Smoking Stinks!

Thank You For Smoking (the book) came out in 1994. The year I smoked my first ever cigarette. I was 17. It was a Marlboro Red. I remember thinking (somewhere between the choking and coughing): I don't feel anything. I don't get it. Am I supposed to feel something? Why do people do this? 11 years later, I found myself asking the same question: Why do people do this? Why am I doing this? I couldn't find a good enough answer, so I quit.

I made the quitting sound easy. It wasn't. Over the years, it does become a habit. It does become a part of who you are. I won't lie. I sometimes miss it. But I miss it for nostalgic reasons, in that it reminds me of being young and reckless (or maybe careless is a better word).

I guess that's my two-cents on smoking. I could go into my grandfather losing a lung--and then his life. Or the recent trip to chemotherapy where someone near and dear to my heart has been going through treatment. I'll save you (smokers) the gory details.

Let's talk about the novel, shall we?




The chapter where Nick meets the Tumbleweed Man is the most telling (and honest) chapter in the whole novel. Did it not feel real? For a large chunk of this novel, it feels like sharp, biting satire--where people and situations are grossly exaggerated for comic affect. We can assume Oprah had a show on smoking, but was it like it played out in the novel? Or the Larry King show? Did a lobbyist go on either show to say smoking 'retards the onset of Parkinson's disease'? Unlikely. But how hilarious it is for Nick to get away with it.

Smoking is bad. Look at what it did to the Marlboro Man. I'm guessing Chris Buckley's Tumbleweed character was based on real life Marlboro Man Wayne McLaren. After being diagnosed with cancer (at age 49), he spoke out against smoking--and Phillip Morris fought back by denying that the man even appeared in the ads. Bullshit. They later said he did appear in ads, but not as the Marlboro Man. McLaren died in 1992, at the age of 51.


I think what is so sad is the honesty of the Tumbleweed Man. He, like so many people back in the 40's and 50's, didn't know any better. The Tumbleweed Man tells Nick: "Doctors used to promote cigarettes" (179). After the first cancer scare, the tobacco companies reaction was filtered cigarettes. The Tumbleweed Man ad campaign was important, in that, it promoted the image of a tough, rugged cowboy. Filter-tips were as the Tumbleweed Man says "for pussies" (179). The Tumbleweed Man ad would toughen up the product.

In 1994, the cigarette ad campaign was under attack. The ads such as Joe Camel, were being criticized for their appeal to children. How much power does an ad have on the public? Do you believe that Joe Camel ads would get kids to smoke? What do you think of the Marlboro Man ads? Also, there's a funny moment where the Senator of Vermont is wanting to push for cigarettes to carry skull and crossbones. Thoughts on that? I know in England the packs read: Smoking Kills. Gets the message across, doesn't it?

Bibliography
Buckley, Christopher. Thank You For Smoking. New York: Random House, 2006.

Election

In novels, we get more of the inner thoughts (psychology) of the characters. In film, we get the voice-over. I've been told (when writing screenplays) to stay away from the voice-over narration. It can work. It works in Election. Goodfellas. Double Indemnity.




I can't help but think of the film Adaptation. The scene where Charlie goes to a lecture on screenwriting where Robert McKee (played by actor Brian Cox) has this to say about voice-over narration:

"And God help you if you use voice-over in your work, my friends. God help you. That’s flaccid, sloppy writing. Any idiot can write a voice-over narration to explain the thoughts of a character."

I think Alexander Payne did a fine job. He didn't abuse the voice-over. We didn't get every thought. I don't consider the writing sloppy, nor flaccid (that's insulting). What do you guys think?

Does Mr. M regret what he did with the ballots in the film? He doesn't seem to have too much remorse in tossing out the ballots in the book: 'I wish I hadn't done what I'd done, and I also wished I'd thought of a less obvious place to dispose of the ballots' (132). If he had pocketed the ballots, no one would have found out.

There are other moments in the novel where we get the thinkings and plottings of characters that don't make it into the film. Can you find them?




We talked about moments that work and moments that didn't work in the novel Election. Could you find a passage in the novel that had potential for comedy (particularly dark comedy) but fell flat? Could you find a passage that was made funny in the film?


Again, talking about what is lost in translation--or in the adaptation of a novel (or play) to a film. A film that is better than the book is rare. I read an interview with Alexander Payne (director/screenwriter or Election) where he said he likes to get unpublished works. He was nice and said he likes unpublished or ignored works because no one knows what to do with it--because they are under-appreciated for humor, character stories, etc). Another film he made that came from an unpublished novel is Sideways. I think the books aren't published because the books aren't any good. But that's me. What do you think?

Bibliography
Perrotta, Tom. Election. New York: The Berkley Publishing Group, 1998.

Get to Know Tom Perrotta

The following quote comes from a 20 questions segment from Post Road Magazine. I agree with his views on the writing workshop:

There’s a lot you can learn from workshops—how to edit other people’s work, how to accept criticism, how to gain some distance on your work. It’s great to have an audience when you’re starting out, and you probably won’t ever get a more attentive group of readers than your workshop colleagues. Some of the best friends I've had are people I've met in the hothouse of fiction workshops. But like anything else, workshops become frustrating and repetitive after a while; there comes a point when you’re able to internalize the voice of your colleagues, and anticipate their reactions in advance. At that point, you're better off on your own.

Here's what he has to say about the screen adaptation of Election (from an interview at Zulkey):

Were you pleased with the screen adaptation of Election? Do you think it was faithful enough to the book?

I loved the movie version of Election-it was one of the funniest and most memorable American movies of the past twenty years. It was broadly faithful to the plot of the book, with the exception of the ending, which had to be rewritten and reshot when the original ending fell a bit flat on screen. But what really makes the movie terrific isn't that it's particularly faithful to my book. It's that the director, Alexander Payne (who also wrote the script, along with Jim Taylor) was able to bring his own inimitable sensibility-which is much more satiric and hard-edged than my own-to the material, and transform it in unexpected ways. That was the really exciting part of the translation from one medium to another-watching another artist breathe new life into the work.

Finally, here is what he has to say when asked about the future of American literature (from an interview with Arriviste Press):


What is the future of American literature? How realistic is it to expect people to digest full-length novels or collections in the face of other entertainment distractions? How do we keep from losing our "marketplace"? How do we get people to read instead of fire up the PlayStation?

TP: It's funny that you ask that question just now. Sometimes it seems like we're in a moment of immense cultural change when lots of traditional forms are being displaced -- the sitcom by reality TV, quality narrative films by high-concept blockbusters, the novel by the video game or whatever. But the new Harry Potter came out last week, and kids all over the country were lining up to buy it. So even the PlayStation generation knows the particular pleasure of disappearing inside a good book for a while, and living through characters on the page. For some small percentage of those kids, reading novels might even become a habit, or even a passion, the way it is for some small percentage of the adult population now.

He Blinded Me With Science (Fiction)

I've read Slaughterhouse-Five many times. Each time the experience is different. Each time I get something out of it that I didn't get out of the previous read. Each time I'm caught off guard by Vonnegut's blend of beauty and horror. He has me laughing one minute and I'm heartbroken the next.

For the most part, I've never like the Tralfamadore sections. I found those moments to be a distraction. I've never been much for science fiction. I'd read those moments and rolled my eyes and eagerly awaited for Billy to flashback to the war or back home to his candy bar-eating wife. But this time reading it, something happened. Maybe I'm burned out on war these days and an escape to a another world or dimension is what I've been needing.

How do you all feel about Tralfamadore? What do you all think of Tralfamadore and the Tralfamadorian way of life? Do you agree with their philosophies? Which one do you like most? What do you not agree with? In a way, they are much like us (look at page 150)--can you locate any other spots where they say something that is quite human?


Vonnegut has based his science fiction on his pulp influences. (I've added some Science Fiction pulp novel covers for you to look at here.) Vonnegut even creates a writer character with the name of Kilgore Trout (who many believe is an alter-ego of Vonnegut). Kilgore writes such titles as Maniacs in the Fourth Dimension which was 'about people whose mental diseases couldn't be treated because the causes of the diseases were all in the fourth dimension, and three-dimensional Earthling doctors couldn't see those causes at all, or even imagine them' (Vonnegut 132).

What do you think of Kilgore Trout? Do you see a connection between him and Vonnegut? What do you think of Trout's books? Would you want to read them?



Slaughterhouse-Five is structured much like a Tralfamadorian book. It's a series of random images strung together in no real order. The only narrative the reader can rely on is the war narrative. It moves from the beginning of the war to the end--even if we are interrupted from time to time, we do end up back to where we left off. Billy keeps re-living the plane crash and the death of Derby and he never changes it. He accepts it. Why? Billy is a passive character. He never acts on anything. Or does he?

Bibliography
Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse-Five. New York: Dell Publishing, 1999.

Onion-style Opinion Piece

ARE NON-SMOKERS COOL?
By Kristian





It's the Great American Smokeout Day on campus but you'd think the library had been evacuated for some reason.

"What's going on here?" I ask a boy or a girl that looks eternally twelve.

"It's the Great American Smokeout. We're trying to inform people of the dangers of smoking..."

Bored and not caring what the little voice had to say, I walk over to a big girl (one of the many) because I like big voices and I needed a big explanation on today's big event. She was carrying a sign with the words: Smoking is ugly. I couldn't help but think this girl could look almost pretty if she lost weight and I suggested that she take up cigarettes.

"They act as an appetite suppressor. I'm sure if you get yourself a pack-a-day habit you can take off a good ten pounds. You have a pretty face."

"Really?" She beamed.

"Yeah. The rest of you isn't, however. But it can be."

"But cigarettes? Couldn't I just exercise?"

"That's work. Cigarettes. You light, you inhale, you exhale. You can sit and do it."

"I like to sit."

"Cigarettes and amphetamines. Those are illegal, but you can find over-the-counter amphetamines. They do the trick."

She ran off, handing off her sign as though it were a baton to another big girl. She turned the sign around to show again the words: Smoking is ugly, but under there was a picture of Charlize Theron from the film Monster.

"Smoking won her an Academy Award," I tell her.

She looks at me like I'm made of Hostess.

I back away.

Every year, it's the same old protests. But not this year. This one is a little bit different. A Little bit lacking in signs, really.

"You ever hold up a sign," says a boy that must weigh 92-pounds. "Arms kill. You can't do it for more than 20 minutes at a time."

"Is that why the only people holding up signs are overweight?" I ask Clay Aiken.

One of my biggest regrets is that I smoked for 10 or more years...Nostalgia. Makes me want to smoke a cigarette and think back. Back to those romantic days of smoking. How cool I looked. Sexy, even. Dangerous. Looked like I lived life on the edge. Look at me I'm killing myself and it's sexy, I'd say (to myself...in the mirror).

It's been about two years since my last smoke. I tell this to Ugly Betty who tells me how proud she is of me. She also tells me (with a wink) to look her up in a chat room called: The Birth Defects. Before I can ponder what that means, I get to witness my first attack on an unsuspecting smoker.

"What happened? The library burn down?" The smoker asks in earnest.

Then it's like someone's shouted: Lost has been canceled. The crowd of non-smokers has turned into a ravenous group. They attack the smoker. They call him vicious names like "Smoker" and "Nicotine lips". There's hair-pulling and scratching and spitting. I'm seeing a side of the non-smokers I like. One nerd throws a bucket of butts on the smokers head. Another one says: "This is your lungs," pointing to his crotch, "And here are lungs on cigarettes." He kicks the smoker in the balls. I laugh even though that one was stupid. This is your lungs on cigarettes? He tried.

After spending several hours, taunting smokers, making them cry, and oh the laughing. There was plenty of laughing. It all had to come to an end.

The sun goes down and the nerds go home to bed and a new group joins the mix. This group of goth-kids refer to themselves as: The Coffin Nails. Their leader is Niles.

"What are The Coffin Nails all about?" I ask Niles.

"We don't hold up signs."

Signs are very unpopular this year.

"We're known for our unorthodox ways of getting people to quit smoking," he tells me very softly. So softly, I have to ask him to repeat himself five times.

"We're not unorthodox," A blond kid who isn't very goth says. "We're Christian, right? I mean, not practicing. All hail evil. Not Satan cuz that's not what we're about either, ok. Right, guys?"

I was starting to miss the nerds from earlier. There's something more disturbing about a nerd-virgin crushed in eyeliner. It's not as cool as you'd think. I decided to call it a day.

I went home and thought back on my day and the friends I made (and hope to never see again in my life) and I decided to not smoke a cigarette.

Kurt Vonnegut

"War Prayer" by Mark Twain (1905)

It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing and spluttering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spread of roofs and balconies a fluttering wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts, and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country, and invoked the God of Battles beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpourings of fervid eloquence which moved every listener. It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their personal safety's sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way.

Sunday morning came -- next day the battalions would leave for the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were there, their young faces alight with martial dreams -- visions of the stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender! Then home from the war, bronzed heroes, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor, there to win for the flag, or, failing, die the noblest of noble deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation

God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest! Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!

Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory --

An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher's side and stood there waiting. With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued with his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, "Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!"

The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place. During some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes, in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep voice he said:

"I come from the Throne -- bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import -- that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he who utters it is aware of -- except he pause and think.

"God's servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two -- one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of Him Who heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this -- keep it in mind. If you would beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.

"You have heard your servant's prayer -- the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it -- that part which the pastor -- and also you in your hearts -- fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is sufficient. the whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory -- must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!

"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.

(After a pause.) "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!"

It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.