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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (May 5, 1978)
‘Rhythms of people’ inspire author By DAGMAR OBEREIGNER Of the Emerald “I love voices, lingo, the rhythms of people. That's part of the reason why I’m a poet,” says feminist author Judith Johnson Sherwin. The award-winning wri ter spoke about contemporary poetry, drama and fiction and gave a poetry reading on campus this week. The sounds of a picket line or the speech of an angry man in a bar excite her. “His anger just seduced me,” she beams. ...better tell no man how you rolled right over on your rock bot tom flapjack buttered side for those mammal-dripping, stick-pin eyes in a two-button suit with computer ears...” Sherwin writes about political subjects. Initially, she found that editors, then predominately male, Small business vital to economy, stresses Martin Roger Martin, Republican gubernatorial candidate, punc tuated his speech pledging sup port to Oregon’s small businesses with swipes at former governor Tom McCall at Thursday's Lane Rubicon Society noon meeting. Martin feels the Straub ad ministration has been largely a continuation of McCall’s policies. “If you don’t like the carbon copy the last three years have been, why buy the original?” said Martin. Unemployment was not as minor a problem under McCall’s administration as the former gov ernor is presenting it, maintains Martin, who is state house Repub lican speaker. He feels the real campaign question in May and November is, ‘ Who is going to re ally do something about the economy?" Martin feels that ''foreign" businesses, such as the Hewlitt Packard Corporation in Corvallis, are not the answer to Oregon’s unemployment. While such large corporations do employ large numbers, the people they hire are those with specific skills or who are highly educated. ‘‘Those firms do not employ the unemployed,” said Martin. In addi tion, big companies tend to locate in populations centers in the state and near the state’s universities, Martin said. “Westfir, John Day, Oakridge, La Grande, Coos Bay, Pendleton” — these are the places where big outside corporations make no dent in the unemployment figures, said Martin, and where other Swiss study announced An opportunity to study this summer with Nobel Laureate Kon rad Lorenz, psychoanalyst Erik Erikson, and Robert Penn War ren, two-time Pulitzer Prize winning writer, was announced by the Washington, D.C. office of the International Institute for Humanistic Studies of Geneva, Switzerland. Students may take the courses either for credit or not. Enrollment for credit in one of the courses is $300 for three undergraduate credits or two graduate credits; enrollment as non-credit student is $230. Participants going to Bennington will be provided with week-long room and board there for $110, while those going to Al tenberg will live in Vienna. Inquiries may be sent to the Summer Program Office of the In stitute, 5530 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20015. measures are needed. “The real solution to unem ployment lies in helping the small businessman,” Martin claims. “The small employer is the back bone of the state.” Martin, who owns an electrical equipment sales business in Lake Oswego, criticized excessive government red tape for hindering the small business owner, when he feels the government should take a more conciliatory attitude towards small employers. “Our mission in the next four years is to make that part of gov ernment you have to work with more co-operative,” said Martin. Martin came out against full time equivalency funding of higher education, saying the state’s uni versities need more than “bare bones budgets.” “We've got Trojan — I don’t agree it’s going to be plausible to dose it,” Martin said when asked about nuclear power. However, he feels that if Pebble Springs is built, it will be the the last nuclear plant in Oregon. “Nuclear power is not cheap energy at all,” he said. He feels that the federal gov ernment must find an immediate solution to the disposal of nuclear wastes. The federal agencies have “transferred the responsibil ity to the state,” and Martin feels it is time they deal with the problem. “It’s Tom who went around the country talking about the “Oregon Story,’ making us well-known from here to Denmark," said Martin, working in a few final jabs at the former governor. “Let’s stop hootin' and hoolerin’ about Oregon outside the state.” COPIES OVER NIGHT NO MINIMUM . 8 am - 8 pm NOW OPEN SUNDAY 12-5 KINKO’S 344-7894 1128-B ALDER STREET 2nd floor Atrium 485-1063 urged her to write about emotions, families and subjects such as what’s it’s like to have a child, she says. “Today, my work is the same, my mind is the same,” she con tinues, “but now feminist authors say What are you doing writing about patriarchal subjects — why aren’t you writing about women's feelings?’” Sherwin calls those people “formula thinkers” and says they wind up with a tired out look. She rewrites her works several times, going from play to drama format and back again. “Each reshaping gets rid of one level of bullshit —there is less and less of ‘she felt she had to be...’ and more comes in of things show ing you that feeling,” Sherwin says. “Just yesterday, sitting with you eating grapefruit a word I stuck too hard or on the wrong angle squirted tart into my face...” “You learn more of a work over time. A work has its own organic life,” she says. “Part of my learn ing has been listening to the work and not me.” After a while, Sherwin says, she began to have a feeling about what a work had to tell her, and did If not try to impose anything on it. She compares herself to a sculp tor gently exploring an object until he finds its shape. Sherwin often employs audi ence participation in her poetry readings, and says the audience helps directly in the shamping of a poem. She has worked with dan cers, and says they teach her “rhythm of the mind and voice which I didn't know of before.” “New York woman with my safety glass with my broad-beamed head lights I talk of death...” Poetry or prose — she has no preference for writing one rather than the other. “I listen to a work and see where it’s going to take me,” she says. If one form of a work is a true statement, she added, it should lend itself to another form if it is listened to. “Hey brassy baby with switched-on hair made them glow in the dark call for a brand new smile to wear in the long nights when the geiger counters praise you... ...Lady of spending in dreams when I see under your put-on costume the intellect how rich, delicious you were made madonna of money...” (The earth speaking to Marilyn Monroe after her death.) Dylan Thomas, Samuel Beck ett, Emily Dickinson, Robert Greeley, Adrienne Rich and Elizabeth Barrett Browning are some of the artists she admires and says have shaped her work. 'The greatest force as a crea tive artist is writing as homage to the great artists,” says Sherwin. Sherwin began to publish her poetry at the age of 18 in the Atlan tic Monthly. Her work has ap peared in numerous magazines and anthologies. She has pub lished three books and is the au thor of four plays. She won the Playboy Fiction Prize in 1977 and the Male Younger Series award for her first book, “Uranium Bombs.” Sherwin’s appearances at the University were sponsored by the English and Speech departments, the University Assembly and Lec tures Committee, and the Women’s Studies Program. 1 WHITE JEANS REORDER JUST ARRIVED!! REG. 2600 NOW 16" HURRY WHILE THEY LAST!!! J II" SSI.I CLOTHES WOOLS I. iM M.(m < •) • MM1M
