ustxtxb_obs_1970_11_13_50_00021-00000_000.pdf

uti’re. 141,,ir lir4 4. “,1 ,..11111011,1111, ,.ilinii ‘ I ell stash the trash HELP KEEP TEXAS LAKES AND RIVERS BEAUTIFUL What do you do with the cartons and cans and containers that are left after that wonderful lunch on the boat? Hang on to them; even if it means taking them home before you find a litter barrel. If you don’t litter, nobody will. UNITED STATES BREWERS ASSOCIATION, INC. 905 International Life Bldg., Austin, Texas 78701 Rechy not fit for Drag? By Steve Barthelme John Rechy, This Day’s Death, New York: Grove Press, Inc., 255 pages, $6.95. Austin Bang. Into one of the ‘Drag’ bookstores, to the back where the Grove Press titles are the various technique-improving volumes and beautiful books, interspersed liberally, the ruling criterion here being the first few letters of the author’s last name no implied criticism of the store, I mean, in the University Co-op you’re lucky if the book you’re looking for is kept separate from the HOOK ‘EM HORNS underwear. Man craves order, right? Look for Baudelaire between aspirin and Bevo Back to the bookstore. I’m looking through the Grove paperbacks for Numbers. John Rechy’s second novel, published in 1967. Well, I can’t find it. A salesman-approaches, or rather tries to slip past, hair curls over his collar, I speak with him cautiously. PATRON: “I’m looking for this book, called Numbers, by a guy named John Rechy. Published by Grove, it’s in paper, something called ‘Black Cat books …’ ” \(this last hesifatingly so as not to violate his territoriality, his CLERK: \(noting that I ye been looking there, we don’t have it.” PATRON: “Don’t you have a place with all the Texasy books together somewhere? This guy lives in El Paso.” CLERK: “Yeah, we do, it’s up front \(by I walked out; disgusted with the thin sophistication of the salesman, the greed of the bookstore operators, the cultural backwardness of the State of Texas which won’t allow material concerned with bluebonnets, the hypocrisy of a society which abhors and vindictively punishes private sexual acts and at the same time burns women, children, animals, and plants in several counties where it has no business. Wrong. I walked out feeling mildly pleased that he had known who John Rechy was and what his novels dealt with. rotten at being literary though, in the Steve Barthelme is a free lance writer who was formerly a teaching assistant in the English Department at the University of Texas at Austin. He has had several short stories published in small magazines and is currently working on a novel. present context, I could probably fake it so that this review will probably be bits of both with an attempt to give impressions of how the book affected me in small areas and small ways. day ‘s Death deals with Jim Girard who travels, goes to schobl \(through not presently he works \(for a lawyer and friend, thinks This enumeration might offend you, as it does me, but it seems necessary if you haven’t read the book. There is one additional factor which supplies the complication/conflict/crisis of the book. This is that Girard is involved as a defendant in a criminal case in Los Angeles. It is gradually revealed that what he is accused of is participating in a homosexual act in a park, which in fact did not occur. Steve Travis, his co-defendant, approached him in the park, knelt, and offered to blow him. Girard aimlessly started to assent, but then abruptly rejected him. A cop, who is obviously trying to screw Girard legally \(it is implied that he had earlier wanted to do something in motion, arresting Girard and Travis on a sex perversion charge, a felony, and lying in support of the charge. The legal proceedings with ramifications make up about half of the book. The other half is Girard’s relationship with his aging mother, who, it becomes clear, is trying to effectively tie up his life. with her own which is failing. More is made of this Nov. 13, 1970 21