of Rose's 'genius at work' stature."
Finally an expanded, 213-page edition of this analysis was published by a Japanese publisher. The popularity of what is now called "glam" or "hair" metal in modern Japan presents a significant marketing opportunity for analyses like that.
After college, Dana and I I returned to Minnesota and began writing and directing for the stage.
Highlights (life after College)
MY HEART IS A SAD CLOWN (tragedy)
GATES (Mamet-like thriller)
WELCOME TO THE GREASE-TRAP (comedy)
RIME OF THE ANCIENT SLOBS (seriocomedy)
McMARTIN (fact-based dramatization)
My last serious play was McMARTIN, which I produced for the stage myself. I have long held a fascination with both child molesters and the wrongfully accused, so this material was perfect for me. After its opening, the Twin Cities' STAR-TRIBUNE raved, "Not nearly as disappointing as his retail-workplace 'comedy' WELCOME TO THE GREASE-TRAP."
For the next few years I focused completely on the theatre. Every once in awhile I did a special presentation of one of my plays for local television (mostly MTN), but other than writing two screenplays and a couple of literary criticisms, I did not tempt a move into film until I came to California in 2005. Since then I have written an adaptation of the George Eliot novel THE LIFTED VEIL. I have also sold and optioned a number of screenplays based on this adaptation. Finally, I had the good fortune to meet one of my rock idols, legendary Girth McDürchstein, and when I told him I had attempted several times (in vain) to penetrate the layers of his masterwork The Hedge, he smiled and gave me a video of the stageplay, a bootleg of the incomplete film, several outtakes and alternate lyrics, and scripts for stage and screen, and told me, "Get to work!" I did.
THE LIFTED VEIL
LÄDENMEISTER
C.H.U.D. (remake)
GHOST TOWN
GIRTH McDÜRCHSTEIN'S 'THE HEDGE' ANALYSIS
Last revised: January 29, 2007
