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Rachel’s tips for success in college Ten years later, my daughter Rachel adds one more tip.

[How come? I linked to Rachel’s post earlier today. She read it and decided to say something more.]

Who Donne it

[Ouch.]

My friend Stefan Hagemann pointed me to a paragraph in Branka Arsić’s “Henry David Thoreau’s Magical Thinking,” a piece that came online a week ago at The New Republic ,  adapted from Arsić’s book Bird Relics: Grief and Vitalism in Thoreau , published last month by Harvard University Press. Stefan didn’t tell me what to look for, but I found it anyway:

In that question, birds are employed in the same way as nature in John Donne’s “Lycidas,” a poem whose parts Thoreau copied in one of his very early commonplace books.

Ouch. The mistake gives new life to a question my friend Rob Zseleczky once heard someone ask a professor: “Milton: didn’t he write Chaucer?” Well, yes. But Donne wrote Milton.

The Bird Relics version of the sentence mentions neither Donne nor Milton:

In that question, on Sherman Paul’s understanding, birds are employed in the same way as nature in “Lycidas,” a poem whose parts Thoreau copied in one of his very early commonplace books.

Anyone can make a mistake. Anyone involved in preparing this piece for The New Republic could have added Donne’s name — the writer, an editor at the Press or the magazine, an intern putting in a link to the text of “Lycidas.” (That text is prefaced by the name John Milton.) What’s remarkable is that no one noticed along the way, at least not anyone with the authority to make a correction. But Stefan noticed, and invited me to notice. So thanks, Stefan.

*

8:57 p.m.: The New Republic now recognizes John Milton as the author of “Lycidas.”

[Stefan Hagemann has made many appearances in these pages. He wrote one of OCA’s two guest posts: How to answer a professor. The other guest post is by my daughter Rachel: Rachel’s tips for success in college.]

Mary Shelley: “a great and sudden change”

Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818).

This sentence jumped out at me last night.

Also from Frankenstein
“A godlike science” (On learning a language)

June Fine (1932–2016)

[June Fine, probably in the 1980s.]

Elaine’s mother June died peacefully this morning at the age of eighty-three. June was a courageous and creative woman who lived with considerable physical pain and ample reserves of humor. She contracted juvenile rheumatoid arthritis at the age of eight and braved its effects for the rest of her life, relying on nothing more than aspirin as a counter-agent. When she was no longer able to play the flute, she turned to painting. When she was no longer able to paint or write (macular degeneration), she turned to collage. When she could no longer see, she became an indefatigable reader of audiobooks. (Most recently, Moby-Dick and Don Quixote .) She was always an indefatigable NPR fan. She wanted to live long enough to cast an absentee ballot for Bernie Sanders in the Massachusetts presidential primary, a matter of great importance to her. But the ballot she requested was lost in the mail or never sent.

June was independent, sometimes to a fault. It’s a great consolation to our family that in the last two years she gracefully accepted help when she could no longer manage daily life on her own. We saw June last weekend in Boston (for what we knew would be the last time) and had a wonderful visit, with some music, some talk about her paintings and her writing, and a story. Elaine read Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Pen and the Inkwell” to her mother, as her mother had read Andersen’s stories to her many years ago.

Elaine has written about her mother here.

Valentine’s Day

[C. 1884. Found at The Graphics Fairy.]

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Free advice

Hillary Clinton, in the last two debates: “A vote in 2002 is not a plan to defeat ISIS.” “I do not believe a vote in 2002 is a plan to defeat ISIS in 2016.”

What Bernie Sanders could have said in response:

“The Secretary is correct: a vote in 2002 is not a plan to defeat ISIS in 2016. But voting to authorize military action against Iraq, as you did in 2002, Madam Secretary, suggests that you lack the judgment necessary to develop an effective plan to defeat ISIS in 2016. On the most important foreign-policy question of the last forty years, you made the wrong choice. In 2016 your insistence on a no-fly zone in Syria is also the wrong choice. We cannot afford to get caught in another quagmire in the Middle East. And a no-fly zone would be the first step into another quagmire.”

Pretty good, I think.

Some rock

[Nancy , November 7, 1955. From Random Acts of Nancy .]

That’s some rock. Context: here. But especially here.

Related reading
All OCA Nancy posts (Pinboard)

Domestic comedy

[Driving up a street of conspicuous wealth .]

“If I had a house that looked like that, I’d just sit inside and think .”

Related reading
All OCA domestic comedy posts (Pinboard)

Klenosky!

Just one sentence about New York City:

It is the town of hope for Billy Klenosky, a song writer whose masterpiece, “April in Siberia,” was voted “Bomb of the Month” by radio station WINS.

Gay Talese, New York: A Serendipiter’s Journey (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961).

As Billy, Mr. Klenosky leaves virtually no digital trail: the name appears in Portuguese and Spanish translations of Talese’s book, and in a Chicago Tribune review of the book. The name William yields more. The Social Security Death Index lists one William Klenosky, born May 28, 1922, died July 15, 1988. His parents were Sol (1894–1970) and Bessie Frenkel Klenosky (1899–1974). Sol was a restaurateur; Bessie, a “fundraiser and production chief” for the American Red Cross. William enlisted in the Army in October 1942 and served as a private. Bessie and William were both residents of Kew Gardens, Queens, when they died.

“April in Siberia” — or “April in Siberia!” — was released in 1959, one side of a 45 on the Bald Eagle label. The performer: Billy “K.” (A name meant to suggest Murray the K?) Billboard called the record “semi-humorous”:


[Billboard , April 13, 1959.]

William Klenosky made his first appearance in the New York Times in 1960, not as a songwriter but as a political candidate, running in a Democratic primary to represent Queens’s Fourth Congressional District. He lost. In July 1961, he was hoping to be elected mayor of New York, dropping a bid for the Democratic nomination to run as an independent. By August, he was collecting signatures to run under the name of the New City party (presumably a party of his creation). On September 20 the Times reported that Klenosky had submitted petitions with 7,600 names. And a day later, the New City campaign was over:


[New York Times , September 21, 1961.]

But no sign in the Times yet of “April in Siberia.” That would come two years later. On May 6, 1963, the show UTOPIA! A Musical opened at Manhattan’s Folksbiene Playhouse, presented by Billy K Productions, with book, music, and lyrics by William Klenosky, and a cast of twenty-seven. On May 7 the Times published a review by Louis Calta. The show’s premise was odd: an astronaut and cosmonaut encounter a group of Tories living in the Rocky Mountains. “A silly little musical,” “a lot of inadvertent humor,” “some strange doings,” said the Times . The reviewer managed to spell Klenosky’s name both correctly and incorrectly in the course of just a few hundred words. Among the show’s songs (all of which the Times pronounced “inadequate”): “I Work for Pravda,” “The Masses Are Asses,” “You’ve Got the Devil in Your Eyes,” and, yes, “April in Siberia.”

The Times review is perhaps most valuable for its summary of Klenosky’s mayoral campaign:


[New York Times , May 7, 1963.]

UTOPIA! closed on May 12.

In 1966 Klenosky was a Republican candidate for office, running to represent Queens’s Tenth District in the New York State Senate. He lost to Democrat S. R. Thaler. In 1967 Klenosky was back on Off-Broadway, with a one-man revue, Klenosky Against the Slings and Arrows of Outrageous Fortune , presented by “Billy K Productions in association with God,” with book “by Life,” music and lyrics by Klenosky, and “lighting by Con Edison.” Among the numbers: “Krushchev, Castro and Klenosky,” “The Republican Dilemma: Goldwater or Klenosky,” “Klenosky v. Thaler,” and “Lindsay Was Prettier and Taller Than Klenosky and Who’s Sorry Now?” The show closed within two weeks. For those unacquainted with the name, John V. Lindsay was elected mayor of New York City in 1965. Does that song title mean that Klenosky attempted a second run for mayor? Or was he still ruing his 1961 petitions debacle?

These fragments of a life suggest to me that William Klenosky had a marked and not necessarily congenial sense of humor, a strong ability to resist discouragement, a penchant for self-dramatization and exclamation points, and an extravagant sense of his own importance. I can imagine him sitting on Joe Franklin’s couch: “Here’s a young songwriter and performer I’m sure we’re going to be hearing a lot more from.”

For eighteen dollars, it’s possible to hear at least a little something from William Klenosky: eBay recently listed a copy of “April in Siberia!” b/w “She Broke My Heart, So I Broke Her Jaw.” The address for the Bald Eagle label: 80-32 Lefferts Boulevard, Kew Gardens 15, New York. Klenosky was breaking into the music business from home: 80-32 is a residential address, and it was Klenosky’s address when he filed his petitions in 1961. Today the 80-32 residence is still owned by a Klenosky.

The record is on its way here. Stay tuned.

*

March 1, 2016: I wondered whether the 1966 song “Lindsay Was Prettier and Taller Than Klenosky and Who’s Sorry Now?” was evidence of a second Klenosky run for mayor of New York City. Yes, it was. A newspaper editorial made a passing reference to a 1965 Klenosky campaign:


[“Absurd Law,” Milwaukee Sentinel , October 1, 1965.]

The Losers Party! Readers of a certain age will remember the New York Mets as largely hapless in their early years.

*

March 1, 2016: I am now the proud owner of a copy of William Klenosky’s 1959 45. Here are two snippets that illustrate Klenosky’s broad — some would say overbearing — sense of humor: “April in Siberia!” and “She Broke My Heart, So I Broke Her Jaw.” Notice the glitches with time: nine seconds into the first snippet, thirty-five seconds into the second, the singer is racing ahead of his own music.

Thanks to Elaine for digitizing these snippets.

Also from New York: A Serendipiter’s Journey
Chestnuts, pigeons, statues
“Fo-wer, fi-yiv, sev-ven, ni-yen”
Leeches, catnip oil, strange potions

New York Times sources
“Results of Primary Contest in City.” June 9, 1960.
“Levitt Denounces Wagner As Failing in Leadership.” July 25, 1961.
“2 Mayoral Petitions Issued.” August 10, 1961.
“9 Entries Listed in Mayoral Race As Filing Is Ended.” September 20, 1961.
“Stephen Kennedy Still Undecided.” September 21, 1961.
“Theater Tonight.” May 6, 1963.
“Theater: ‘Utopia!’ Opens: Musical by Klenosky at Folksbiene Playhouse.” May 7, 1963.
“8th ‘Utopia!’ Show Is Last.” May 13, 1963.
Death notice for Sol Klenosky. October 9, 1970.
Obituary for Bessie Klenosky. December 20, 1974.

Other sources
“Reviews of New Pop Records.” Billboard , April 13, 1959.
Dan Dietz, The Off Broadway Musical, 1910–2007 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2010).

[Dietz’s book is my source for song titles and the details of Klenosky’s shows.]

New old phone booths

The New York Times reports on refurbished replacements for Manhattan’s four streetside telephone booths.

Related posts
New York’s public telephones : The Lonely Phone Booth : Telephone booths