ustxtxb_obs_1972_10_06_50_00015-00000_000.pdf

Page 11

by

PRESS c. Phone 512/442-7836 V-4 1714 SOUTH CONGRESS P.O. BOX 3485 AUSTIN, TEXAS NIB NO =NINO NO us Re mal IFJTURA More Titles . . . Think Ahead . Buy Now . . . Avoid Delay . Titles listed below, and all others stocked by the Texas Observer Bookstore, are offered to Observer subscribers at a 20% discount. The Texas Observer Bookstore pays for the postage and handling. Amounts shown are for discounted prices, plus the 5% sales tax. To Order Texas Observer Bookstore. Are you interested in receiving a more complete list of titles available from the Texas Observer Bookstore? $ 6.68 SHADOW ON THE ALAMO: NEW THE COMING OF AGE \(de Beau HEROES FIGHT OLD CORRUP $ 8.40 TION IN TEXAS POLITICS $ 4.20 $ 5.84 $ 4.20 THE SANTA CLAUS BANK ROB $10.50 BERY Re-creation of one of LOS MAJADOS: THE WETBACK SOURCES: AN ANTHOLOGY OF CONTEMPORARY MATERI-ALS USEFUL FOR PRESERV-ING PERSONAL SANITY WHILE BRAVING THE GREAT TECHNOLOGICAL WILDER-ALL MY FRIENDS ARE GOING TO BE STRANGERS \(McMur $ 6.30 $ 7.52 THE TICKET SPLITTER: A NEW FORCE IN AMERICAN POLI-THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE \(2nd THE WORKERS: NINE UNUSUAL PORTRAITS THAT EXPOSE THE GROWING DISCONTENT OF THE AMERICAN BLUE-COLLAR WORKER WITH THE QUALITY OF HIS LIFE AND WATER WASTELAND: RALPH NADER’S STUDY GROUP RE-PORT ON WATER POLLUTION THE MISTRESS AND THE MAFIA: THE VIRGINIA HILL STORY CONSUMER BEWARE: YOUR FOOD AND WHAT’S BEEN STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE: A RE-PORT ON CRIME AND PUN-ISHMENT IN AMERICA \(Prepared for the American Friends $ 51.2644: VANISHING AIR: RALPH NA-DER’S STUDY GROUP ON AIR America’s most bizarre bank robberies the famous Santa Claus Bank Robbery in Cisco, Texas OUR BROTHER’S KEEPER: THE INDIAN IN WHITE AMERICA THE MAKING OF A RADICAL: A POLITICAL BIOGRAPHY \(NearA POPULIST MANIFESTO \(New $ 5.00 LIVING THE GOOD LIFE: HOW TO LIVE SANELY AND SIMP-LY IN A TROUBLED WORLD BURY MY HEART AT WOUNDED $ 1.64* A HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH-ALIENATION AND ECONOMICS $ 6.68 THE GREENING OF AMERICA $ 1.64* THE SOMETIMES GOVERN-MENTS: A CRITICAL STUDY OF THE FIFTY AMERICAN LEGISLATURES \(Citizens Con1.64* $ 1.64* CHINA! INSIDE THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC \(Committee of ConLA RAZA: THE MEXICAN $ 1.64* THE LAST WHOLE EARTH CATALOG $ 4.20* CRISIS IN THE CLASSROOM \(Sil $ 2.06* THE ECOLOGICAL CITIZEN \(Van $ 1.05* THE INJURY INDUSTRY AND THE REMEDY OF NO-FAULT HOW TO TALK BACK TO YOUR \(Non-Texas addressees exempt from Paperback THE TEXAS OBSERVER BOOKSTORE 600 W. 7, Austin, Texas 78701 wanted to salute them in my mind as stoic partners of the land.” SILENCE IS transformed into primeval significance: “The silence of the universe is deeply in the trees, in the land. It is the silence that dinosaurs heard as they looked up from , their grazing and stared out into the ferns.” Even when he veers on sentimentality, as in a love story, there are gems to save him: C … we held each other as if the only reality in the world were made of lips and hands and warm, moist skin.” He dares to open another story with: “Let me tell you about a, young man and his search for love.” And one holds one’s breath. But he makes it: “In effect, he wanted to get on with the long-delayed business of creating his heaven on earth.” And out of the near-bathos of his portrait of a starving Mexican child, he emerges with existential nobility: “Who was to blame? .. . Mexico . ; God . . . ; Juarez … ; The man on the curb? the shoe shine boys? the father? the mother . . . ? Nobody?” His gallery of memorable portraits is not “strange and awesome” human beings whom he can view because: “I like them better than I would gods.” And so he offers love and attention to a “Robert Stack” figure, aged, broken. To a man and a woman wondering how many flowers there will be on their graves. To a son and his mother aging together; an eccentric woman staring “into her special corridor of space.” To a child achieving a moment’s greatness as he plays his trombone-solo version of “I’m Getting Sentimental Over You” on the fifty-yard line of a football field. Oh, hell, I have no hesitation in calling Bode one of the finest writers around. Is he regional? Yes, if the universe is a region. Irrelevant? Yes, if to feel is dated. Safe? Yes, if the revolution of the soul is easy. Mild? Yes, if that miraculous grain that creates life within a cell is calm. 1 October 6, 1972 15 1 We are interested in publishing 1 I books on Texas, etc. If you have I a manuscript, please write a short we will advise you at once if we I are interested in looking at the I manuscript.