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Updated: July 30, 2009, 12:55 am	Share    Print    Email

Alan Alda and Roger Rosenblatt respond during the Q&A in a packed Duke Hall. Photos by Douglas Harrington

Southampton - Last week ushered in what is defined as the official Southampton Writers Conference (SWC), as the first session represented the overlapped Playwriting and Children's Literature Conference within the broad definition of the SWC. This central session represents the original gathering in its 36th season and is the most eclectic in its literary offerings.

First book authors and SWC alumni Elena Gorokhova and Helen Simonson.

It might not be a bad idea to relate here just how the SWC describes itself, "As part of the Stony Brook Southampton Writing Program, the Writers Conference provides a forum for authors of all genres to study and discuss the craft of writing. Through workshops, lectures, readings, and small-group discussions, the conference offers inspiration and guidance to new writers, established writers, teachers of writing, editors, and those who wish to audit the conference. Located in a resort area of natural beauty, the conference offers instruction that is friendly, rigorous, professionally useful, and intellectually challenging."

Session II, the central and longest session of the conference, was officially opened on Wednesday evening, July 15 with a keynote address by the distinguished and hugely popular American author Richard Ford. He is associated with a school of writing referred to as "Dirty Realism," whom among its numbers include Ford's friends Tobias Wolff and Raymond Carver. Ford has won many awards including the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award. He is probably best known for his "Frank Bascombe" novels which include "The Sportswriter," "Independence Day" and "The Lay Of The Land."

Legendary cartoonist Gahan Wilson.

The following afternoon included readings from two soon to be published first novels that attest to the success and importance of the SWC, as both authors are alumni of the SWC, with one a graduate of the Stony Brook/Southampton M.F.A. program. The latter, Helen Simonson, read from her upcoming novel, "Major Pettigrew's Last Stand" for which she received a six-figure advance from Random House. A remarkable sum for a first novel. Russian born Elena Gorokhova read from her memoir about growing up in the Soviet Union, "A Mountain Of Crumbs," soon to be published by Simon and Schuster. Both authors in the Q&A that followed their readings credited the SWC with influencing their success as writers.

Although a memoir and not fiction, I commented to Gorokhova on how beautifully lyrical I found her prose, "I think it comes from me being raised in Russia, where we memorized literature, all those classics. I certainly didn't do it on purpose and many of the chapters in the memoir are not as lyrical as this, but maybe that is why I picked this chapter to read. Many of the chapters are ironic in tone, as it is about a system that represses the spirit."

I asked Simonson, as most first novels have at least some degree of an autobiographical nature to them, how much of her British upbringing came into play in her book, "I spent my teenage years in a school village in East Sussex and have spent 22 years in the States, so I am very nostalgic for the British countryside. One of the inspirations for the novel, by setting it in England, at least in my head, allowed me to spend time there." She also when on to admit that Major Pettigrew himself is modeled on a former English teacher that she "absolutely adored" named Major Chadwick.

Rehearsal of Artist Director Bill Carden's Ensemble Theatre Studio actors in Avram Theatre.

There is a truly eclectic nature to this session, which couldn't be better proved out than by running into legendary cartoonist Gahan Wilson in the lobby of Chancellor's Hall. Wilson was on his way to give a lecture and Q&A on dark humor, a subject that any fan of his cartoons knows he is more than qualified upon which to lecture. A three-year participant in the SWC, Wilson noted, "I really am impressed by the way Bob [Reeves] is putting this together. I think he doing a really neat job of building it, filling it out, expanding it. I am very happy to be tied into it." Wilson went on to comment on how well all the converging artists get along at the conference, "There are all kinds of really snappy types and it is all very congenial. I don't see any cat fights or any problems, its smooth as silk." Nothing he might make a cartoon out of I suggested, "No, that's not true. I can't go that far," Wilson joked. (Look for my upcoming in-depth interview with Gahan Wilson this summer at Hamptons.com).

Renowned playwright Joe Pintauro with the students of his Craft Lecture.

While Wilson gave his lecture in Duke Hall his fellow Sag Harbor resident, playwright Joe Pintauro was giving what the SWC describes as a "Craft Lecture" in the Fine Arts building. Almost two dozen students gathered at a large table in classic tutorial style as the renowned novelist and playwright shared his insights regarding his art and his creative process. As we walked together across the campus to an evening cocktail party for the participants, Pintauro, a long-time supporter and participant of the SWC, commented on both the professional and neophyte students attending his class, "There seems to be some pretty good playwrights at this conference. I find a high quality of interest, it is not dilettante. People seem to want to be professional, want help, want inspiration. It is really a great bunch." Pintauro clearly enjoys sharing his expertise and passion, "I absolutely love it. It is a lonely, solitary life writing a full length play or novel. People just need to be encouraged and know that other people are struggling like them. Every play is a new challenge, new rules and you get to share a little bit of the pain, the glory and the good expectations."

As noted in the previous installment of this SWC reporter's notebook, many evening events are open to the public. One of which was Thursday evening's stage reading of a new Graham Gillis play, "A Boy Called Newfoundland," by members of the Ensemble Studio Theatre, New York City's premiere development theater which is in residence at this year's SWC. As part of the overlapping Playwriting Conference, EST actors attend workshops and give SWC writers the chance to hear their words read aloud by professional actors. The benefit to the conference participants is obvious, but I asked EST Artistic Director Bill Carden what the company was drawing from being in residence at the SWC, "What we are getting out of it is the opportunity in the afternoons to bring actors out here to work on new plays in an atmosphere that is really supportive and creative. They love being here and we are really getting a lot of developmental work done on scripts that are ready for that kind of work. It gives us the opportunity to see how an audience will react to a play that we think is ready to go. It is really wonderful, this is really meaningful to us and the playwrights."

Southampton Writers Conference participants gather for a sunset cocktail reception.

The first lecture on Friday morning produced a packed house, as actor/writer/director Alan Alda and his friend, essayist/novelist/playwright Roger Rosenblatt presented a lively, conversational lecture and Q&A that, frankly, could go on the road as the greatest comedy act since Abbott and Costello. The repartee between these two brilliant artists was at times side-splittingly hilarious, while simultaneously insightful, illuminating and instructional. They spoke of their earliest memories of writing and the influences on their art and careers. They talked about their artistic processes and their creative passions and inspirations, hell, they talked about their wives. It was at times hard for this reporter to determine who was having more fun, the artists or the audience. It was a truly rare experience that everyone in attendance will be talking about for weeks and probably refer back to for a lifetime. Both men have or are participating in the aforementioned public evening events with Alda and company having presented a staged reading of Robert Brustein's new play, "Three Farces And A Funeral," based on the life, letters and plays of Anton Chekhov on Saturday, July 18 and Rosenblatt, along with Meg Wolitzer, offering an upcoming reading, lecture and Q&A on Thursday, July 22.

At this writing, only at its mid-point, the SWC has already proved out Tom Wolfe's claim to it being "the best writers conference in the country." How could it not not be with a line-up of artists that includes, besides those already mentioned, Emily Mann, Joe Mantello, Tony Walton, Elizabeth Benedict, Jeffrey Sweet, Kaylie Jones, Frederic Tuten, Jackie Reingold, Zachary Lazar, Fiona Maazel, John Wray and one of America's greatest playwrights, Lanford Wilson.

The original Writers Conference continues along until July 26 when it will give way to the continuing Playwriting Conference that will be joined in the last session by the Screenwriting Conference which will feature evening events with the likes of director Peter Hedges, actor Alec Baldwin and writer Jon Robin Baitz.

Frank McCourt (1931-2009). Image courtesy of Google Images

A REPORTER'S SIDEBAR
While writing this installment of the Southampton Writers Conference 2009 Reporter's Notebook, I heard word of the death of Frank McCourt. First I cried a little and then I poured myself a drink, lifted it to the heavens and bid him farewell. There is an old saying that goes, "Others drink to forget, the Irish drink to remember!" Despite impending deadlines, as I knew my daughter of Erin editor Eileen Casey would understand, I closed the laptop and spent the rest of my day remembering and rereading a beautiful Irish literary voice now silenced.

As I would never be so bold as to actually call Frank McCourt a friend, I have over the years as a fellow writer been in his company on several occasions. Although as an editor I did arrange a McCourt interview for one of my writers, I sadly cannot number him among my many literary interviews. I did, however, in 2003 have the pleasure of interviewing his brother, the irascible Malachy McCourt. It remains for me one my favorite and most quotable interviews.

What is it about this tiny island afloat in the North Atlantic, how is it that it produces writers of such lyric voice? The closest shore in Europe to the America that seemed to draw Celts like the sound of a poet's harp that had been restrung with wrapped threads of gold. Born here amid the poverty of the depression, the illusion of the golden harp held no promise for the McCourts and Frank, at three years old, was returned to the impoverished Limerick of his mother's birth. Angela, the archetype matricentric mother so common in Irish society that carries the weight of the family troubles and toils of existence like the myth of Sisyphus. A portrait of it never better brought to page than in his astonishing first book, "Angela's Ashes." Not only a first offering of incredible depth and beauty, but the first offering of an author who was 65 years old at the time of its publication.

It was a memoir that literally left the literary world breathless and garnered this humble New York City school teacher a worldwide following of impassioned readers. The story not yet finished, he followed the book named in honor of his mother with his own story of immigrant hope, frustration and realization in "Tis." Finally, he added to his memoir lexicon the story of his early journey in the vocation to which he devoted his life in "Teacher Man."

Did he think as he held stolen milk and bread in his hands, as a child's offering to his abandoned mother and the siblings he as the eldest felt obliged to help nourish, that half a century later he would hold in his hand the Pulitzer Prize? Did he realize in those darkest of Limerick days that he would one day find his way from desperate Irish poverty to New York University? Did he envision amid the death of three of his six siblings at the hands of malnutrition an eventual Masters Degree, several honorary doctorates and a seat on the graduate faculty of the Southampton campus of Stony Brook University? Did he realize the lives he would touch as he shared with his students his gift of so poetically and passionately telling the detail of one's life in the classes he taught in memoir writing? These are some of the questions I would have asked at one of the literary interviews I always hoped for, but will now forever regret missing.

There is a perfect Irish irony in the timing of the passing of this Celtic warrior poet. An irony that would be more than fully appreciated by McCourt himself, as the upcoming issue of The Southampton Review was created in his honor and will be launched the week of his death. On Friday, July 24 former Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins, another Irish-American, and other distinguished writers will give readings in celebration of the release of the third volume of the literary magazine produced by the Stony Brook Southampton M.F.A. Program in Literature and Creative Writing. It is filled with words celebrating the life and art of Frank McCourt, himself a writer to whom words seem best used when weaved to create the genre of memoir. Thankfully, even in death, we will never be without him because he left us the gifts of his own.