Rick Simonson

May 24, 1988, Ray Carver and Where He Was Calling From
May 24, 2008

Not often has Mist Place done intentional ventures into the past. Enough is on the plate in front ... or right ahead, more than can be kept up with.

Nevertheless, there are the occasional biddings back. An email came last week from Carol Sklonicka, who has long been at work on a full-scale biography of Raymond Carver. Colin Harrison at Scribner is its editor. The email from Ms. Sklonicka was in the form of a fairly minor fact-checking inquiry. A question, based on an obituary, as to whether a reading he and Tess Gallagher gave in May 1988 was his last (he died in August of that year). And a little on whether he had helped start the reading series itself at Elliott Bay.

This email came smack as I was in the midst of a deadline-weighted task I was doing my best to avoid. What better way to avoid such than to do email.

For whatever reason, perhaps the timing, with Ms. Sklonicka I rimbled and rambled, a long digressive note about the various readings Ray and Tess had done, the other ways they were in the store (with other writers, just shopping), last sightings (1988 ABA convention), even a funny bit, before really meeting Ray, of taking a call from him in Syracuse, and looking (on my end) through the want-ads in a Seattle paper, trying to help he and Tess find a rental house in Seattle. One thing I told her which I learned only more recently, in stories about Dutton's closing in Los Angeles - it seems that Ray's last reading may have been there, when he and Tess were down for that ABA visit, shortly after their Elliott Bay reading.

The part I wrote most extensively of was Ray's last reading at Elliott Bay - exactly twenty years ago, May 24, 1988. It was the day before his 50th birthday - which would be his last.

That reading was set in conjunction with Atlantic Monthly Press' publication of Where I'm Calling From: Selected Stories, and Tess Gallagher's newest book of poems, Amplitude (if memory serves). It was the third time in three years they had read together; each had been with a new book. Each of those times there had been huge audiences.

Such it was that night in May 1988. Packed to the rafters and beyond was our basement space. A good number of those there knew Ray had had battles with cancer - one lung had been lost to cancer. There'd been treatment - less widely known - for another occurrence, which was still evident in Ray the night of his reading. He had a hair-piece, he was a bit puffy from treatment. The hopes, then, were still for the best. He was out and about.

But there were concerns. Ray and Tess' readings would usually consist of them standing at our tabletop podium and reading, one, followed by the other. That night, Tess was concerned lest Ray not have the strength to do a full reading. The stage setup was re-set so that both could sit at a table. This put me, introducing them, in the unusual position of being seated myself - best to be heard through all the nooks and crannies of audience.

When Ray and Tess took the stage that night, there was applause, but also a collective sense of realization, that Ray was or had not been well. The air took on much more gravity.

Even though he was seated, Tess to his left, Ray in his way made out that it was just another good night, a good one to be there for. And he started reading. I will never forget what that was like: how utterly quiet a room of some hundreds of people could be. Ray launched in on the not-short story 'Elephant.' It was so quiet, you could hear his breathing - the taking in of a breath, each breath - over the speakers as he read. He didn't sound so strong in that beginning.

Ray kept at it. And the pull of the story pulled everyone. There would be a little laughter, then much. That took care of hearing the breathing. But in there, too, Ray gained strength, his voice more and more so.

When he finished, the applause wouldn't end. It was a transcendent moment. Those there knew they had heard something in a way they never would again.

Tess then also read beautifully, and then there was a signing that went on and on ...

As always, when the night was over, Ray was the most gracious guest, going out of his way to acknowledge and thank everyone on staff - even those who'd been far from the reading action. Off he and Tess would be into the night, whether it was to stay in town, or catch the ferry and get home to Port Angeles.

Twenty years later, it is still a presence. 

If not too diverted, by getting ready for this year's BEA, perhaps some words of that twenty-year-ago ABA - also a southern California show, the 1988 ABA in Anaheim. Ray and Tess figured in that, but so did much else.

Oops, if the writing's done, it doesn't hurt to post these things live ... four days later ..

Posted by Rick Simonson on May 24, 2008 | Comments (0)