Beginnings
These are our beginnings…
These are some of the stories you’ll find in our inaugural issue of Vistas & Byways. The first story is called Sister Theresa and the Evil Patrol and the second is called Nocturne. The excerpt from Margaret’s memoir will be found in the Table of Contents under the title It’s Been Forty Years.
We are, first and foremost, eager to receive your best work, no matter the genre. You might notice that two of the stories described above take place in San Francisco. A writer who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area will be subject to different influences than one who writes in New York or Wisconsin. In addition, all OLLI at SF State writers are at least fifty and much of our best work is being done by folks in their eighties. There is no privileged time of life, but age does sometimes confer wisdom.
In recognition of September 11, 2001, we include two distinctly different reminiscences about one of the most horrific days in our nation’s history: Cathy Fiorello’s Passages and Charlene Anderson’s I Slept Through 9-11. For those of you who prefer fiction to memoir, we invite you also to look at Bill Carpenter’s Sorrow’s Memory Is Sorrow Still, which also touches upon 9-11, and is a profound and tender meditation on how three generations of a family are inextricably bound by their war experiences.
Lest you think all is high seriousness in our Literary Review, we kick off one of our regular features, Interview with an Instructor, with Mike Lambert’s conversation with Sarah Broderick. Sarah led an OLLI at SF State class this summer on Playing the Trickster: An Approach to Creative Writing. We recommend you take a look at Mike’s interview with Sarah before delving into some of our trickster offerings: Michele Praeger’s The Making of a Flarf Poem and Wolfgang, and Charlene Anderson’s Ruminations on Rutabagas.
But poetry is not just about trickery and randomness, as in our Trickster selections. This vital genre expresses states of mind and emotion—such as found in The Dead Husband. It may take the form of A Love Letter to a Poetess; express a phobia as in Arachnophobia; or the pain of lost love as in Someone. Poetry opens up realms of freedom and intensity not readily available in prose.
In V&B Forum, which we plan to make another regular feature, we engage in the controversy over Harper Lee’s “new” novel, Go Set a Watchman. This is the sort of feature in which our readers are encouraged to comment in a box at the end of the article. But there will be a space for you to comment on any story that piques your interest. For example, you may have a response to Laurie Taylor’s offbeat ghost story about a man who returns from the dead so that he can receive swimming lessons from his daughter-in-law, or to a whimsical parable, Selling Dreams, about a woman who sells dreams—for the right price.
We would like to acknowledge Richard Simmonds of our Web & Design Team for the many attractive photos he has contributed to our inaugural issue.
In future issues we may incorporate such features as an interactive blog, excerpts from books by OLLI at SF State instructors, and issues that give special attention to one theme. The shape and, ultimately, the success of our venture will depend on your active participation. Don’t put your latest poem or short story in a drawer. Send it to Vistas & Byways! Our next issue will come out in the Spring of 2016. You may begin sending your submissions in December. (See our Submission Guidelines.)
Editorial Board
Fall 2015
- After her four year mission in Africa, Sister Theresa is thrilled when the Mother Superior of the Sisters of Mercy in Oshkosh, Wisconsin sends her to Old St. Mary’s Church in downtown San Francisco. But soon after she arrives at the venerable landmark, the long arm of the Vatican descends upon her in the guise of handsome Father Juan-Diablo. He’s the new Parish Priest—and does not like what he sees in Sin City.
- An insomniac awakes in the middle of the night. He searches for consolation in the elusive meaning of three words—Change precedes insight—which he had heard nearly a half-century before. He asks himself why the man who spoke these words, a City College of San Francisco psychology professor, might have been murdered in cold blood thirty years ago.
- “The smell of the paper mill, greetings from voices with southern Ohio twangs and July’s smothering heat send my thoughts into tender remembrances of life in Chillicothe,” writes Margaret Liddell in her memoir about growing up as a young black girl in a small town in south-central Ohio. Take one last walk with Margaret through Chillicothe, population 22,114, forty years after she left, as she searches for “objects from a lifetime ago.”
These are some of the stories you’ll find in our inaugural issue of Vistas & Byways. The first story is called Sister Theresa and the Evil Patrol and the second is called Nocturne. The excerpt from Margaret’s memoir will be found in the Table of Contents under the title It’s Been Forty Years.
We are, first and foremost, eager to receive your best work, no matter the genre. You might notice that two of the stories described above take place in San Francisco. A writer who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area will be subject to different influences than one who writes in New York or Wisconsin. In addition, all OLLI at SF State writers are at least fifty and much of our best work is being done by folks in their eighties. There is no privileged time of life, but age does sometimes confer wisdom.
In recognition of September 11, 2001, we include two distinctly different reminiscences about one of the most horrific days in our nation’s history: Cathy Fiorello’s Passages and Charlene Anderson’s I Slept Through 9-11. For those of you who prefer fiction to memoir, we invite you also to look at Bill Carpenter’s Sorrow’s Memory Is Sorrow Still, which also touches upon 9-11, and is a profound and tender meditation on how three generations of a family are inextricably bound by their war experiences.
Lest you think all is high seriousness in our Literary Review, we kick off one of our regular features, Interview with an Instructor, with Mike Lambert’s conversation with Sarah Broderick. Sarah led an OLLI at SF State class this summer on Playing the Trickster: An Approach to Creative Writing. We recommend you take a look at Mike’s interview with Sarah before delving into some of our trickster offerings: Michele Praeger’s The Making of a Flarf Poem and Wolfgang, and Charlene Anderson’s Ruminations on Rutabagas.
But poetry is not just about trickery and randomness, as in our Trickster selections. This vital genre expresses states of mind and emotion—such as found in The Dead Husband. It may take the form of A Love Letter to a Poetess; express a phobia as in Arachnophobia; or the pain of lost love as in Someone. Poetry opens up realms of freedom and intensity not readily available in prose.
In V&B Forum, which we plan to make another regular feature, we engage in the controversy over Harper Lee’s “new” novel, Go Set a Watchman. This is the sort of feature in which our readers are encouraged to comment in a box at the end of the article. But there will be a space for you to comment on any story that piques your interest. For example, you may have a response to Laurie Taylor’s offbeat ghost story about a man who returns from the dead so that he can receive swimming lessons from his daughter-in-law, or to a whimsical parable, Selling Dreams, about a woman who sells dreams—for the right price.
We would like to acknowledge Richard Simmonds of our Web & Design Team for the many attractive photos he has contributed to our inaugural issue.
In future issues we may incorporate such features as an interactive blog, excerpts from books by OLLI at SF State instructors, and issues that give special attention to one theme. The shape and, ultimately, the success of our venture will depend on your active participation. Don’t put your latest poem or short story in a drawer. Send it to Vistas & Byways! Our next issue will come out in the Spring of 2016. You may begin sending your submissions in December. (See our Submission Guidelines.)
Editorial Board
Fall 2015
