Info
Catalogue #s: 567, 850
Title: An Ear to the Ground: Presenting Writers from 2 Coasts
Authors: Horton Foote, Arun Gandhi, Vaclav Havel, et. al.
ed. by Scott C. Davis
Style: Nonfiction
Artwork: 79 original illustrations
Pages: 492
Size: 6" x 8.25"
Publisher: Cune Press
ISBN: 1-885942-56-7 paper $19.95
ISBN: 1-885942-85-0 cloth $34.95
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Description
An Ear to the Ground includes:
Essays by 78 new authors.
Original portraits of each author by East and West Coast artists.
Profiles of each writer, written by a confidant.
Essays on the theme "local truth"
Piquant, surprising, unpredictable prose from 75 of the finest emerging writers of the
East and West Coasts. Put your ear to the ground. Learn of our future as it passes from
the heat of local discourse into national debate. Listen to men and women who, for all
their didifferences, share the notion that literature, by its excellence as art, tends to
orient, heal, and uplift.
Meet:
Cheryl L. Schuck, a woman detective from LA
Ron Ritts, a cab driver from Miami
Jerry Reid, a stock car driver from North Carolina
James Hall, a prison guard from San Quentin.
Climb El Capitan with Cy Keener
Go winter surfing with Reba Owen
Fly fish for steelhead with Scott Richmond
Ride a roller coaster with Lance Carden.
Did you know that pulverized vegetables are the secret to eternal
life? Let Hillary Rollins explain.
Did you realize that North Dakota is the state which gets no
respect? Listen to North Dakota native Robert J. Brake.
Want to make your body perfect? Read Nancy Woods on
the
Wonder Bra.
Ever want to give "helpful" advice to that nice newlywed couple?
Let Grace Druyor tell you how it worked out for her daughter
and her new husband.
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Quotes
"An Ear to the Ground is a
very good book: a livewire collection brimming with talent. I read it right through and
was grateful to Cune Press for giving the grassroots a chance to grow and thrive."
- Jonathan Kozol
"What a pleasure! An Ear to the Ground is as tantalizing as
an intimate dinner party at which people truly listen to one another and hear all kinds of
wonderful stories. I admire Scott C. Davis for inviting all these terrific people to the
table. The Profiles are an innovative addition, as inviting as a warm introduction."
- Naomi Shihab Nye
"While major media conglomerates are using modern technology
to build bigger empires and capture ever more of the national book scene, a collection of
artists and writers, some of whom are published for the first time, have issued their own
book, An Ear to the Ground. It is a hopeful sign that in the new world of
multinational media conglomerates, artists and writers have found a way to reach
publication on their own."
- Ben H. Bagdikian, author of The Media Monopoly
"An Ear to the Ground introduces not only new writers but
a new way of looking at the world. Here is a book which embraces geography and history.
The profiles and pictures of the contributors are just as moving as the prose. When the
word is given and we move into the next century, the fingerprints of these authors will be
everywhere."
- E. Ethelbert Miller, Howard University
"An Ear to the Ground is a new publishing paradigm...
cooperative publishing-authors and artists working together to bring their writing and art
before the public. A grassroots effort to use new technology to enrich our culture. A
lonely, yet vitally important, voice."
- Roger Simpson, University of Washington
From the Press
Gannett News Service - October 8,
1997
"The essays here are faithfully upbeat and frequently inspiring-- and pure in their
simplicity..."
"Lots of folks conditioned to rattling off readable facts in their daily work...think
it's easy to write either publishable fiction or literary essays. Until they try. They
learn it isn't. That's what makes [An Ear to the Ground] so gripping and
impressive."
"A pleasing twist in An Ear to the Ground is the editor's inclusion of both a
small bio and profile of each essayist at the end of their piece. This is quite
fulfilling. Readers are usually left dangling if they wish to know more about a
writer."
"...Scott Davis...lays down a blistering Afterword. In it, he recounts the sad story
of modern publishing..."
"Davis is right about one thing: the fate of American culture depends in large part
upon fresh literary talent, talent currently being smothered by the greed-driven publicity
and distribution apparatus currently in place. Maybe he can spark a literary revolution
with collections such as this."
Publishers Weekly - June 16, 1997
"Davis' vision of a community-supported literary movement has resulted in An Ear
to the Ground: Presenting Writers from 2 Coasts, an anthology of short personal essays
by 75 'emerging authors' from around the U.S."
"...the essays offer diverse readings of American life."
The Tacoma News Tribune - November 30, 1997
"...a rich array of pieces that are variously humble, dazzling, funny, sober,
heart-rending and spirit-lifting."
"Locales range from Tacoma to Tangier. A native of Japan tries to make a place for
herself in the United States. A California film-maker travels to Egypt to get in touch
with her family tree."
"The final pages of the book are given over to Davis' intelligent and impassioned
plea to readers, writers and publishers to do their part: in developing environmentally
sound products and publishing practices; in supporting grassroots literary presses; and in
reforming distribution practices which have grossly skewed the balance in favor of the
mega-bookstores at the expense of independent booksellers, small presses and
yet-to-be-discovered writers. This eloquent argument ought to be in the front of the book,
not buried in back."
The Eugene Register-Guard - August 31, 1997
"[An Ear to the Ground] is a major labor of love. And, perhaps surprisingly in
this era of chain bookstores and publishing by international corporations, An Ear to
the Ground hits a literary bull's eye."
"Reflecting a vast range of experience and subject matter, the voices in this volume
illuminate modern life--entertaining, educating, prodding and provoking as they focus on
the theme 'local truth.'"
"With this book, Davis proves his point: mega-publishing doesn't equate to a lock on
talent. The diversity of quality literary voices is as stimulating as Davis ballyhoos. The
collection is impossible to put down."
Library Journal - October 1, 1997
"Considerable ground is covered, from cross- and multicultutralism, marginalized
writers, and literary genres...to a heartening remedy to the trend in ever-merging
corporate megapublishers."
"Highly recommended for public and academic libraries."
Kirkus Review - August 8, 1997
"An interesting and admirable endeavor..."
Seattle Post-Intelligencer - August 22, 1997
"A small Seattle press offers an intriguing anthology of essays of emerging writers
from the West and East coasts, an admirable project of upstart publishing."
Santa Barbara News-Press - April 27, 1997
"...truly wonderful...powerful and sometimes pithy little essays that stick in your
memory."
The Miami Herald - September 7, 1997
"The collection...spotlights writers who might not otherwise have an opportunity for
wide exposure."
The Oregonian - December 7, 1997
"[Davis'] sense is that commercial publishing, whether at big houses or small, now
puts so much emphasis on the commerce that a ton of good stuff...sinks to the bottom of
the pond."
"'We've got a cultural crisis here,' Davis says, and the crisis he's talking about is
the overwhelming power of consumerism, which is turning publishing into a marketing-driven
business that responds to mass tastes, the literary equivalent of McDonald's."
"'We used to have a balanced fabric of public life,' he explains. 'But now the
commercial sphere works so efficiently that it's taken over.'"
"Davis, a writer himself who won a prize for The World of Patience Gromes, a
book about working as a conscientious objector during the 1970s, sees his current mission
as bringing to the surface work that lies below the crude radar that is triggered by the
almighty dollar. Yes, he admits, he's working against the tide. But, not surprisingly for
a guy used to going against the grain, the 50 year old Davis sounds energized rather than
discouraged at the prospect."
Independent Press (formerly Small Press Magazine)
"An Ear to the Ground is a genuinely interesting book, one which may chart a
new direction. Hefty, scrupulously produced and edited, it profiles and prints over 75
writers. The prose is tight and purposeful. An Ear to the Ground is at once a good
read, a rich book and a publishing vision."
"As with modes of travel where one moves without fixed intention, idling attentively
accumulating stories and complications, pausing, conversing, detouring and retracking, An
Ear to the Ground gives the reader entry into many lives that would otherwise pass
unknown. Our individual humanity as well as articulate correspondence with the world's
richness requires us to be informed, sensitive and attuned to the planet's thoughtful
murmuring. This book helps."
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Editor's Bio
Scott C. Davis is a Seattle author and building contractor. He has written two
award winning books: The World of Patience Gromes: Making and Unmaking a Black
Community and Lost Arrow and Other True Stories. Davis founded Cune Press in
1994 and conceived and edited An Ear to the Ground: Presenting Writers from 2 Coasts.
Editor's
Note
The Story Behind An Ear to the Ground
by Scott C. Davis
In December 1994 and February 1995 I toured the East and West Coasts, talked with book
reviewers and visited independent booksellers in their stores. In all, I met with a couple
of dozen book reviewers and more than 60 booksellers.
I wanted to know the prospects for literature in our commercial age. How, I wondered, was
it possible to sell thoughtful books to the general public? The answer I received was
simple: local authors.
And so Cune's Local/International series was born. The "local" side to the
series was designed to establish a nurturing home audience for our writers--and to finance
the enterprise by selling books.
The "international" side was to give writers hope of expanding their readerships
beyond their home turf. Books in the series would advertise for one another. Readers, we
hoped, would want to collect the series.
I had almost no money, so I was going to kick the series off by publishing chapbooks. But
bookstores also had told me that they wanted books with thick spines so that they would
look good on the shelves.
I was drinking mineral water with an old friend named Andy Rutten in the Stanford
University Bookstore Cafe when Andy proposed that I skip the chapbooks and publish an
anthology. "Put a larger number of new writers into print for your money," Andy
reasoned, "and give the bookstores a spine at the same time."
Thus An Ear to the Ground was born. I began hunting for new writers. I held a
national essay competition, took referrals from mentors such as E. Ethelbert Miller of
Howard University, telephoned exotic literary hangouts in cities I had never
visited--Books & Books in Miami Beach, for example, where I sleuthed out the notorious
Bicycle Poets of South Beach--represented in An Ear to the Ground by Jeffrey Knapp
and Adrian Castro.
I wanted to penetrate the localities that compose North America--the places, people,
ethnic groups, labor groups. In the Profiles I wanted to sketch the essayists, and also
the places that writers inhabit. To me a "locality" was a state of thought.
I was looking for writers who had talent, but I also wanted interesting people--American
originals who wrote from their own experience in their own voices. I was forced to turn
down far more writers than I accepted. Even so, the book grew from an affordable 20
writers to an incredibly expensive, almost unmanageable 78. Then there were 65 profile
writers. Plus 18 artists. In the end over 220 people donated their time or work. As this
book grew, I felt like it was organizing me.
Ultimately I realized that this volume is more than a literary exercise for the elite. We
were modeling America, fitting it to enter a new century.
That's why we included portraits of essayists, Dewar's style bios, and profiles--short,
teasing commentaries designed to bring essayists down from their pedestals. I wanted to
create a reader-friendly book that would expand the audience for good writing.
People are busy these days. So I chose short pieces that could give readers a taste and
develop their appetites for more. I had collected these authors, and I was calculating
that readers would make collections of their own.
We hope our that book and our cooperative publishing approach will be widely imitated. We
are inviting the public to participate in a renaissance of thoughtful writing composed and
published in American localities.
- Scott C. Davis
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Comments from Readers
(send to comments@cunepress.com)
Just finished the book [An Ear to the Ground]
and I loved it! First and most important the writing is fine. There are lots of folks
there I'd like to get to know better. Reading was like going to a pot-luck, or barn
raising, or block party and finally getting to meet the neighbors and their families--and
finding some new friends. I know it sounds corny, but it's experiences like this that give
evidence of God's embracing love for all and for each of us, and that's cause for
rejoicing...and for hope.
I love the format. I'm always looking for really short stories, good ones, that is. These
are busy times (and that's a topic for consideration, but good or bad it seems acutely
true) and as you probably know reading is one of the things that is sacrificed for time.
When I get into a book I just want to live there, do nothing else, until I finish because
I don't want to lose track of characters. That's a problem if I've got hundreds of pages
to go AND work to do. With An Ear to the Ground I could read, get really
involved, feel like I got to know someone a little, and then have a place to stop--all
within 5 or 10 minutes. It's great! And I guess you already know that some of the writing
about the writers is as fine as what the writers wrote.
Don't take this wrong, but I've got a friend who likes to keep a book in the john, and
this one is perfect for the purpose (no, the pages stay in the book). I'm ordering one for
him.
So, send me the two copies I ordered on the phone and I'll pass them out to friends. And
I'm looking forward to your essays--Lost Arrow.
Yours,
George Strong
Castro Valley, CA
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