Page Two Y THE MICHIGAN DALY SUNDAY MAGAZINE February 6, 1 977 Februeiry 6,. 1971 THE MQ-IGAN DAILY SUNDAY MAGAZINE Page Two THE MICHIGAN DAL'( SUNDAY MAGAZINE February 6, 1977 February 6, 1977 notes . This issue of the Sunday Magazine (in case you haven't noticed) represents a. radical departure from our format in the past. As a full-fledged Sunday supplement to The Michigan Daily, we hope to be bringing you more in-depth features, profiles and book reviews. In addition, we will be providing you with such, new-fangled extras as an acrostic puzzle, a comic strip, and the week's "happenings." Thumb through it leisurely, keep it around all week. Long after the rest of the newspaper has been to the recycling plant and back-the magazine will still be intact-wait- ing to be picked up and read, whenever you have the chance. Elaine Fletcher, Susan Ades, -The Editors COVER PHOTO OF ERNIE VICK By Pauline Lubens contents: sunday magaz Ine CO-EDITORS- Susan Ades Elaine Fletcher BOOKS EDITOR- Tom O'Connell ADVERTISING- Don Simpson FEATURES Ernie Vick . .1 .3 . . . War Exiles . . . 5 . .s JAMES DICKEY: DOWNTOWN SERIES An Overview r- . The fre breathing HAPPEN INGS r 0 S BOOK REVIEWS , . . a S T I FK~AUTI ruL- 4 l IGHT J>Th'T IT... , ' CiI{17 ~ f,4 H T -T'5 IGHTS LIKE THIS THAT BRING OUT THE uPOET IN YOUR SOUL.tMAKEiS YOU WVA NT TO SAY CRAZ Y -T-HINGS YOU'D . ONLY SA1Y tUN DER A LOVED~ t4- V j ,,... ' Fs'<- 1 rIM RC7ENi~ M~Y ASS OFF OUT l FRC. I A - .1. .. .. ........ . . .... Sunday mQgaZine acrostic puzzle THE ZODIAC By James Dickey. Doubleday & Co. 62 pp.. $6. By TOM O'CONNELL IF NOTHING ELSE, James Dickey's existence has served to dispel many of the ' stereotypical and naive beliefs about poets that seem to be widely held today. His early years as a writer and teacher were undistinguished, to say the least. After stints as a fighter pilot- during both World War II and the Korean conflict, Dickey taught Freshman Eng- lish at Rice University in Texas and later at the University of Florida. He found it necess'ary to. leave the latter position after a dispute arose over the propriety of a poem he had read to a group of women, and he subsequently turned to writing advertising copy in both New York and Atlanta. Dickey published his first book of poems at 37 - rather "late in the day" as he him- self reflects. Things have improved considerably since then. In 1961 a Guggenheim Fel- lowship took him permanently out of the advertising business, and later Dickey spent two years (1966-1968)' as Poetry Consultant to the Library of Congress. A collection of verse entitled Buckdan- cer's Choice won him the National Book Award and his one novel, Deliverance, was made into a successful motion pic- ture in which Dickey himself played, a minor role. Recently the poet has be- come something of a minor celebrity, reading at Jimmy Carter's inaugura- tion a poem especially written for the occasion after downing a few drinks with Jack. Nicholson and John Wayne. But howeverDickey ,may not live up to the image of the. artistic poet, his poetic artistry is still unquestionable, and his latest work; a poem in twelve -parts entitled The Zodiac, is no excep- tion. It analyzes the existence of a fail- ed, alchoholic Dutch poet, the son of an amateur astronomer, who alternates be- tween futile attempts at writing, periods of the delerium tremens, and a cumpul- sive fascination with the constellations. According to the foreword, it is based on another poem of the'-same title writ- ten by Hendrick Marsman, a Dutch sea- man killed by a torpedo in 1940. But ~~n4 , . 41 - ,#* 4 tN-1, 2 R~ickey states that his effort is no mere tr anslation; that with the exception of a few l.ines it is entirely his own work. IT S EASY TO SEE how Marsman's poem must have intrigued Dickey, for it illustrates one of his fundamental pre- mises about the nature of the idiom-the idea that "all poetry is nothing more or less than an attempt to discover or in- vent conditions under which one can live with oneself." The protagonist in The Zodiac struggles to find a reason for his existence by establishing some kind of relationship between himself, his past, and the stars. His inability to define the relationship or incorporate it into his poems leads him to drunkeness and des- peration,rand final acknowledgement of his failure: This man has given up On anything stronger than he is. He's traveled everywhere But no place has ever done any good. What does his soul matter, saved like a Caesar-headed goldpiece, When the world's dying?- Dickey believes we live in an era" "weary of overrefined, university-pale subtleties" and his verse is character- ized by this belief. It seldom fails to re- flect his open and forceful personality. Although it sometimes shows a lack of grace and an occasional need for a lit- rle understatement, these faults are more than compensated for by his stark and powerful imagery. An example is the following passage, in which the Dutch poet's inability to write, as well as his spiritual and creative emptiness is reflected and amplified by the night landscape he views through the window of his bare, lonely flat: The town square below, deserted as a Siberian crater, lies in the middle Of his white-writing darkness stroboscoped red-stopped by the stammering mess Of the city's unbombed neon, sent through rivers and many cities By fourth-class mail from Hell. And later Dickey creates the same feel- ings of emptiness and insignificance when the poet goes outside to view the constellations in the sky: He loafs around The square. He might be a cock-sucker Looking for trade. He's got a platform - a springboard For himself .' . Nobody sees him; nobody cares. le thinks he's sending night-letters To Mars, and yet he's looking straight Into the Milky Way T TIMES THE POET seems to al- ternate between moments of lucidity and madness. His need to understand his role in the universe has become an obsession; it is a need which we seem to know from the start will never be fulfilled. le finds moments of tempor- IP ary se an ol an ur period gressi the re ed by hopele But nothin to the past t also p for The He Wrar an( Only The tagon: he w seems easy quest Gone ergy ages. ed, ar in~g t work: Ohn o Brin Th Lan on So k Of Mak So The T e a zine I C 1..~o 15 393A Y'1 (. F y 12 DL 34 V 5 5 5612. 57. X _59 6 4 U 6 '. C ui3 ig} J; 17 " 20 4 2 i li f A f L 96 ; 97 G9U 1499 100 ii 0 I Tli," 211 120 % 1.2 1-- n- s ; :z z,> i c 86 4 1'1Aan f 0 0 tL 1O8 12 111 ' -, i ~ 9 - F1g 13 1.3;1 3 ; 32} N :x15 } L 5+ 1.i..%- 21? St'. 1921 1? Z11< 151 l "25.J 1S t 157 X151 ! 19v ? .II.21, 41 3 11-u 1+2 r1:r 0s 3 C: 160 : 131 "-' 05 1' 12 1 1A 3 1 l2 205 J 26 E20? ? zV?05 ?r 4( 1 1 ?31;: ?13 -413 - 90 79i -' 1 170 17 - GX1 1 r S 1 P1. 1,_.i By TEV1EN J, POZSGAI A. Talisman; fixation. 106 B. Reverts; moves backward ............. _. 6 C. Measure of randomness or disorder in a system ..----- 14 1) Open; not kept back -_- 13 171 E. Self-destructive desire (2 words) ....... 82 F. Something for something (3 words) (Latin) .... - 10 140 1 31 126 0. Odd; strange ........ 194 100 112 178 42 P. Once popular brain surgery ............. - 75 f 45 83 154 68 15 58 208 123 18 151 78 183 129 172. 3 Q. Enchroachment; inroad ......... 44 113 209 29 56 202 143 30 33 22 115 101 95 193 160 152 11 207 54 K5 35 28 70 R. Philistine; barbarian. S. Total disregard of w external reality. T. The Graduate director.......... U. Forgetful; oblivious. 205 99 170 195 63 9 149 72 51 182 24 135 89 48 127 177 146 104 26 61 34 174 131 188 23 145 80 136 12 148 86 186 122 38 162 203 168 INSTRUCTIONS Guess the words defined at the left and write them in over their numbered dashes. Then, trans- fer each letter to the corres- pondingly numbered square in the pattern. The filled pattern will contain a quotation reading from left to right with the black,. squares indicating word end- ings. Meanwhile, the first let- ters of the guessed words will form an acrostic, giving the author's name and title of the work the quote is extracted from. Answer to This Week's Puzzle Next week, and every week, look for the answers to the Sunday Magazine Acrostic in this slot. 196 7 197 120 155 62 94 73 G. Without awareness or sensation......... The shades off modern syirn 180 105 142 5 71 132 43 98 36 117 176 V. Dormant; not apparent W. "She was just seventeen/-" The Beatles, I Saw Her Standing There (5 words)......... 128 157 150 55 77 189 H1. Draw out; bring forth 1. Corroborate; supply ..... J. Treatment; tension reliever .............. K. Visionary; impractical one.... L. All through; across ..... M. Insane asylum (slang) .r 84 134 17 27 141 166 TIE POET'S THIRD EYE: A GUIDE TO SYMBOLISM IN MODERN LITERATURE by Gordon E. Bigelow Philosophical Library, 146 pp., $7:50 By M ARNiE HEYN (;ORDON BIG ELOW has writ- ten what may be the defini- tive textbook on symbolism in all its :horny and elusive ava- tors. Except for its price, it is the perfect classroom compan- ion for courses in literature, psychology, linguistics, acnd phi- losophy. Confusion about sym- holism is surely a common oc- currence: the lecturer raises a hand close to the shoulder, flaps it in an eccentric clockwise di- rection and says, "You know- symbolism-" students write a big "S" in their notes, underline it twice, and come away none the wiser. This book is a pos- sible means of changing that. Bigelow's erudition is impress- ive and his prose is nice and straightforward (with three ex- ceptions-to be covered later). Hlis first chapter, "From Alle- gory to Organicism," traces the transition, in world view, from the medieval cosmos to the En- lightenment's mechanist uni- verse to the post-Romantic evo- 1,utionary perspective. He ex- plains the apparent conflict be- tween allegory and symbolism, the metaphysical role of ambi- guity, perspectivism, and logical posi ivism. Bigelow does an es- pecially good job in tracing the hermetic world view in Euro- pean literature and thought. Bigelow's greatest strength lies in philosophy, ratherrthan in criticism, as the chapter, French Symbolism Movement" demonstra'es. He has a firm enough grasp on symboliste his- tory and techniques, but attitude (which is perhaps the most im- portant aspect) escapes him. Bigelow apparently thinks that all poetry is wri'ten about un- happy love affairs with beautiful women. In addition, he has a hard time with straight talk about sex: "'equited love and te consummation of healthy de- sire are seldom to be found ." He moreover mistakes mo- tives of the symbolistes: The decadent was typically a man near middle age with a dandy's narcissism and pre- occupation with fancy clothing and a contempt for bourgeois proprieties which sometimes led to behavior deliberately intended to shock. In this res- pect Nerval is often cited, leading a lobster at the end of a long ribbon on the Paris streets. but Nerval had spells of actual insanity and does not provide so good an example as Verlaine and Rimbaud, who conducted a flagrant homo- sexual affair across France and the low countries, or Bau- delaire's excesses with drugs and alcohol, or Mallarne's counsel and example of with- drawal from active life into the hermetic consolations of art. Meanwhile he has no idea what to do with the decadents. Nevertheless, Bigelow's dia- gramatic nproach to interpret- ing symboliste verse can be very helpful in explaining the idenifiable characteristics of symbolism in literature-wi.h o without the symbols. ' E DREAM SYMBOLISM of Freud and Jung" chapte is both helpful and unhelpful "reud comes in handy for san d revisionist lumps, for "me chanical" interpretation anda rigid format for understanding dream symbols. Bigelow is ne' er actually disparaging towar Freud, but he does treat hi work as an historical prelude t Jung's. Bigelow does a muc better job untangling Jung's ra ther involuted and fluid concep tions of dreams, symbols, th unconscious, and especially a chetypes-which have, because of linguistic confusions, been th ostensible topic of more roste monographs than penis envy: So the archetype is not the actual symbol; it is the mode of energy and the formative principle underlying and send- ing up the symbol from the collective uncooscious. "Myth as Literary Symbol" isnamed; this chapter will t of more interest to linguist semanticists, and anthropoli 53 109 118 153 4 184 175 37 93 173 206 185 156 144 187 92 165 133 87 190 64 67 108 199 60 139 X. Of minor importance. Y. Elephant hunters (2 words).......... Z. Experience; know-how......... 107 97 103 49 21 119 52 79 74 16 8 163 198 121 41 59 164 125 90 50 179 40 201 20 110 1K1 158 124 147 200 19 32 39 192 114 96 47 66 204 137 81 25 111 88 2 76 116 169 130 159 65 57 46 91 N., Goal; purpose ... ....__ __ __ - - - 181 102 167 138 69 161 ~I