198
LEONARD MICHAELS
I met a man in Detroit who owned a submachine gun; he
claimed to have hit Dutch Schultz. I saw a gangster movie that
disproved his claim.
I knew two girls who had brains, talent, health, good looks,
plenty to eat, and hanged themselves.
I heard of parties in Ann Arbor where everyone made it with
everyone else, including the cat.
I knew cardsharps and con men. I liked margin al types be–
cause they seemed original and aristocratic, living for an ideal or
obliged to live it, whereas ordinary types seemed fundamentally
unserious. These distinctions belong to a romantic fop. I didn't
think that way too much.
I worked for an evil vanity publisher in Manhattan.
I worked in a fish-packing plant in Massachusetts, on the line
with a sincere Jewish poet from Harvard and three lesbians; one
was beautiful, one grim; both loved the other who was intelligent.
I loved her too. I had dreams of violating her purity. They talked
among themselves, in creepy whispers, always about Jung. In a
dark corner, away from our line, old Portuguese men slit fish into
open flaps, flicking out their bones. I could see only their eyes and
knives. I'd arrive early every morning to dash in and out until the
stench became bearable. After work I'd go to bed and pluck fish
scales out of my skin.
I was a teaching assistant in two English departments and I
graded thousands of freshmen themes. One began like this: "Karl
Marx, for that was his name.... " Another began like this: "In
Johnathan Swift's famous letter to the Pope.... " I wrote edifying
comments in the margins. Later I began to scribble "Awkward"
beside everything, even spelling errors.
I got
A's
and
F's
as a graduate student. A professor of English
said my attitude wasn't professional. He said that he always read
"a good book" after dinner.
A girl from Indiana said this of me on a teacher evaluation
form:
"It
is bad enough to go to an English class at eight in the
morning, but to be instructed by a shabby man is horrible."
I made enemies on the East Coast, the West Coast, and in the
Middle West. All now dead, sick, or out of luck.
I was arrested, photographed, and fingerprinted. In a sound-
