Hemingway's Lost Short Story

You may or my not have heard about Hemingway's lost short story. The son of a friend apparently had been holding onto the story for all these years. Seems Hemingway in 1925 wrote this satire on bull fighting and sent it to this friend. Now it has come back into the limelight and the Hemingway estate does not want it published. It will be sold at Christies for about eighteen thousand. Eighteen thousand dollars for a short story at a time when you couldn't' give away a short story. The form is basically dead. The heyday of the short story was in Hemingway's time when "slicks" like the Saturday Evening Post paid as much as four thousand dollars a story. In todays dollars, probably like twenty thousand, maybe more. Hemingway of course made his mark with the short story. In Our Time was a collection of stories that brought him to the attention of Max Perkins at Scribners. You know the rest of the story. So here we are in 2009 where a short story is discovered and people are willing to pay almost twenty thousand dollars for something the Hemingway estate deems unworthy of Ernest. As a writer I can only envy those days when the written word was held in such high esteem that a short story was like a movie today. Those writers were the celebs of their time, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Faulkner, Dos Passos. Apparently the story spoofs bull fighting, something Hemingway held in high esteem, but others do not want to see the light of day. It is interesting that the Hemingway short story will get about what it would have in 1925 dollars. I guess some writers really are timeless.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com

Bookscent

I was doing a book signing the other day and suddenly I looked around and had a very strange feeling--I felt I was looking at history. All those books in their pulpy pages on all those shelves. History. We will not see it again. Books will go away. The kindle and the IPOD and the downloaded book are here to stay. Technological revolution is that way. Imagine the uproar when the first printing press started cranking out hundreds of papers. Scribes must have thrown up their pens like Scrooge in the last scene of A Christmas Carol. Books are a good thing to have and I prefer them, but they are on paper and paper is a vanishing commodity. If a person can download hundreds of books and their newspapers all before their morning coffee, then yes, something has changed. How fast will it come? In a nanosecond. It is already here. The big publishers are in a tailspin, trying to figure out the new model. How do you replace all that revenue when one guy can download a book and zap it out to ten of his friends? Sounds like the Knapster mess all over again. Borders is teetering, publishers are not acquiring. Hmmm. Sounds like the automakers. Too much stock, not enough readers. But the plain fact is that a digital file is stored easily, does not require a publisher to print a bunch of copies he might not sell, and allows the reader the ease of carrying multiple works and reading literally anywhere. This means authors and publishers will have to embrace a new model. If the end result is the dissemination of the work, then it is a good thing. More people can get their hands on your book. As a writer I like that, but I cant' help but feel a little sad that the warm pulpy smell of a bookstore will be replaced by the clean ascetic smell of plastic. Maybe they will come up with a spray: Bookscent.

Talk Radio Chicago--Notes From the Tour

Drivetime. 8:15 AM.
"Hold the line for Frank."
I sit with the phone pressed to my ear. Frank is blaring in my ear about the Chicago Bears.
"I mean the Bears need a new coach, a new quarterback...why don't they just replace the whole fricking team..."
"One minute," the producer says in my ear.
"Alright...well enough of this sports hooey...lets talk some literature hah?"
"Thirty seconds..."
I stand up and start pacing with the phone. Click! Frank's voice comes in very loud.
"Yeah...we got us an author next, Elliott Hazelgrove and his book...ah, whats his book, wait a minute, I got it right here...wait a minute...yeah, here is it Rocket Man...with William Elliott Hazelgrove...ok, thanks for being on the show, Bill."
"No problem, Frank," I say walking across my office.
"Now Bill...what is this Rocket Man about anyway, blasting off Rockets or something, ha ha."
"Well...not really Frank, it's really about a man trying to keep his home--"
I turn and pace back across the room.
"I mean is it like the Roosians are coming or something, Bill and you're going to get them with your rocket right?"
"No...no its's really about what we going through Frank," I begin again, thinking of the people in their cars listening to old Ray and I throw it around. "It's a funny story about a man trying to get his part of the American Dream--"
"A Funny Story! Well, that's good hah, Bill? I mean you got to be funny or people won't read your book...am I right?"
I nod, turning in my office, feeling perspiration running down my back.
"It's satire Frank and I think that allows people to laugh at their problems and--"
"Now this Rocket Man, if he aint blasting off rockets then why do you call him the Rocket Man...it not something sexual is it Ha Ha?"
I laugh, sweating profusely.
"No...well he does blast off the rockets for his son's Scout troop actually."
"So he does blast off Rockets at the Roosians!"
"Ah...well, not at the Roosians Frank--"
"I'm just messing with you, now...you got a lot of good reviews here on this book...comparisons to John Irving, Richard Russo and John Updike, not that I read anybody like that, but hey they are some pretty impressive names, you know what I mean?"
I nod in my pajamas.
"Well, that's right Frank...I think the comparisons are due to my comment on life in suburbia..."
"Do you know why they call them the suburbs, Bill? Hah? I did some research and the reason they call it the suburbs is because it is SUB URBAN which basically means it's not up to the standards of the city and if you ask me, it still isn't!"
"Well, that's very interesting Frank, I--"

"Now you are the Hemingway writer in residence...and you write in what, this guys attic?"

"That's right, Frank."

"So you're kind of the Hemingway dude!"

I nod slowly rubbing my forehead.

"I guess you could say that."

"That's what you are, the Hemingway dude, ha, ha."

"Sure, why not, I'm the Hemingway dude," I mumble.
"Now let me ask you this, is there a lot of sex in your book, Bill?"
" Well, some Frank..."
"You got to have a lot of sex Bill, that's what sells you know."
"Oh... I know--"
"Well, give us your website so I can tell people to go buy your book, Rocket Boy."
"Oh, you mean, Rocket Man, that's http://www.billhazelgrove.com ."
"I aint even going to attempt to spell that one, but thanks for coming on the show and good luck with Rocket Boy...Elliott Hazelgrove!"
The phone goes dead and I hang up. I hear Frank on my small radio on the desk.
"Now, getting back to those Bears, like I say, lets dump the whole fricking team and start over!"

Nothing I Can Do...hmph?

Nothing I can do, hmph? Scoorge to Marley on his death bed. Last rites and all that? Nothing I can do. The year is ending and we are still running but of course there is nothing we can do. 2008 will end despite our frantic efforts to get it all done. Where did it go? I suppose that is a common lament, but it seems more so this year. Work will do that--it obviates time. Suddenly fall is behind us and we are two days before Christmas and we are still trying to get it all done, burning through the best years of our lives. The internet keeps us all going all the time now. The final frontier of home and heart broken with a broadband line and so our kids and ourselves run for the screen to get it all done. But it will not change anything. We will be a year older despite our best effort, maybe a year richer, maybe a year poorer. But really that matters not at all because any time lost makes us all penurious. So, I for one will hang it up today and let the year finish it's libelous course. What can I do anyway, but spend some time with my kids and wife and try and remember life before I tried to get it all done. Besides, there is nothing we can do....

hmp?

TO MY BIG BROTHER GEORGE

AND so it goes. The final line of It's A Wonderful LIfe. I always watch that movie and I appreciate the line. But, really what does it mean? George has no money. He is in debt. His life insurance policy is all he has. As Henry Potter, the villain says, "You're worth more dead than alive George."
So, what does his brother Harry mean by that final toast? Surely, he speaks of the riches of a well lived life. George has many friends and is loved and this is finally what gives him his wealth. I wonder how many people think of wealth in those terms. I would say we have to redefine wealth. I have come up with a new criteria. Now that I have a family and I see the sands of time slipping away, I think we have all been swindled into thinking what true wealth is. This is my criteria for wealth:

When was the last time you came home early from work?When was the last time you didn't go into work to spend it with your family?When was the last time you called up a friend and did something with them for no reason at all?When was the last time you spent the entire day with your family doing nothing?When was the last time you slept in?When was the last time you took a walk? When was the last time you curled up with a good book?When was the last time you turned off your cell phone or beeper?When was the last time you planned to do absolutely nothing?When was the last time you didn't try and fill all your time with workWhen was the last time you did something with your son or your daughter?When was the last time you watched a sunset? A sunrise? When was the last time you looked at the stars?When was the last time you walked through the woods?When was the last time you didn't read the newspaper or get on the Internet and didn't care what was happening in the world?When was the last time you remembered what it was to be a kid again?When was the last time you went to a coffeehouse with a book?When was the last time you had a party and didn't' give a damn about the cost or what it did to your house?"When was the last time you read poetry?

Well, you get the picture. I have come to view wealth a whole lot differently. I saw a man the other day in front of his million dollar vacation home on a beautiful lake. His son was out on the dock. The man came out and swept the dock while his son watched. When he was done, the man went back into the house. I wondered if that man knows that one day his son won't be there at the end of the dock. So I guess that's what Harry Bailey was saying in the end. He was toasting his brother who didn't have any money but had all the things that money simply can't buy. Time. Money can't buy time and that is precious.
So I say it to loud and clear, here's to George, truly, the richest man in town. Amen.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com