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EIGHT: Back to America, Back to Europe
- University of Georgia Press
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[ c h a p t e r e i g h t Back to America, Back to Europe Major notes that their return to the United States in the spring of 1983 was especially difficult for Pam, but he clearly had some ambivalence about returning to Boulder (“Licking Stamps,” 197). This is evident in their almost perpetual movement over the next two years. Soon after he returned to Colorado, he began making arrangements to take a visiting position at the University of California at San Diego for the following spring. That appointment was arranged by Sherley Anne Williams and Jerry Rothenberg. At the end of the 1982–83 academic year, he had received a sabbatical leave from Colorado that enabled him to go from San Diego in 1984 almost directly to Venice. It was this constant movement, rather than editorial or financial considerations , that led to the delay by the Fiction Collective in publishing My Amputations, which was released 12 March 1986. After its completion, he immediately began work on the manuscript for Painted Turtle, the story of one of the minor characters he had introduced in My Amputations. Before going to California, however, he made a sojourn to Georgia; he had been invited to be a short-term writer-inresidence at Albany State University in January 1984. This job enabled him to visit relatives in Atlanta, which provided the basis for Such Was the Season. He conducted workshops, did readings, and visited local music clubs while in Albany and Atlanta. Within a short time after his return to Boulder from Georgia , he and Pam began the drive to San Diego. On the way, they back to america, back to europe [ 167 visited Mesa Verde, site of the Anazazi cliff dwellings. They then drove to Gallup, New Mexico, and then to the Zuni reservation, which is key to the setting of Painted Turtle. They moved on to San Diego, and a week later celebrated Pam’s birthday by going to Tijuana. They had difficulty finding a place to stay. The experience was so unpleasant that they did not cross the border again until accompanied by a colleague with significant experience. The trip to Venice began late in August 1984 with a flight to Rome, where they stayed at the Hotel Sitea. Two days later, they moved on to Venice. They were met at the airport by the friend of a scholar who was doing an Italian translation of Reflex and Bone Structure, a work that was never published . Their apartment at Fondamenta Tolentini 170 was not yet ready, so they spent a few nights at the two-star Hotel Tivoli nearby. The time in Venice was spent very quietly and involved a daily routine of food shopping , walking around the city, and occasional trips to the countryside with William and Franca Boelhower; William was a U.S. scholar who taught primarily at universities in Venice and Padua. There were no lecture tours or tourist trips to major European sites for the first six months. Instead, Major prepared My Amputations for publication (Fannie Howe was his editor), worked on the manuscript of what became Painted Turtle, produced a set of poems related to the material of that novel, developed ideas for a novel about Venice, wrote a long poem about the city that was later published as Surfaces and Masks, and did a large number of pen-and-ink drawings and watercolors. It was one of the most productive periods of his career. Even the leisure time was used creatively. He describes their morning practice of getting coffee in the Campo Santa Margherita: “Across the campo was a building which became one of the main settings for my Venice novel. Many of the people we saw daily became models for its minor characters. When I needed a face to go on a character, I often found one in the newspaper. I’d cut it out and pin it to the sheet with the character’s history” (“Licking Stamps,” 199). This passage not only suggests the integration of everyday life into his artistic work but also the orderliness that he had introduced into his creative process. The young writer who put things down with minimal revision or who employed rolls of paper à la Kerouac has now become the calm craftsman methodically going about his business. It was only in April 1985 that he felt the need to hit the road again. The justification for the trip was research that Pamela wanted to...