BEAT SCENE ISSUE 62

Charles Bukowski may be the cover star of the Beat Scene 62 but it’s the new nine page interview with Carolyn Cassady that steals the issue for me. She’s written and spoken many times about her husband Neal Cassady and lover Jack Kerouac but I’m never less than fascinated by their relationship. I still can’t grasp the hold Neal had over people – Carolyn in particular. Even his portrayal in On The Road isn’t flattering: a con-man and a rat who abandons a sick Jack in Mexico; and that’s without the bigamy and constant philandering she had to deal with. Maybe she was hip and I’m squarer than I’d care to admit.

Continuing the spouses theme, Richard Brautigan’s first wife Virginia Aste is also interviewed. There’s a good article about Kerouac and his time in Detroit with his first wife Edie Parker (who Carolyn memorably refers to as a weirdo and a nut case). Bukowski gets his coverage - reviews and extracts from a couple of newish books. Dan Fante writes about his father, John Fante, and fellow writers blacklisted by Hollywood during the 40s.

Loads of other stuff as usual within its 64 advert-free pages. Four pounds stirling.

www.beatscene.net

JOHN FANTE - A CONVERSATION WITH BEN PLEASANTS

“Fante was my god”. As the rule states no mention of John Fante is allowed without Bukowski’s quote, I’ll get it out the way now.

Fante’s 1939 Ask The Dust was one of those books that as soon as I read it I couldn’t spread the word quick enough. Every person I told or I bought a copy for loved it immediately and hunted out his other books, particularly those starring his alter-ego Arturo Bandini.

He was blind and nearly seventy by the time Ben Pleasants interviewed him in the late 1970s. Those interviews have remained unpublished, except for a small segment released last week as a Beat Scene Press chapbook, John Fante - A Conversation with Ben Pleasants. Naturally enough he talks about Ask The Dust, as well as reminiscing about his pal Willam Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s handshake. There are no earth shattering revelations but it’s a nice little collectable addition to the Fante shelf.

John Fante – A Conversation with Ben Pleasants is published in an edition of 125 numbered copies by Beat Scene Press, priced £5.95 at beatscene

86'd by DAN FANTE

Like most of John Fante’s current readers I discovered him via Charles Bukowski. Buk claimed him as his God, and that’s enough endorsement for anyone. Books like Ask The Dust and The Road To Los Angeles made aspiring writer Arturo Bandini an unforgettable creation: a self-absorbed romantic dreamer thoroughly convinced of his own genius.

Back in 2002 I saw Fante’s son, Dan, give a talk. He spoke about his father, Bukowski, and his own writing. I wasn’t much interested in his own writing until he read the opening pages from Mooch and was converted on the spot. It felt like the passing of the baton. We shared a few words and he wrote in my copy of Mooch “For Mark, I hope you like my new book – It drove out many old demons for me. Best, Dan Fante”. Many old demons, I’m sure, but a stack of novels, plays, poems and short stories later, Fante is still wrestling those demons and fending them off the way he knows best - the only way - with the written word.

86’d follows familiar ground as Fante’s alter-ego Bruno Dante woozes through the streets of LA struggling to keep a limo driving job and the booze at bay. Not a great combination. No sooner he climbs aboard one side of the wagon, than he spectacularly stumbles off the other. But through all his failures, blackouts, mental girlfriends, AA meetings and dumb moves, you’ve got to admire his pig headedness and dogged spirit even through the skuzziest of lows. “My life wasn’t a total shit sandwich”, he says. And it is dead pan lines like that, that make reading Fante such a treat. Also, no one throws abuse with such casual ease. As the pages get darker, and the voices in his head get louder, his fuse gets shorter. From shooting vitriolic insults from the hip, to indignant rage, to psychotic fury, the angrier he becomes the more incisive and funnier the writing.

Much of the story and characters are predictable but that’s hardly the point. 86’d contains a couple of Fante’s most memorable passages, which I won’t spoil here, and overall this may well be his best novel.

86’d by Dan Fante is published by Harper Perennial, priced $13.99.

LAST DAYS OF THE CROSS by JOSEPH RIDGWELL

When I first came across Joe Ridgwell’s writing a few years back – mainly short stories scattered across the internet - he claimed to be the author of a novel Last Days of the Cross. After searching for it to no avail I put it down to self-mythologising bullshit, but no, here it finally is courtesy of new independent publishers Grievous Jones Press.

Ridgwell delivers straight down the line, no nonsense, no fussing, unpretentious, conversational storytelling where the words fly off the page. In Last Days of the Cross his romantic notion of becoming a poet lands him in Australia, where he assumes wondrous poems will come tumbling forth to critical acclaim and Joseph Ridgwell Appreciation Societies will be founded. That he chose Australia in the first place shows his head ain’t screwed on straight and further evidence of his rash heart-ruling-the-head nature comes when Joe falls for a junkie prostitute who’s just nicked his money.

There are obvious (and acknowledged) influences of both Arturo Bandini’s delusional claims of artistic greatness in John Fante’s Ask The Dust and Henry Chinaski’s need to hustle ridiculous jobs as poetry doesn’t put beer in the fridge from Charles Bukowski’s Factotum. Readers of those will find much to enjoy here as the tale wobbles from self-inflicted heartache to pure comedy on the turn of a page, leading to a cringing will-he/won’t-he dilemma when faced with an unexpected proposition.

Thoroughly recommend this and as good as it is I predict Joe’s next one will be even better. That appreciation society might not be too far away.

Last Days of the Cross by Joseph Ridgwell is published by Grievous Jones Press, priced £10. www.grievousjonespress.com.
In Search of the Lost Elation at www.josephridgwell.blogspot.com