I've worked hard to be a dutiful native son, an enthusiast for writers from Ohio, and some I prize highly -- Hart Crane, Sherwood Anderson and Dawn Powell chief among them. When it comes to Cleveland writers, the situation is hopeless. Crane lived here as a boy, but was born in Garrettsville, a village about 50 miles southeast of the city. His grandfather, Arthur Crane, ran a cannery in Garrettsville, and by the turn of the last century, thanks largely to Arthur, the village trumpeted itself as the "maple syrup capital of the world." Arthur's son, Clarence Arthur Crane, founded Crane Candies, developed the formula for Life Savers and sold it for a pittance. At its web site, the Garrettsville Chamber of Commerce rightly makes a big deal out of the candy connection, only to dispense with Hart Crane in a single dependent clause: "who wrote poems now studied on college campuses throughout the country."
My brother has a copy of Fine Arts in Cleveland: An Illustrated History, by Holly Rarick Witchey and John Vacha. In their preface, the authors define fine arts as "visual art, music, dance, theater, and belles lettres." Their treatment of literature is dominated by theater, and they exaggerate the importance of Langston Hughes, who worked briefly with a Cleveland theater, Karamu House. They get Crane all wrong, referring to him as a "lyrically romantic poet":
"He was a passionate wanderer whose last adventure took him to Mexico in 1931. While sailing back to America to settle family affairs in 1932, Crane jumped ship and drowned. His body was never found."
In three sentences they make at least four factual errors, and "jumped ship" is a memorably awful choice of words. Elsewhere they report: "Crane's meteoric career ended abruptly, however, with his suicide at the age of thirty-three."
Last April 27 was the 75th anniversary of Crane's death by suicide. He was 32.
1 comment:
Dear Mr. Kurp:
I won't apologize for mistakes I made when this book was published, I was 23 and had spent the better part of three years working on the research (and getting a Ph.D. in Fifteenth Century Italian Painting at the same time from Case Western Reserve University). At the very least it was an honest attempt by myself, John Vacha, and the Encylopedia of Cleveland History folk to do something in terms of research.
I apologize that it failed to please you but I've often found that it is much easier for people to criticize books than to write them. As Samuel Johnson said, "Criticism is a study by which men grow important and formidable at a very small expense."
Yours sincerely,
Holly Rarick Witchey
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