After Howie, A New Dilemma

My summer reading has been considerably lighter by what I'd hoped it'd be. And when I say light, I mean I'm reading Tragedy and Hope. The idea that we are a nation ultimately dominated by economic interest, that the world is a sum of its economic interest, is hardly new. It's been the premise of every other song I've ever listened to since I was seventeen. The significance of the individual against an international economic interest is hardly a new idea either.

I used to toot around my relation to Howard Zinn as though it was proof of my academic pedigree. And yes, it is a pedigree. The smarts don't just come from my mother. They come from her side. The Zinns have a history of turning out math professors, religious scholars, and one writer. I am the second to come along.

Partially out of respect for Howard's legacy, and partially because I do not want to live in the Zinn shadow, I made the decision to focus on the quiet desperation of everyday life, rather than the quiet desperation of anyone in a particular social class. Becoming political places me in a precarious position; I must do politics  better than Howard Zinn. If I make my name as a writer, comparisons will follow. They are inevitable. If I decide to write with a political message in mind, unless I do politics far differently or better than Zinn, I will be seen as a shadow of the man. 

What do you do if you're Howard Zinn's cousin?  The point of my writing is largely lost if you do not ask that question. The short stories I post, particularly "Choices", about a political disagreement between a father and daughter, attempts to answer it. You look at politics as a destructive force in the home, and, in analyzing how it severs relationships instead of fostering unions, you find a new angle of oppression. 

How do you get political if you're Howard Zinn's cousin? The answer, on the surface, is that you don't. Politics becomes a metaphor for the dynamic in the home, and, rather than the call to action that Howard wanted, a forum onto which parents latch on for their need for control, and onto which their children latch on as a means to express their need for individuality. The inability to reconcile (and, arguably, the loss of focus) means a lack of cooperation and the futility of politics.  

This has been my solution for the three years that I have been writing. Which brings me back to Tragedy and Hope. It's a book based on history that I've already learned; however, it's assembled to shake the reader. Whether Quigley intended it or not, it implies, to me, that our lives may be dominated by the economy, but they don't have to be. And I find the urge to become politically active. Because any political experiences I have will inevitably filter into my writing, I cannot promise I will always stay neutral. 

But I try.