Great news from Gene Fehler! He has received a letter from Simon and Schuster. They can envision some of Gene's 8-line Goblin poems in a "gate-fold" book for their Little Simon Division. Gene has been invited to reformat his poems accordingly and resubmit them for this project. Way to go. Also, Gene's book, Dancing on the Basepads has hit the stands. Get yours autographed for Christmas. *Welcome*, first time visitor Gabrielle Johansen and returning visitor Barbara Burton. So glad to have you with us. And hats off to newcomer Diane Milks who jumped right in with a witty essay about a mushroom hunt. Made us want to head for the woods. Nice work, Diane.

Be sure to come out to our next meeting October 4!

The news is on the net! Our own Sue Renault garnered Best of Issue for her poem "The Kitchen Window" in SCWW's upcoming anthology, Horizons 2001! See the whole list on the SCWW web site: http://www.4bnc.com/users/scww/horizons2001winners.htm.

The September meeting brought a new writer to my attention, Diane M. Milks. And a fine writer she is, too. Her piece, "The Fungus Among Us" opened my eyes to the wonderful world of mushrooms. It was interesting to learn that Fungi are neither plant nor animal, but some type of combination of these categories. I'd seen these not plant and not animal wonders in the pastures I roam, but I hadn't paid them much attention. Now I know that some of these wonders can be eaten which to us Piggs is an important feature of thing found in pastures.
Diane's article was very well written, but could be improved with the moving of several sentences to place the emphasis sentences in the traditional first and last positions in each paragraph. Not following the format expected of theme writers and magazine writers can lead busy editors to reject an otherwise wonderful piece.

Sue Renault read from Chapter Four of her book, Elecphonose. Written for the younger reader, this book features Cyrus Poppingood, who is deaf, and his older sister Lacy. Cyrus and Lacy follow Elecphonose, a metal-riveted, tube-twined, steely chested, clunky footed, trunk pulsating, robot legged contraption that had swallowed their dog, Moppsie, to the local zoo. Once at the zoo, Elecphonose is admitted, but the gate to the zoo is closed before Cyrus and Lacy can rush in.
Selecting a point of view is a challenge in this piece. Sue advised that she is using an omniscient point of view in this piece, which fits the need to show sound at the same time as showing Cyrus' deafness. This viewpoint is difficult to write because the narrative voice tends to be schizophrenic as it works in and out of more than one head per scene. Still, this story may require this viewpoint. I am looking forward to the next installment of Elecphonose.

The October issues of Writer's Digest has a good article on "Point of View" and has a new, at least new to me, column on copyrights called "Ask the Lawyer".

Leland Beaudrot, novelist, poet, and voice impersonator, wandered into the room behind the saloon at the appointed time in September and presented the reworked ending to his novel, Fairy Play. It was easier to tell the characters apart this time as Chris, not to be confused with Chrysanthemum, is now Stacy. And there was a very clever moment where the Foxy Flower Fantasy froze the frame, bring time to a screeching halt, and Dexter, feeling his chest for a heart beat and finding none asked, "Am I dead?" But the suggestion that Dexter found out he loved Abby by saying "I love you" to Abby when he thought he was saying it to the Foxy Flower didn't clear the Sheriff's holster. I'd give the precocious Dexter one more shot at figuring out who he loves and why.

Meanwhile, back in Harmony . . . John Kingsbury bellied up to the writer's table in September with another chapter in his tale of young love in the heartland of 50's USA. And once again, this story moved faster than Doc Holliday's trigger finger at the OK Corral. So fast, John's reading couldn't keep up with the group's eyes as we read ahead to find out what would happen next. The Sheriff's synopsis: While Johnny, trapped in the rec room basement of the Wolfe house, waited for Amanda to finish getting ready for their date, her father, the Medal of Honor winner in WWII and current day town drunk sat before him. Johnny gave short answers to Mr. Wolfe's leading questions. The father of the girl dying of leukemia guzzled beer and cleaned a pistol. At the same time, he also told Johnny a story of conflict, exploding friends, body parts, fear, horror, shock, and numbed heroism. And who would not understand why this foul mouth, insensitive drunk was also a staggering poster boy for survivor's guilt? Finally Amanda appeared and said, "Let's go Johnny Preston." The Sheriff thinks Amanda understood.

Well, we asked for it, and we got it. At previous meetings we'd had some concern about the "lack of conflict" in excerpts from Gene Fehler's Slipper Muffit's 1956 Nonpareil Baseball Tour. Great characters, we said. Great dialogue, great setting. But what about conflict? Don't we need some clashes, some cross purposes, some driving unmet needs? In answer, Gene patiently alluded to "some stuff that happened before." Boy, he wasn't kidding. At our last meeting, he backtracked to a story-setting chapter and zapped us with one fastball after another: attempted seduction, sexual and physical abuse, an aborted runaway escape, and murder-all the while drawing finely nuanced characters in his trademark understated style.

When we'd caught our breath, we suggested that some of the physical movement in the fight scene was a little hazy-where exactly were the characters in relationship to each other and the room? And wouldn't Carter check on his mother first, before Bubba? Finally, Bulldog needed just a little more in the final scene, when Carter and Candy sit on the steps, clearly in shock. Bulldog suggests that Gene stay in the moment a little longer and give the scene a little more depth.

These are minor quibbles with some great writing that has left us hanging with the all-important question, "What happens next?" Gene, we're ready and waiting for your next pitch.

Carolyn, my wife, found herself in a quandary. Her text book and notes spread before her and the TV spouting a ceaseless audio-visual barrage of information, rumors and wild guesses, she did not know whether to study history of centuries past or of the moment. Fortunately, the test scheduled for September 11, 2001 (9-11) was postponed in light of the shocking events of that day.
At an age when most are in mid-career, climbing the ladder and looking forward to retirement, Carolyn is working on her college degree. Her goals have been postponed by a number of auto-immune disorders, diseases in which one's own immune system goes ary and attacks the body. In short, the "good guys" go bad.
We are often advised, "Write what you know." Today, we all know some things we may wish to forget, but we dare not. With our words and our deeds, we are all writing history. Clearly, we need to exercise vigilance in light of recent acts of terrorism, but we dare not become vigilantes. We must not inflict injustice on others in the name of protecting ourselves or our nation. A body that attacks itself cannot be strong. Carolyn knows.

Printed Matters is the newsletter of the Greenville Chapter, SCWW, which meets on the first Thursday of each month at 6:00 p.m. at The Open Book, 110 S Pleasantburg Drive, Greenville, SC.

Thanks to our contributing writers & news reporters: Sue Renault, John Kingsbury, Randy Crew, Nancy Parker.

Copyright 2001 by Leland Beaudrot, Editor. Contributing writers retain all rights to their work.