new memoir by anti Vietnam War activist Joel Eis

 Standin' in a Hard Rain: Lessons from the Last Revolution:
The Making of a Revolutionary Life 

 By Joel Eis

World BEYOND War is proud to be publishing this important, delightful, inciteful, and provocative new memoir!

He became  one of the people his parents warned him against! … He was followed and informed on. His phone was tapped. He was shot at, did some time in jail, and was black listed from work. The last time he saw his FBI file, it was as thick as a small city phone book.

Standin’ in a Hard Rain, the Making of a Revolutionary Life is the fast-paced, personal, “boots-on-the-ground,” front line account of major events by a dedicated radical in the 1960’s (and beyond) who found himself at the table with the planners and out in the street, running from the cops. It traces the difficult evolution of a generation trying to stay true to their values  in a country in which they felt at odds. It ends with the burning of his draft card at the age of 73.  

“Joel Eis’ memoir is an amazing story. Somehow, he happened to be in the right place at the right time in the sixties. It’s the story of a left wing Forrest Gump, only it’s real!” --Will Durst

“I was spellbound by Joel Eis' Standin' in a Hard Rain from the start. Eis tells his story of what it was like to be an anti-war activist in California's Central Valley in the late 60's and early 70's. Eis makes the reader feel like they are there." --Mike Rhodes

Buy the paperback from your local bookstore. Or buy a signed copy or bulk copies at a discount from the author’s own bookstore: Rebound Bookstore in San Rafael, California.

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Chris,
 
So where are you now?

I was born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and only lived in the U.S. from ages 7 to 20. "My Eel Pie Island Dharma" memoir mostly describes my life living in a hippie commune on an island in the Thames in west London, U.K. after I resisted induction. I got 3 draft notices in June 1969 and knew it was time to leave. I eventually returned to Canada on a long shot gamble after living a life of poverty on the streets of Europe. It was a good idea! I've lived in Canada since 1972. I lived in Canada's unofficial capital city, Toronto, before deciding I wanted to live closer to nature, as I'm a poet and haijin (haiku poet). I've lived in a small village, Marmora, for just over 30 years. I was the village librarian here for 3 years and then the village librarian in a nearby village for another decade. 

 
I'm gathering you have the info on where the book an be bought at
 
https://www.amazon.com/Standin-Hard-Rain-Making-Revolutionary/dp/B0BNW3ZDBD

 
While the book begins before the Vietnam war and continues after it, that period was very important, as you know.


The mid 1960s to early 1970s were a formative time for the strange bipedal beings on this planet. Even at the time, in my teens and barely into my 20s, I knew I was living through a major historical cultural shift like The Renaissance or The Enlightenment. It sounds like you got to experience the amerikan politikal/cultural  changes to the max! After perhaps 2 years of deep commitment to opposing the VN War and opposing the draft, I received 3 draft notices in a week and left. I also experienced surveillance and harassment for my activism - we had a police motorcycle escort when my parents drove me to the airport off the Rickenbacker causeway from Key Biscayne. That was the extent of my activism in amerika. Surviving on the streets then became my challenge, as my parents never discussed or even seemed aware of my politikal beliefs or understood my activism. You were "lucky" to come from a progessive background in a relatively progressive part of the U.S. like California.     
 
What political stuff have you done recently? That's what matters now.


When I returned to Canada I joined The Canadian Liberation Movement. It was basically an anti-amerikan movement opposing U.S. imperialism in Canada. We worked for Canadian versus U.S. unions like Steelworkers, a quota of Canadian versus amerikan profs, who dominated various university departments, etc. . Slowly we became aware of our own internal colonialism with our First Nations, but the internal and external contradictions in the movement, as well as in international Marxist-Leninist movements and countries, led to its breakup in the mid 1970s.   

Recently I've been a low key activist supporting our local conservation (nature) area, Callaghan's Rapids. ATV riding maniacs have taken to driving up and down the riverbed, destroying wildlife as well as the general peace and quiet. I've also taken a  profile in questioning a proposed local mega project to build a boondoggle energy storage facility on top of the slag heap of the local abandoned mine pit.    . . .  "think global - act local"

poet as citizen gadfly (on my blog):

http://riffsandripplesfromzenrivergardens.blogspot.com/2022/

I'm very impressed that you and your wife have opened a used book store  :  )  Jealous, even!!!

Enjoy your semi-retirement and some peace and solitude - you've earned it!!!

in peaceful solidarity,
Chris/cricket (my haijin name)
 

poet as citizen gadfly: Marmora pumped energy boondoggle

published Dec. 15/22 on page 13 of The Community Press

Dear Editors The Community Press,

Late last week I received a postcard in the mail announcing an info drop-in session for yet another proposal for a pumped energy storage project. This is the same project which died a decade ago after public concern was expressed over the safety of building a storage pond on top of the old Marmora mine slag heap, which looms over the village.    

There is no perceived benefit to the residents of Marmora village for this project. In addition to the risk posed by the slag heap dam, there are also concerns over noise levels from turbines pumping water up and down the slag heap at all hours, reduced property values (who wants to live in the shadow of a volcano?), traffic issues etc. .

The drop-in session is scheduled for this Thursday at The Legion from 4 to 7 pm. This is not a convenient date or time of day for most Marmora residents. It's scheduled for 10 days before Christmas during working hours and then dinner time. The drop-in setting discourages residents from attending what should be a group meeting and denies us the ability to hear the concerns of our neighbours. It sounds to me like Ontario Power Generation and Northland Power want to keep this "public" meeting as inconvenient to the public as possible.    

Sincerely,

Chris Faiers   (signed)

Marmora, ON

Haiku Canada outsiders and insiders

 
Chris, it was really my own curiosity, asking about Eric Amann's memoir -- in case I, a slow reader, might actually be able to read it in a visit to Special Collections. So, no worries about not including that level of detail.

From what I can tell, Eric and Anna Vakar were both rather 'outsiders,' which is why they clicked on some level, if only for a short time.

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Hi Again Vicki,

It's quite a slight volume, and I'm sure you could read it in an hour or two in a relaxing afternoon in the archives  ;  )

Yes, I'm sure Eric thought of himself as an outsider. While cleaning dinner dishes, I did some further reminiscing about Eric and his involvement with haiku. In his memoir The House on Fountain Street the reader can see why this would be so - he was raised by "rough", working class New Canadians, and he would have stuck out like a sore thumb in that group. He was an intellectual swan in a flock of very supportive adult ducks. My image of his early editorship of Haiku mag is of a lonely, highly intelligent and deeply philosophical person looking for soul connections in the strange universe of NYC. The uniqueness of haiku, its esoteric nature in the still staid Amerikan culture of the early 1960s, would explain its appeal to the young med student/doctor.

It's always dangerous describing someone's looks, but Eric was noticeably different looking. When I finally met him at what I consider the founding meeting of HC circa 1977/78, I thought he looked gnomish or elvin. I bet he was teased a lot in his youth for his immigrant background, his high intelligence, sensitivity and his unusual looks. Definitely the makings of an "outsider" personality.

Regarding the Haiku Society of Canada and it's morphing into Haiku Canada, I can see a profound difference in the personalities of Eric and George Swede and their styles of leadership. Eric the quiet, self-effacing outsider who seemed to want our haiku community to be low key and casually social and individualist. After the initial meeting in Eric's apartment near The Danforth in Toronto, our next gatherings were casual restaurant dinners and get-togethers. I think of George Swede as the flip side of Eric's casualness - the corporate and promotional leader. Of course it took both aspects and the contributions of many, many other haijin to form HC. It bugs me that the founding of HC is described in its online home page as consisting of Eric, George and Betty Drevniok. There were a LOT of other haijin involved! I suspect that the major personality differences between Eric and George caused Eric to move on from George's "corporate" version of HC. After a lot of initial commitment to developing HC, I also became absorbed in my own poetry and writing projects, including founding Unfinished Monument Press and coordinating the Main Street Library poetry readings. In the longer view it took both these competing styles of leadership, and it's likely that without George's more organized and formal leadership style, HC would probably not still exist some 45 years after its founding and we wouldn't be corresponding today about  archival projects!

rare Eric Amann autobiography off to Haiku Canada archives

Hi Vicki and Katherine,

I'm sending my next package of donations to the HC archives today. The two books include Eric Amann's autobiography, The House on Fountain Street. This is an extremely rare book which tells the story of Eric's arrival in Canada as a refugee/displaced person after World War Two at the age of thirteen. Interestingly, I don't remember the book even mentioning haiku, although Eric was the godfather of Haiku Canada.

Eric inscribed this copy to me:

Jan. 29, 2009
Dear Chris:
Thanks for your book Zen River - beautiful & memorable pieces of poetry and prose.
with all best wishes,
Eric   

The other book is Milkweed: A Gathering of Haiku edited by Marshall Hryciuk and published with his Nietzche's Brolly Press in 1987. It is also inscribed to me and signed by Marshall.

The inscription is difficult to read, but I believe it reads:

An edition for the editor*
Chris forever
cheers
Marshall Hryciuk

 *I had previously published Marshall's chapbook this is hilarious with my Unfinished Monument Press


In my first packet I forgot to include my mailing address:

Chris Faiers
12 Main St.
Marmora, ON
K0K 2M0

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reply to Vicki's request for some more info on Eric's book:
 

By the time I'd decided which books to send next, and prepping the mailing envelope (and lots more reminiscing), I didn't take the time to add the details on Eric's autobiog. Sorry. It's a professionally produced and quite short book, I'm guessing around 100 pages or less. You can read it in a couple of hours. I don't think the packet will reach the UofVic library by tomorrow when you visit, but I hope you have the chance to read it one day. Eric had a much rougher and harder life than most people would imagine, and it's quite amazing that he not only  survived the turmoil and difficult circumstances but managed to become a medical doctor!  

The several times I met Eric in Toronto at haiku get togethers he was very quiet, modest and somewhat self-effacing. I don't know if it was his modesty or shyness, but as I remember his book doesn't go into any details of his involvement with haiku and the major role he played with developing a modern English language haiku form and community. Curious.

Eric and I exchanged books in 2009 (per the dedication) but I believe he'd self-published his auto-biog. in the early  2000s.

Over the decades I've known a number of people who have donated papers to various archives, myself included. From what I gather donated papers are often just placed in small boxes and left for the curious and researchers to dig through. I don't think librarians, or HC archive committee members, would be expected to catalogue or otherwise delineate materials.

Good luck with your meeting tomorrow with the UofVic Special Collections chief librarians. Hanging out in libraries with librarians is always fun  :  )-  

 

Haiku Canada Archives//Dr. Eric Amann, godfather of Canadian haiku

 
I've resumed fishing through old boxes, drawers, and shelves to finally start donating again to the Haiku Canada Archives now that they've found an official home with the Univ. of Victoria library. It's part of my ongoing project to declutter my small house and to get "important" materials into various archives. Having the cancer operation has reinforced my goal to get as much of this stuff into good homes while I'm still above ground. I don't know anyone locally who'd know how to do this once I'm gone, and rare items would likely end up in the recycling bin or worse, the local landfill.  

part of email from Vicki McCullough, a member of the Haiku Canada archives committee and current archivist on the Haiku Canada executive:  

Thank you for adding the Cafe Haiku link and that chunk of your story and haiku history. So glad to see your mention of Eric Amann in there -- and the note in your email that Eric Amann has an autobiography that you'll send anon. He didn't hang around on the haiku scene as George Swede has, so I've wondered what we might pull in about him. Other than, well, I have a fat file of correspondence between Eric and Anna Vakar and a few other slimmer files to do with the brief period  Anna was an editorial consultant on Cicada. Now that I've received all I'm going to get from Anna's estate and have done some browsing through the last arrivals, I've decided to start by identifying what is unquestionably most eligible for the Haiku Canada Collection at UVic Library Special Collections -- and that would be these aforementioned files. Then I'll ripple out from there, assessing significance until it's (hopefully) clear what is not eligible to be sent: that is, what does not meaningfully fit the haiku-and-related-forms mandate. I'm imagining a grey area where I'm not sure and will seek guidance from the UVic librarians.

 part of my reply to Vicki about Eric Amann:

IMHO Eric Amann was one of the most important English language haijin to date. His 1960s mag Haiku literally changed the form and to a degree the content of modern English haiku. The other mags of that period, and I subscribed to and was published in most, if not all of them, were strictly 5-7-5 in form and limited in content. The "rules" of haiku back then were strict - haiku were to be about nature, not people, although gradually haijin became aware of senryu, and over many decades the distinction seems to have blurred.

Eric critiqued my early attempts at haiku in his preferred non 5-7-5 form, and after some practising he began publishing my haiku as exemplars of non 5-7-5. The other small haiku mags of that period followed Eric's lead with Haiku as I recall. I was pleased and very surprised when I recently found one of my first acceptance notes from Eric on a torn piece of paper!

The "thread in haiku" piece skims over my personal history, and explains how for several years I was still occasionally writing, and even managing to publish two small chapbooks of haiku (I'd never heard of chapbooks in 1969, I just wanted a collection of my haiku gathered in one place.) After living in the Eel Pie Island commune and living on the streets and traveling in Europe, I returned to Canada in 1972. It was a pleasant surprise to be invited to what I consider to be the founding meeting of what became Haiku Canada at Eric's apartment in east end Toronto circa 1976 or 77. I believe I've posted a description of that meeting somewhere on my blog, and if I find it I'll forward it to you.

 

 

Doug Ford: Evil Superman

 sent as letter-to-the-Editor, Toronto Star

Dear Editors,

Doug Ford must stay awake at night dreaming up ways to be more evil. He's nonstop been adding to his list of evil superpowers - the not withstanding clause to attempt union busting, overturning the Green Belt  promise he swore to uphold to give developer supporters land to greed on, and now he's formed a League of Evil Super Mayors to do his bidding. Darn! Superman is just a comic book figure, but I wish Doug Ford were!

arrggggghh  : (

Chris Faiers (signed)

 

Cricket song poem and zenriver pic: Angelee Deodhar (RIP)