April 14

In the light of my last post, I have to cheer on fellow old coot Steve Cohen, who is a 58-year-old 1L at New York Law School:

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/04/14/back-to-school-a-58-year-olds-thoughts-on-the-one-l-year/

http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/04/12/cohen

The DVD Savant, Glenn Erickson, praises Uli Edel's film The Baader-Meinhof Gang, which John Waters liked so much (PMD, March 10 Extra Edition):

http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s3183baad.html

Carsten Jensen's list of the top seafaring tales includes some unusual items, such as Hans Kirk's The Fishermen (a Norwegian novel available in English translation):

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/apr/14/top-10-seafaring-tales-carsten-jensen

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_kirk

I enjoyed  Scott Bryan Wilson's rundown of his collection of novelist Robert Coover:

http://quarterlyconversation.com/constant/robert-coover-rarities

Although I was aware of British children's author William Mayne from any number of laudatory mentions in histories of children's literature, I did not know until I read his Times (U.K.) obituary that he had been convicted on multiple counts of child molestation:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article7097657.ece

This raises interesting questions as to what extent the "ick" factor here should have an impact on our reading of Mayne, and whether it should have an impact on children's access to his work. As an adult, once you know it, you know it, just as with any knowledge of biographical facts. Many creators are unpleasant people, and some are criminal and evil people; it's undeniably fascinating to know about, but it doesn't bar me from considering their work. On the other issue, I would hardly toss Mayne's novels from children's library collections, but sure, I can see where people might get a little exercised about them being there. 

Niles's Blog brings up the parallel case of another British children's writer, Alick Rowe:

http://www.alexfoster.me.uk/2010/04/06/alick-rowe/

A Blog Supreme notes the death of jazz drummer Steve Reid, who played with Miles Davis and Sun Ra among others:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/ablogsupreme/2010/04/remembering_an_oblong_odyssey_steve_reid.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Reid

The Chicago Cultural Center has mounted a show of the graphic work of the great  African-American artist Romare Bearden, who counted jazz among his visual subjects:

http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=11&int_new=37402

Among notables born on this date are educator Anne Sullivan, scholar Robert Curtius, baseball players Greg Maddux and Pete Rose, architect Peter Behrens, Maldivean novelist Husain Salahuddin, country singer Loretta Lynn, jazz saxophonist Gene Ammons, jazz trumpeter Shorty Rogers, and actors John Gielgud, Rod Steiger, Julie Christie, Bradford Dillman, Brad Garrett, Robert Carlyle, and Adrien Brody. Greg Maddux, the absolute artist on the mound, is unquestionably my favorite pitcher in major league history, rivaled but not surpassed by Christy Mathewson (whom of course I never saw, but man, the stories I heard from my grandfather!) and Tom Seaver. Tom Verducci's appreciation of Maddux's mastery is one of the best that I've read:

This appreciation, not by accident, made no mention of any career statistic of Maddux, no more than you would cite records sold to describe the voice of Sinatra. Maddux is synonymous with the art of pitching. He was that good. Never again will we see, or hear, anyone quite like him.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writers/tom_verducci/12/06/maddux/