At Maxwell Street: Chicago’s Historic Marketplace Recalled in Words and Photographs

Tom Palazzolo approached me in late 2007 with the idea of turning his 1983 cinema
verité documentary, At Maxwell Street, into a book. We had just published Water Tanks of Chicago: A Vanishing Urban Legacy, by Larry W Green, and that book was striking a chord with people who had never noticed these aging wooden behemoths in their midst. Tom, like Larry, was a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In fact, I had taken Tom’s filmmaking class during the summer of 1977 at SAIC, so we had known each other for 30 years. One of Tom’s most remarkable films is called Caligari’s Cure
(http://www.facets.org/asticat?function=buyitem&catname=facets&catnum=/207), and I actually had a bit part in that movie.

Tom’s concept for the book was to approach his friends and acquaintances and get them to write about their experiences of the old Maxwell Street marketplace. He got veteran arts journalist Jack Helbig to write the introduction, and Lori Grove of the Maxwell Street Foundation, and coauthor of Chicago's Maxwell Street (IL) (Images of America) to write the foreword. The other contributors are the eminent painter Robert Guinan, the Sun-Times critic Bill Stamets, local merchant and wonderful prose stylist Lionel Bottari, poet John Platt, local artist Linda Platt, and an oral history from old-timer Leland “Sugar” Cain, Jr. A DVD of Tom’s original movie accompanies the book, along with a slide show of extra images with harmonica and guitar music, labeled Maxwell Street Blues by local musicians Little Jukela and Willie Poor Boy, recorded at Jimmy’s Woodlawn Tap in Hyde Park.

For those who are not familiar with it, Maxwell Street is an avenue that runs E/W two blocks south of Roosevelt Road (12th St) and is intersected by the Dan Ryan expressway leading into downtown Chicago. The open-air marketplace started there around the turn of the 20th century, and was active up until 2000, even though it was undergoing painful urban renewal in the last 10 years of its existence. It is now under the auspices of the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and is called University Village. The city kept moving the marketplace, and it got smaller and more insignificant with each displacement. I’m not sure exactly where it’s located now, but it was in the news this past week because the city was considering raising the vendor fees for selling at the marketplace, and people thought that would spell its ultimate demise.

The market on Maxwell Street was a unique and colorful place, where shoppers could get just about anything extremely cheaply. It was a photographer’s paradise, and this is where Tom and his wife Marcia cut their teeth as artists in the mid 1960s. The book also includes amazing photographs by Tom’s friend and fellow SAIC classmate, the painter Bernard Beckman. He has a keen interest in blues and gospel music, and there are many poignant photos in the book from Beckman of the street performers at Maxwell Street. The book as delayed because we kept adding and changing things right up to the last minute, even while the book was at press. We wanted the best book possible, and now that it’s finally published we feel like we accomplished putting together a great book.

Bob Sirott of WGN AM 720 radio called this book, “quite a nice little keepsake.” http://wgnradio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=46757&Itemid=557 – I had a call yesterday from the painter Robert Guinan who loved the book, and lamented that there were no surviving pictures of Johnny Young, a pioneering blues artist who made Maxwell Street his main hangout, and who Guinan profiles in the book. Guinan told me he thought a book of this kind on Maxwell Street was long overdue. There are some good promotional things coming up for this book, an event at the Oak Park (IL) Public Library at 7 pm on December 18 where Tom and his wife Marcia will sign books and they will show the movie. Tom will appear on Ray Hanania’s Radio Chicagoland show WJJG AM 1530 on December 5 at 8:30 am. And, this is big, Tom will be live on WGN TV (channel 9 in Chicago, and nationally syndicated on cable TV) on the Midday News program on December 18 around 12:20 pm, where they will interview Tom about the book and show snippets from the movie.

Is the book business recession proof?

Alan Greenspan is in the news once again, his grizzled face increasingly haggard as he looks on with shock and awe at the tanking international economy. A recent cover image on the New Yorker magazine shows Wall Street traders bleeding from their eyeballs as the Angel of Death and Destruction holds up a broadsheet with the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeting straight down to Hell. There is finger pointing on both sides of the political aisle, as the fallout from irrational exuberance affects everyone. The upcoming presidential election offers two starkly different approaches to resuscitating the damaged economy, and columnist and Princeton professor Paul Krugman, this year's Nobel Memorial Prize Winner for Economics, tells us that the pain is only just beginning . . .

The book business, on the other hand, remains as quietly quirky as ever. In tough economic times, as publishers both large and small tighten their belts and rein in their advances to unknown authors who are not yet established with the reading public, one thing becomes abundantly clear: Commission reps, those feisty independent sales people who ply their trade in different territories throughout North America and beyond, offer incredibly good value for all publishers. Commission selling is fixed-cost. Commission reps pay their own expenses, including transportation, taxes, and insurance, and they only get paid when orders ship into their designated territory. Selling on commission is a time-honored practice, and if you take a look at the history of this noble profession you will see that it goes all the way back to eighteenth-century Europe as well as the North American colonies, where an intricate network of booksellers and travelers was established.

Independent reps bring more than good economics to the big table. Besides being resilient, cost effective, and an integral part of the operations of the book industry, independents can and often do freely speak their minds to good effect. This is an added value, and the self-directed rep can offer valuable advice to help publishers succeed in the marketplace. It's simple. If the publisher succeeds, the rep does, too. NAIPR reps are a talented bunch of folks, and in some cases have more than five decades of experience to draw upon. Because independent reps carry a mixed bag of publishers and go into a variety of accounts, this means they are flexible and can adapt to many situations. The durability of the relationship between publisher and independent rep counts for a lot as well: over time the rep develops into an expert on his publishers’ backlists, and the specific disciplines they publish. Booksellers rely on this breadth of knowledge in making their buying decisions. Everyone wins when you employ an independent rep.
So the answer to the question in the title of this piece is: YES! Publishers and booksellers can make good things and strong sales happen with a little help from their friends at NAIPR.

Missouri to publish a new collection of stories by Rudolph Fisher

Rudolph Fisher was a great writer. He wrote short stories that depicted life in Harlem in the 1920s and 30s, the so-called Jazz Age, with a rare sense of humor, grace and objectivity. He was also a true a renaissance man: -- a full-time doctor, musician, and orator, he also wrote two novels and a number of book reviews and scientific articles. One of the novels is a mystery, a favorite of mine published years ago by University of Michigan Press, called The Conjure Man Dies.

The University of Missouri Press anthology collects all of his short stories, and is called The City of Refuge: The Collected Stories of Rudolph Fisher. It’s edited with an introduction by John McCluskey, Jr., a professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Indiana University. This is a new and expanded edition.

This definitive collection of stories by Fisher shows his remarkable range as a writer. It includes seven unpublished stories that take up such themes as martial infidelity and passing for black, and relate the further adventures Jinx and Bubber, characters that appeared in Fisher’s novels. In all Fisher offers vibrant tales of inner-city life, laced with humor from black folklore, and infused with music from Harlem’s many cabarets, speakeasies, and nightclubs. It offers a multifaceted portrait of Harlem that is unmatched in depth and range by Fisher’s contemporaries or successors, as the New York Times Book Review said, “one feels, smells, and tastes his Harlem; its people come alive and one cares about them.”

This book also includes a famous article Fisher wrote called “The Caucasian Storms Harlem,” which describes the craze for black music and dance. McCluskey’s introduction has been updated to include the new works, and places Fisher’s work and career in a broader context of American writing during the 1920s.

Hopefully this new edition will gain Fisher a wider readership, and enhance his stature as a major American writer. Booklist noted about Fisher’s work, it shows “the complexity of black urban life in its encounter with the dangers and delights of the city.”

Fall 2008 - Pick of the Lists

Fall 2008 - Pick of the Lists

Breaking the Spell of Binge-Eating Kortink, Paper, $18.95, ISBN 978-0-89733-577-5, October, Health/Self-Help, Academy Chicago

A runaway bestseller in Holand in 2006, this empowering book has now been translated from the Dutch. Kortink is a spiritual psychologist who has formulated a unique therapy for the effective treatment of binge-eating and an array of eating disorders.

Chicago Neon Signs Zamudio, Cloth, $24.95, ISBN 978-0-97869676-2-8, October, Photography, Wicker Park Press

Zamudio takes pictures of familiar and exotic neon signs throughout the city with a Diana, a toy camera made completely from plastic, including the lens. The photographs are striking images that will remind readers of a bygone era in an ever-changing urban environment.

Anatomy of a Trial: Public Loss, Lessons Learned from People Vs OJ Simpson Hayslett, Cloth, $29.95, November, History/Journalism, University of Missouri Press

A compelling insider’s account of the trial of the century: -- Hayslett was a media liaison who had unprecedented access during the trial. This is a page-turning narrative of the incredible events that took place in the courtroom.

Hollywood Under Siege: Martin Scorsese, Religious Right and Culture Wars Lindlof, Cloth, $32.50, ISBN 978-0-8131-2517-6, August, Film/American History, University Press of Kentucky

The film version of The Last Temptation of Christ caused a storm of controversy when it appeared in 1988. Lindlof interviews all the principles involved in the release of the film, and shows how this key event became a tipping point in the ongoing culture wars. This is fascinating reading.

Intelligence Matters: CIA, FBI, Saudi Arabia, & the Failure of America’s War on Terror Graham, Paper, $17.95, ISBN 978-0-7006-1626-8, September, Current Affairs, University Press of Kansas

Senator Graham chaired the historic joint House-Senate inquiry into intelligence failures leading up to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. This book tells a riveting tale and is an unflinching exposé of breakdowns, incompetence, and deceit at the highest levels of government.

Charles Darwin: Concise Story of Extraordinary Man Berra, Cloth, $19.95, ISBN 978-0-8018-9104-5, November, Biography, Johns Hopkins

2009 is the 200^th anniversary of Darwin’s birth (Feb 12), and this compact and heavily illustrated biography reveals the man behind the great scientist. This book digs deep to reveal Darwin the Man,

Cook’s Journey: Slow Food in the Heartland Friese, Paper, $26.95, ISBN 978-1-8881603-6-9, September, Cooking/Travel, Ice Cube Press

Iowa City chef embarks on a journey around the Midwest and chronicles a variety of Slow Food Movements. This includes micro-breweries in Ann Arbor and smoked trout from Lake Superior region. Readers will be amazed at the remarkable diversity of culinary offerings of the Midwest. This book is a delight.

Winter Sky: New and Selected Poems, 1968-2008 Barks, Cloth, $26.95, ISBN 978-0-8203-3237-6, November, Poetry, University of Georgia

Coleman Barks is well-known as the translator of 13^th century mystical poet Jalal Al-Din Rumi. Barks has reached a devoted and inspired worldwide audience with his translations of Rumi’s work. Here is a luminous collection of over 400 pages of Bark’s own playful poetry.

Gallery Ghost: Find the Ghost Who Paints the Most Nilsen, Cloth, $17.95, ISBN 978-1-59960-036-9. August, Children’s/Art, Birdcage Press

Something spooky is happening at the museum. At night the ghosts of 24 famous artists come out to play. Published in association with National Gallery in Washington, DC, it features 24 of their greatest masterpieces. This book will provide hours of fun for kids 7 and up, as they learn about each artist and their paintings through poems and stories.

Waters of Michigan Dempsey, Cloth, $29.95, ISBN 978-0870138300, April, Photography/Regional, Michigan State University Press

80 duotone illustrations present Michigan's greatest resource as seen through the lens of a camera.

Pittsburgh to Publish a Panorama of 19th Century Printed Views of the City

Historical print and antique map expert Christopher W. Lane has put together a stunning collection of reproductions of various views of the Pittsburgh, PA from books, magazines, illustrated newspapers, lithographs, and other types of material from the 19th century. A Panorama of Pittsburgh: Nineteenth-Century Printed Views offers 140 full-color illustrations, and is published in conjunction with the Frick Art and Historical Center in Pittsburgh. The book offers various views of Pittsburgh, from an idyllic little village on a confluence of rivers in 1817, to the Great Conflagration in April, 1845 where over 1,000 houses burned to the ground. We see the development of Pittsburgh as an industrial powerhouse and how this was depicted in everything from fine art to advertising materials.

2008 is the 250th anniversary of the founding of Pittsburgh in 1758. This book is a fitting tribute, and belongs on the shelf next to the classic book University of Pittsburgh Press published originally in 1990, Arthur G. Smith’s Pittsburgh Then and Now. Lane’s book is an instant classic as he provides visual and written examples of prints, and he has provided here the most comprehensive listing of depictions of Pittsburgh ever assembled.

Prometheus Books to publish rare Mark Twain collection

S.T. Joshi has done it again. He’s come up with an incredible collection of uncommon writings by Mark Twain in What Is Man? And Other Irreverent Essays. As an editor and literary sleuth Joshi, an independent scholar who has edited collections of great American writers such as H.L. Mencken and H.P. Lovecraft, among others, has weeded out key writings by Twain on religion. Reminiscent of the French Enlightenment writer Voltaire, Twain had an unbounded contempt for religious hypocrisy and obstructionism. He peppered his essays with a razor sharp satirical wit, and his writing is characteristically sardonic and humorous in these essays.

Many of the essays in this book have not been readily available before, and Joshi provides helpful annotations to explain various historical, literary and religious references. The main essay in the book is What Is Man? (1906), a long philosophical dialogue about the nature of religion, where Twain asserts that altruism does not exist, that every human action is the product of outside influences, and we help others primarily as a means to make ourselves comfortable. Twain condemns religious exclusivity, the dreadful treatment of animals by a supposedly moral human race, and what he calls the hypocritical Christian thirst for money. Twain pulls no punches here, as he did in the posthumous collection of his writings, Letters from the Earth.

Although Twain maintained until the end of his life that he believed in God, he expressed a deep skepticism toward such religious beliefs as “special Providence” (God’s interference in the affairs of individuals), the concept of hell, the religious basis of morality, and the divine inspiration of the Bible. He had serious concerns about central religious tenants, and it’s clear that these weighed on his mind for much of his life. Twain’s family was uncomfortable with some of his writings (for instance, Letters from the Earth was not published until 1962, well after his death in 1910), and editor Joshi and Prometheus Books have done readers a great service by bringing Twain’s obscure but lively philosophical writings on religion to a wider audience.

There are many surprises to be had in any Twain collection, he was an undisputed master of many styles of writing, and Joshi provides a comprehensive introduction that elucidates Twain’s shifting attitudes towards religion in general. What we have here is a true American original, Mark Twain, thought by many to be the Father of American Literature, taking a straight aim at the multifarious claims of religion – metaphysical, moral and political – and exposing what he saw as their fallacies and deliberate obscurantism.



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Tennessee revisits its Vernacular Architecture series with a powerhouse Victorian Studies book

Anna Vemer Andrzejewski is an assistant professor of art history at University of Wisconsin at Madison and she had written an unusual and innovative book about how surveillance played a key role in the building of prisons in 19th century America, and how this dynamic spilled over into the construction of post offices, factories, offices, and even houses. Building Power: Architecture and Surveillance in Victorian America shows how surveillance influenced a diverse array of the built environment in this country from roughly 1865 to 1918. She goes so far to say that surveillance not only motivated a range of common buildings but also was and is a defining practice of modernism.

French philosopher Michel Foucault is the author of Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison, and the classic Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972-1977, and his ideas are what informs Andrzejewski’s arguments. Foucault wrote extensively about the idea of ever-present gaze and control, and the kind of insidious power that “reaches into the very grain of individuals, touches their bodies and inserts itself into their actions and attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives.” The argument is complex and way too multilayered to paraphrase here, to say nothing of the fact that it’s been translated from the French, but Foucault also goes back to English political philosopher Jeremy Bentham’s central idea of the Panopticon, that is, a building, as a prison, hospital, library, or the like, so arranged that all parts of the interior are visible from a single point.

Andrzejewski’s title and the very concept of Building Power is an interesting play on words, a reference to Foucault’s panoptic theory. Even so, she builds and expands on Foucault’s creative arguments and illustrates how diverse American spaces were built with close scrutiny in mind in Victorian America, and how this complicated landscape influenced all aspects of everyday life and the principles of modernism. The book is illustrated with 80 photographs, and, according to architectural historian Ken Breisch from the University of Southern California, Andrzejewski’s “comparative method is original and yields new insight into the widespread role of surveillance in American life.”