By JAMES D. WATTS JR. Scene Writer on Jul 10, 2012, at 1:00 PM Updated on 7/11 at 3:03 PM
ARTS
This has not, by any standard, been a good week for far too many people.
We've been horrifically reminded how fragile ...
Celebrity Attractions announced that Disney Theatricals will donate a portion of this week's ticket sales to the Tulsa run ...
Tulsa native Tracy Letts won the Outstanding Actor in a Play at the 58th annual Drama Desk Awards, presented Sunday night ...
CONTACT THE BLOGGER
918-581-8478
Email
The New York Times' ArtsBeat blog reports that "House of Earth," a novel that Woody Guthrie wrote in 1947, will be published some time in 2013, after it is edited for publication by the team of writer Douglas Brinkley and actor Johnny Depp.
Brinkley, the author and editor of 26 books including the recently published biography of TV newsman Walter Cronkite, had heard about the novel and set about tracking down a copy of the typescript -- which he found in the University of Tulsa's McFarlin Library.
In a story published in the New York Times by Brinkley and Depp, they write that the novel was "written as a direct response to the Dust Bowl," when Guthrie came across the adobe houses of New Mexico.
Guthrie was convinced that adobe houses "would endure the Dust Bowl better than wooden aboveground structures that were vulnerable to wind, snow, dust and termites."
The novel is the story of a married couple whose efforts to construct a house that will both protect them and be in harmony with the land on which it stands runs afoul of the ruling class -- banks and the lumber companies, who take every opportunity to exploit people like Guthrie's protagonists.
Brinkley and Depp write: "After finishing the novel in 1947, Guthrie put the manuscript away and concentrated on songwriting. He may have sensed the novel could be considered passe (post-New Deal writing was frowned upon by cold war-era critics) and ahead of its time (graphic sex). His fertility cycle prose was so edgy that publication was unlikely."
The two write that, "at heart, 'House of Earth' is a meditation on how poor people search for love and meaning in a corrupt world, one in which the rich have lost their moral compass....It's almost as if Guthrie had prophetically written 'House of Earth' for the summer of 2012."
Only active print or digital subscribers of the Tulsa World are allowed to post comments on stories posted to Tulsaworld.com. After you fill out the form below and click submit, your comment will be published instantly online along with your screen name.
By clicking "Submit" you are agreeing to our terms and conditions.
