It’s Jean Shepherd’s birthday today, “Shep,” 1921, in Chicago. He died in Florida at age 78, back in 1999. I was just a little too young to be a fan, but my brother and sister loved him. He was on WOR, the radio station, late at night, and he just talked. And talked. And talked. Told wonderful funny stories. No one else did that — he was unique and brilliant. He was a precursor to Spalding Gray and Garrison Keillor. And if you need some proof of how important he was as a figure in American Humor, Jerry Seinfeld said “He really formed my entire comedic sensibility—I learned how to do comedy from Jean Shepherd.” The first name of Seinfeld’s third child is Shepherd.
When he was about to be released by WOR in 1956 for lack of sponsors, he did a commercial for Sweetheart Soap, not a sponsor, and was immediately fired. His listeners besieged WOR with complaints, and when Sweetheart offered to sponsor him, he was reinstated. Eventually, he attracted more sponsors than he wanted—the commercials interrupted the flow of his monologues.
He’d organize stunts with his listeners. The most famous was a hoax he created about a nonexistent book, I, Libertine, by a fake author “Frederick R. Ewing,” in 1956. During a discussion on how easy it was to manipulate the best-seller lists based on demand, as well as sales, Shepherd suggested that his listeners visit bookstores and ask for a copy of I, Libertine, which led to booksellers attempting to order the book from their distributors. Fans of the show planted references to the book and author so widely that demand for the book led to claims of it being on The NYT Best Seller list. Then — the kicker — Shepherd, author Theodore Sturgeon, and Betty Ballantine actually wrote the damn thing, with a cover by illustrator Frank Kelly Freas, and it was published by Ballantine Books.
The hoax was so successful that I, Libertine became the talk of the town, even earning the unique distinction of being banned by the Archdiocese of Boston, despite the fact that it didn’t yet exist. I, Libertine covers the bawdy misdeeds of Captain Lance Courtenay as he carelessly romps through the royal court and the bedchambers of London’s finest ladies. It is a hilarious, picaresque adventure that Ewing himself would certainly have been proud to call his own, if he had existed. Jean Shepherd makes me sad, because I associate him so strongly with my older brother and sister, Jay and Bonnie, who were my whole world when I was a little boy, and who are gone.
This poem from Today’s Writer’s Almanac is by David Sanger, and it’s called “My Daughter’s Morning.”
My daughter’s morning streams
over me like a gang of butterflies
as I, sour-mouthed and not ready
for the accidents I expect
of my day, greet her early:
her sparkle is as the edge of new
ice on leafed pools, while I
am soggy, tepid; old toast.
Yet I am the first version
of later princes; for all my blear
and bluish jowl I am welcomed
as though the plastic bottle
I hold were a torch and
my robe not balding terry.
For her I bring the day; warm
milk, new diaper, escapades;
she lowers all bridges and
sings to me most beautifully
in her own language while
I fumble with safety pins.
I am not made young
by my daughter’s mornings;
I age relentlessly.
Yet I am made to marvel
at the durability of newness
and the beauty of my new one.
Vermont Lizzie tells me she’s worried about Robert’s deficient gardening skills affecting the care of Susan’s garden. I won’t alarm you with the deets about the near-disaster involving “hideous red-dyed mulch.” The team had to come down hard on him, but harm was averted. Looks pretty good to me.
Everyone thought a clue/answer from yesterday’s puzzle was unusually good. The clue was “Two things associated with Gene Simmons?” The answer was KISSANDMAKEUP. It helps if you know who Gene Simmons is, which I didn’t. I confused him with Richard Simmons that little funny gym guy. Gene is the lead singer in the heavily-made up rock band Kiss.
In the Nitpicking Dept., Weezie had trouble with MACE being clued by “A spice related to nutmeg.” She or he wrote:
MACE is not a spice “related” to nutmeg; they are the exact same species and different parts of the same plant. Nutmeg is the seed itself while mace is the covering. In my wayward youth, I stayed with a stoner friend at a solar-powered chocolate factory on the island of Grenada, and got to taste fresh mace (as well as cacao fruit while helping restore an overgrown grove, tangy!). That was followed by a few weeks on a moored sailboat off the coast of Carriacou (a small Grenadian island). Nutmeg and mace are major exports of Grenada, so that trip left me with a nostalgic fondness for the spices.
jberg came back with: Well, the clue says the spices are related, not that they come from related plants. Like my fingernail is related to my finger, or at least that’s how I read it.
In today’s puzzle, the clue at 35A was “What a guitar gently does in a 1968 Beatles song.” Well, you all know that one, right? — WEEPS. Joaquin shared this brilliant version from the concert honoring George Harrison after his death, featuring Clapton and McCartney, with Ringo on the drums (voo den?). George’s son Dhani is the young man on one of the backup guitars. You could do worse with six minutes than give it a listen.
Not gonna try to top that. See you tomorrow! Thanks for popping in.
The Wellington Files 