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A taste of local talent
By Linda Sorinm, April 27, 2007
Readings
“Works in Progress”
Fri, May 4, 5–7pm
Posada San Francisco, Plaza Principal 2
50 Pesos, includes wine reception
Last year it was SRO—“standing room only” at the first ever Author’s Sala “Works in Progress” event. The audience, laughed, cheered, was sometimes moved to tears and overall was bowled over by the quality and range of the works being read. Based on this year’s lineup the audience is in for another treat. Be sure to get there early to secure a seat!
We are blessed in San Miguel with a wealth of talent in all spheres of the arts, as well as in business and philanthropy. The Author’s Sala was founded to highlight the works of writers living in San Miguel as well as those who come here for inspiration, solitude and a creative environment in which to write.
The “Works in Progress” evening provides an opportunity for both published and unpublished writers to share their output with an audience. The majority of the presenters have, until now, been unpublished. This is your opportunity to discover emerging talents and to say “I heard him/her read from his/her work before s/he was ever published.”
Following are the readers for the 2007 Works in Progress evening:
Manja Argue
When Manja Argue retired from Pacific Telesis where she worked as a computer systems admisnistator she set out to discover her creative self. Argue had written poetry in her personal journals over the years but only as an expession of her own feelings. She began writing seriously after the age of 60. At this time she has self-published four chap-book of her poetry and short stories (some are considered flash fiction). These books are The Wolf Aproaches/El Lobo Se Acerca, The Slide/El Tobogán, Passing/Transito, and Short Stuff. This last book is entirely short fiction.
Argue reads an assortment from these books to give a flavor of her efforts.
Lena Bartula
A visual artist for over 30 years, Bartula’s repertoire includes painting, installation, book arts and mixed media. She includes writing among her passions since 2001. Her poems and short stories have appeared in Dream Network Journal, Dry Ground: Writing the Desert Southwest and Foreign Ground: Travelers’ Tales, and the soon-to-be-published San Miguel Authors’ Sala Anthology.
She reads from a manuscript titled, Sleeplessness Counts which includes poetry and prose.
Rochelle Cashdan
Rochelle Cashdan is an anthropologist turned writer who lives in Guanajuato. Translations of two of her stories have appeared in El Correo, Leon. She is a member of San Miguel PEN and helps select English-language books for the Biblioteca.
She reads Therapy, a contemporary story about what happened after the swan raped Leda.
Sheryl Dunn
Canadian lawyer, Sheryl Dunn, switched careers—and countries—but not priorities. Her suspense novel-in-progress, The Termination Cure, will shake, rattle and roll conventional wisdom about justice as her forensic psychiatrist swings into hip but dangerous action. Scenes from the novel won two Canada Council awards.
Joanne Howard
Joanne started out as a nurse, exercise instructor, radio and TV host and newspaper columnist. Her goal has always been to improve the quality of life of women through her teachings and writings. How the mind works and how it affects the body and vice versa has always been of great interest and she has done much research in the field of body/mind health.
Her reading is from a memoir about marrying the same man twice and the unbelievable trauma and recovery involved.
Judith Jenya
Artist, writer, actress, attorney, mediator, family and art therapist, educator, mother, grandmother and peace activist, Judith Jenya lives in SMA after living in California, Hawaii, Bosnia, Northern Ireland, Los Angeles and the Middle East. She founded and directed several programs for children.
Leap Before You Look, her work in progress, is a memoir of a lifetime of seeking, exploring, and taking risks—in both real wars and personal challenges. It talks of finding a spiritual path, facing death, her childhood as a “pink diaper” baby, losing loved ones and the joy of being alive.
Murray Kamelhar
Murray Kamelhar was an Equity actor in stage, film and TV; an assistant professor in the film department at California State University at Northridge; and the executive producer and director for 23 instructional TV programs, which he wrote. He has also been the principal of a school, a merchant seaman, a baker and campaign manager.
He reads, “Reflections on My Father’s Life” from his memoir.
Marcia Loy
Marcia Loy is a writer who moved from Chicago to San Miguel de Allende two and a half years ago. She lives here full time. She has recently finished the manuscript for a novel and will read from a new novel called Full Stop.
Lynda Schor
Prize-winning author Lynda Schor has published four books of short fiction, and has had many stories and articles in magazines. She’s taught fiction writing at many colleges including 25 years at The New School. She lives in San Miguel and New York City with the poet Halvard Johnson.
Lynda Schor reads from an unfinished work of fiction called, The Orgy. (See excerpt below)
Cynthia Simmons
Cynthia Simmons never intended to be a writer when she wrote her first play, Sally of Monticello, she was trying to develop an acting vehicle for herself. But she loved the process. Slowly her focus shifted, and in 2002 Cynthia got an MFA in Screenwriting from Goddard College in Vermont.
Cynthia reads from a short story, Coming Home, loosely based on a maternal aunt’s experiences in the 30s.
Alice Sperling
Alice Sperling started professional life as an art director, working for ad agencies in New York, Aspen and Denver. In 1982, she opened her own marketing and PR firm representing mainly arts-based clients.
This is her first foray into writing, other than all those thousands of press releases over the years. Naked Under Polyester was prompted by, nay wrote itself, as a sanity preservation technique when traveling alone to Vietnam and Cambodia this past January and her luggage was lost.
Clint Worstmann
Clint Worstman is 68, retired and has lived in San Miguel de Allende for nearly five years. Until retirement he was administrator for the Outpatient Methadon Detox Clinic at San Francisco General Hospital, San Francisco, California, a joint venture with the University of California-San Francisco and the San Francisco Department of Public Health. He co-authored two works about health care delivery to addicts published in obscure public health journals.
Veiled Voices is his first work of fiction.
Following is an excerpt from one of the readers.
Seduction by Lynda Schor
Joan Collins, in Past Imperfect, an autobiography
He was insatiable. Three, four, five times a day was not unusual for him. He made marvelous dipping and corkscrewing motions. He could stay hard forever; he was never impotent. He was also able to accept phone calls at the same time.
Warren Beatty
I was standing in Nathan’s at the corner of Sixth Avenue in the Village, wiping mustard off my low riders, when I saw Warren Beatty. “A hot dog,” he said softly to the guy behind the counter. Well, maybe it isn’t Warren Beatty. What would he be doing here? I looked more closely. Maybe I stared, though I tried to hide it. His papaya lips curled up in a smile. “It’s me, it’s me,” he said, holding up both hands, as if surrendering. My two boys were screaming. One wanted ketchup mixed a certain way with the mustard, creating a marbleized effect on the terrazzotilecolored hot dog; the other had just let his brand-new hot dog slip out of the roll and onto the filthy floor. He was crying because he desperately wanted to pick it up and eat it, and I wouldn’t let him. “Do you want TB?” I asked, stamping on the frank in order to obliterate any of its desirable qualities. Warren seemed surprised at the lack of attention to him. “Let me buy the kid another dog,” he said. I just nodded, slightly embarrassed. I am very t
hin, and tall, especially in my platform sandals, and combine, so people (men) had told me, awkwardness and attractiveness in a way that is extremely sexy. I am also very shy. I find it hard to look directly at very handsome men, as if I have a fear of being dazzled by outer beauty—something that shouldn’t count for much, but can. Warren seemed fixated on my youngest, who was gripping my prewashed jeans with one greasy hand, tiny, filthy legs balancing in huge sneakers, taking large bites from his replacement hot dog, ketchup streaks all over his face like blood. A homeless person with a bad sunburn was trying to wrest my other boy’s carefully garnished food from him. “Hey, you don’t have to do that,” said Warren, handing the unfortunate man a five-dollar bill. The man looked at it scornfully, pulling up his shorts with his elbows. Warren gave him five more. That sparked my interest. I am very attracted to rich men who are also liberal. They are rare finds. “Hey,” he said, “how about ditching the kids and cal
ling me at the Carlyle later?” He handed me a printed card. Both boys were crying for another hot dog each, french fries, and tropical drinks. I took the card, to be polite. “What’s your number?” he asked. He didn’t write it down.
Joan Rhys
Why Warren Beatty would want to go out with me is beyond me. He told me my work had intrigued him, and he needed to get to know me on some other, deeper level. I know that sex isn’t just sex with him, yet I went into it knowing there would be nothing more than sex. But, as usual, I was left feeling deeply disappointed, empty. At that time I was living in an SRO in New York, a sleazy room, and he gave me a key to his suite in the Algonquin. Was it that or the restlessness, the hunger, the longing to be filled up through every hole.
Ann Landers
He came in the door and we made love. He didn’t have an orgasm. He was very careful. He washed his hands a lot. Is that going to keep him from getting some sexually transmitted disease? I guess that made me wonder why I’d go to bed with someone who’s known to have slept with almost everyone.
Warren and me
When I got home the phone was ringing. I rushed for it, nearly falling over the baby. The bags of food I was carrying dropped, oranges spewing across the floor, when I tripped over the baby’s foodencrusted, chrome highchair leg. The kids were foraging amongst the spilled food for cookies while I answered the phone. “I’m busy right now,” I said, as soon as I found out who it was. “I’m lying on my triple king bed, with nothing but a towel wrapped around my privates,” he whispered, in his wonderful husky voice. “So?” I said. “I’m still busy.” At one time this might have interested me, but no longer. “I’ll wait,” he said. “No matter when you’re ready, I’ll be here. Nobody refuses me. It intrigues me. I’d come there, but I have to admit, kids bring me down.” “Go to hell,” I said. I felt sorry for him because he wasn’t living real life. Later, very much later, after all the bedtime rituals, and after I’d run through the apartment organizing and cleaning somewhat so we could begin trashing it tomorrow, I realized t
hat the kids bring me down too. I lay across my mattress, barely able to move. But my mind, annexed all day with trivia, was spinning.
Martha Stewart
I had my hair done exactly right the day before. This left exactly the right amount of time so that my hair would be styled the way I like it, but not stiff, as it often looks when I come out of the beauty salon. Warren likes to be spontaneous, so I had to hold him off so I could get things (dishes, candles, bedding, a meal) just perfect. Things looked so great, I must admit; I was tempted to call the television studio to come video the entire experience.
Ruth Westheimer
Everything in Warren’s world has to do with sex, living out sexual fantasies. His way of relating is through seduction. He’s into all aspects of sex. Nothing is bad to him. This I like. He’s even into lesbianism. The first thing he said to me was, “If you misbehave, I’m going to spank you.” I felt a little self-conscious at first—like, why would he like me? But he has the ability to make you feel comfortable immediately. It’s not looks, or desire to be in love that rules Warren. He goes at it for the same reason a writer writes, or a painter paints—to discover something. Unfortunately what he really wants to discover in this way may remain elusive. He’s full of contradiction and paradox.
Natalie Wood
After a few times with Warren, I felt unleashed. He’d opened up all sorts of possibilities. I recall writing in my diary, “I’ve been Warrenized.”
Warren and me
Warren Beatty is a sexual and artistic icon. An institution, like Elvis Presley. The difference is, Elvis seduced with his art; his charisma was part of that. If he was unfaithful, he kept it a secret. His unobtainability, while seducing with his performances, was exciting. What’s compelling about someone who will screw anyone and everyone? But I know what’s exciting; I’m already excited. Maybe it’s the Don Juan thing—the seeker in search of some elusive knowledge, imparting a noble goal to evil, sleazy behavior. Or even the Don Quixote thing—the search for non-existent romance and nobility by someone innocent, whose wrongheaded approach causes him to make errors that, by chance, bring him success in his search. Finally, I had to admit that, recalling the way his thick brown hair wouldn’t stay back, and something sad but urgent about his blue eyes, made my nipples hard.
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