Teaching to Write or Writing to Teach?

Ever since I graduated from San Diego State University with my Masters Degree in Creative Writing, I have been teaching to write. In other words, the teaching paid the bills so I could write. Following ten years of writing and teaching, I accumulated some fiction about which I was proud to say, “These stories were written to teach the reader something.”

What better way to label a volume of short fiction that had a lot to say to humanity about compassion, understanding and open mindedness, than to put the picture of “Compassionate Conservative” himself, George Walker Bush, right on the cover? Of course, the title story about “The President’s Parasite” is a satire, one of the time-honored traditions of my relatives from the British Isles, Jonathan Swift, Alexander Pope and George Orwell. Satire teaches by using ironic humor, and this story is dripping with it.

How’s this? I’ll make you, the reader, a promise. If you have an open mind and are not offended by things like the biggest penis on record, homeless folks fighting for fame and fortune, the President of the United States being outwitted by a genius tapeworm residing in his bowel, or an abortionist who sings Beatles’ songs, then perhaps you will see the humor in my work. Remember how it was in school? Sometimes, the teacher made you think about what you were reading. That’s the way it is in my new book of short fiction, The President’s Parasite and Other Stories.

I am the kind of guy who chuckles out loud when showing my college students The Trial, a film based on the novel by Franz Kafka. There’s a scene in it where Joseph K. watches a lawyer make love to a washer woman on the floor of the courtroom where he is supposed to be getting his “justice,” but all the court officials stand around “gawking” at them. Milan Kundera, the Czech author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being was quoted as saying, “Franz Kafka should be read as fact and not as fiction.” Aha! So, Joseph K. is magically transformed into William Jefferson Clinton, one of the Bush boys, or dozens of other “absurd politicians” that we elect as our leaders. Now do you understand why I laugh?

My college professor, Dr. Maurice Friedman, once told us in his “Modern Existentialism” class, that he knew Max Brod (the best friend of Kafka who refused to burn his manuscripts when K. died), and that Brod told Friedman that Kafka used to read from his work to a collection of “Czech Literati” at some bistro in Prague. Friedman said Brod and the audience “laughed their asses off at Kafka’s stories,” as I hope you will laugh when you read many of the stories in this collection. It’s the laugh of the literati “insider,” so this makes you an intelligent human being. If you don’t laugh, and you take them seriously, then that’s fine too. Many never found the humor in Kafka. Remember this: I am a teacher who teaches to write and writes to teach. So, write to me at jimmusgrave@cox.net, if you have questions!

Political Analyst Predicted Racial Divide on Obama Candidacy in the Ethnic Presidency: How Race Decides the Race to the White House

A New York Times Poll released July 15 found that the prospect of an Obama presidency has deeply divided black, white and Hispanic voters. A majority of Hispanics and blacks say an Obama White House will improve race relations. A majority of whites say it won’t. In his book, The Ethnic Presidency: How Race Decides the Race to the White House, noted political analyst Earl Ofari Hutchinson predicted that race would be a decisive factor in the presidential race.

Hutchinson said that the New York Times poll validated many of the key points and predictions in his book, The Ethnic Presidency. The poll found that a majority of whites are skeptical about Obama’s competency, experience and political beliefs. While a majority of blacks and Hispanics believe that Obama is best able to bring racial harmony and hope to the poor and dispossessed.

“The racial divide that the New York Times poll found on everything from black and white views of racial progress, political expertise, immigration, and the future of the country under the first African-American president,” says Hutchinson, “echo the points detailed in The Ethnic Presidency.”

Hutchinson goes much further and tells how racial messages, images, stereotypes and code words impact and influence presidential elections past and present. The New York Times poll found African-American, Hispanic and Asian voters will play a major role in the presidential election. Hutchinson tells why their role and importance in presidential elections has grown immensely in the past decade and will continue to grow in future presidential elections.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His new book The Ethnic Presidency: How Race Decides the Race to the White House was published by Middle Passage Press, February, 2008.