Ever been caught off guard by the twist in a short story that left you pondering life's unexpected turns? We've all been there, and this episode celebrates the king of the twist ending, O. Henry. Joining me is the artistic director of Austin Shakespeare, Ann Ciccolella, as we delve into the whimsical world of this short story maestro. With Anne's intimate knowledge of translating literature to the stage, we unravel the intricacies of bringing O. Henry's vibrant characters and plots from the page to the spotlight, ensuring that every theatrical rendition pulses with the same energy and wit found in his timeless prose.
Anne and I also reminisce about how O. Henry's stories, like "Cupid à la Carte," have a unique way of threading joy and pathos into the fabric of our lives. We examine his sharp character sketches that draw readers into worlds as familiar as they are enchanting. Anne shares her approach to enlivening these narratives for the stage with multi-role casting and a mix of dance and music, crafting an immersive experience that pays homage to O. Henry's distinctive storytelling style. It's an episode that literature aficionados and theater lovers alike won't want to miss, as it's filled with the kind of insights that can only come from deep appreciation and professional expertise.
Rounding out our discussion, Anne and I touch on the profound impact reading with children can have, not just on their cognitive development, but on their emotional world as well. We stress the importance of sharing stories like O. Henry's, which are steeped in the beauty of language and the richness of the human experience. So, grab your favorite book, cozy up with your little ones, and let's journey together through the laughter, the twists, and the heartfelt moments that only a great story can provide.
Ever been caught off guard by the twist in a short story that left you pondering life's unexpected turns? We've all been there, and this episode celebrates the king of the twist ending, O. Henry. Joining me is the artistic director of Austin Shakespeare, Ann Ciccolella, as we delve into the whimsical world of this short story maestro. With Anne's intimate knowledge of translating literature to the stage, we unravel the intricacies of bringing O. Henry's vibrant characters and plots from the page to the spotlight, ensuring that every theatrical rendition pulses with the same energy and wit found in his timeless prose.
Anne and I also reminisce about how O. Henry's stories, like "Cupid à la Carte," have a unique way of threading joy and pathos into the fabric of our lives. We examine his sharp character sketches that draw readers into worlds as familiar as they are enchanting. Anne shares her approach to enlivening these narratives for the stage with multi-role casting and a mix of dance and music, crafting an immersive experience that pays homage to O. Henry's distinctive storytelling style. It's an episode that literature aficionados and theater lovers alike won't want to miss, as it's filled with the kind of insights that can only come from deep appreciation and professional expertise.
Rounding out our discussion, Anne and I touch on the profound impact reading with children can have, not just on their cognitive development, but on their emotional world as well. We stress the importance of sharing stories like O. Henry's, which are steeped in the beauty of language and the richness of the human experience. So, grab your favorite book, cozy up with your little ones, and let's journey together through the laughter, the twists, and the heartfelt moments that only a great story can provide.
Welcome everybody to another episode of Troubadour Talks. Today I have Anne Ciccalala with me, the artistic director of Austin Shakespeare, and we are going to be talking about oh Henry. Oh Henry, the short story writer from the early 1900s. Also, I might add a personal favorite of Anne and my writer that we both love, which is Ayn Rand.
Speaker 1:I just want to start with a quick quote from oh Henry, just to give you a taste of part of what I love about him, a major part. We'll talk about this as we go and why we think you should read oh Henry, and the quote is inject a few raisins of conversation into the tasteless dough of existence, and personally I just love that kind of idea, injecting a few. And so hopefully, anne and I will inject a few raisins into the dough of existence for you today. Well, welcome Anne, thank you. So why, for everyone out there, if you're in Austin or in Texas again, anne is the artistic director of Austin Shakespeare. Why or what's going on and why are we doing oh Henry Let me put it that way today to have this conversation?
Speaker 2:Well, we have a little motto of Austin Shakespeare the bard is only the beginning, so a really interesting language.
Speaker 2:So we've done a shiller, we've done Cyrano de Berzerac, we've done Tennessee Williams. And oh Henry obviously is not a playwright, he's a prose writer. He's a short story writer but he's one of the most celebrated short story writers ever and I knew him in terms of an image of him from New York, that is, he lived in New York a lot of his later years and his more famous years, but he spent something like 12 or 13 years in Austin, texas, and one of our colleagues, dr Shoshana Milgram, has done some talks about that and I bet you can find some of them on YouTube still about oh Henry's life in Austin. But it's his writing that I really think people can find exciting. I think it was something that people read a lot in past years when they were in, you know, later grammar school, in early high school. But I feel like it's just not done that much anymore and hopefully this will get some interest from our local community and from your global community.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, the premise of Troubadour, in my view, is to elevate life, enriching discourse and elevating discourse in life. And that, I think, is what oh Henry does, probably better than almost any writer ever Short story or novels or anything. I just want to read a quick quote from Ayn Rand about oh Henry. Oh, thank you. Like she's a wonderful writer in her own right, in terms of not just her insights but the way she puts words together, which is really important. So she says philosophically, romanticism is a crusade to glorify man's existence. Psychologically, it is experienced simply as the desire to make life interesting. This, this desires the root and motor of romantic imagination.
Speaker 1:Its greatest example in popular literature is oh Henry, whose unique characteristic is the pyrotechnical virtuosity of an inexhaustible imagination, projecting the gait of a benevolent, almost childlike sense of life. More than any other writer, oh Henry represents the spirit of youth, specifically the cardinal element of youth, the expectation of finding something wonderfully unexpected around all of life's corners. And I just love that. And I sometimes feel like Ayn Rand is almost conjuring oh Henry a little bit in her usage of words and the way she kind of plays with words, but in a now she's more of a precise writer than oh Henry, of course, but just thought that was wonderful and she's the one who introduced me to oh Henry and I've read a lot of his stuff through because of because of her.
Speaker 2:Thank you for sharing that. So that's in the romantic manifesto, the Ayn Rand collection of her writing on art.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly that's from. That's from her leanings in that way. Now, were you introduced by Ayn Rand or did you know about? Oh?
Speaker 2:Henry, I think I knew her from. I knew a hundred from school.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:I think I read it in literature classes and stuff, I don't. I mean, I recognized it when she said it, but she wasn't the person to introduce it to me Okay.
Speaker 1:So let's talk a little bit about the well, we're going to start with the show you're doing. We don't talk too much about the show, but one of the things, one of the question I did have as we go into this, is an interesting thing about how are you adapting this? So, oh, henry has been adapted for film a few times. I remember there was a famous 1950s series of short stories done by Hollywood directors, including Howard Hawks, I believe is a very famous director. So you have you chosen and written these, or is there a script out there that you're? Because this is a theatrical performance you're doing on Austin Shakespeare.
Speaker 2:Right, I mean my goal, I adapted it. I adapted it from the short stories, not from another play or anything, but I really wanted to get oh Henry's sense of buoyancy.
Speaker 2:You know he has such a free spirit. That was my goal. I try to not have too much narration, but when you're adapting his short stories there were just some sections that his voice is so wonderful and, honestly, you have to hear it. I mean, you have to have some narration. So even though I used, you know, probably 75 percent of it is dialogue. Probably 25 percent of it is music and dance and his own narration, which will be fun. So what's behind me, you were asking, is Austin, texas, um, circa 1900, when Henry lived here. He lived here for over 13 years and I just passed some of those churches that you see on there as I drove from downtown to U-Kirk and that big street you're seeing is Congress Avenue and you can see a little bit of the of the river.
Speaker 1:Yeah, in the background, okay.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's.
Speaker 1:Congress to your right? I think it is yeah.
Speaker 2:Yes, so it's great to get to this right yeah. So, it's great to to go downtown Austin, and that's one of the things that our colleague Shoshana Milgram did was sort of walk through some of those locations.
Speaker 2:But you know, one of the first things that you and I talked about, kirk, when we talked about our Henry, was the fact that there's a story there are lots of stories about him, but a story that he carried a dictionary with him when he rode on a horse and for a little bit of time he was in the West, meaning he did actually work on ranches and so on in the West and that he loved coming up with definitions of words and his vocabulary in his stories. Sometimes you have to look them up. Once or twice he makes up a word.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I think that one of the joys of reading him is the playfulness and imaginative use of language, and there's all kinds of examples of this. But why don't we jump into Cupid all a cart and that's one of? That's the first story you're starting with, yeah, and I don't want to open with the opening line, but there's a line that's one of my favorite all time oh Henry lines, and there's a lot of them. Like so much of this is playful, but I'll just tell you so Cupid all a cart Beautiful, fun, enjoyable story about a man who's, you know, eating food, gets in the way of his love, essentially because he falls in love with a woman who cannot stand that men eat food because she's a waitress and all she thinks of them in their stomachs, and it's hilarious and funny and enjoyable and there's tragedy and it goes up and it's and it's like seven pages, right, and a lot happens in seven pages. But you know, I'll tell you there's a lot of observations that he, that oh Henry puts throughout his stories that are accurate and to me, like the fun of it is that he will take something that I think is a cliche way of thinking about things, but he wraps it up in some new language, that's the perfect. So I'll just let me read the line and then I'll tell you my my thought on it real quick.
Speaker 1:So this is in Cupid all a cart. And he says as soon as I saw main, I knew there was a mistake in the, in mistake in the census reports. There wasn't but one girl in the United States. Now I first off, as someone who is currently in love with a woman, this viewpoint is 100% what it feels like right, and the cliche is like oh, I only have eyes for you, right? That's how we all think and that's that's the kind of boring, mundane way that we, our minds, are, you know, wrapped up in language. What's beautiful about oh Henry is he gives us new ways of seeing the world and new ways of like formulating. So it's fun and playful because, you know, I think that's, I think that's an important part of enjoying this dough of existence that we have.
Speaker 2:That structure of that was very much like his story. He's known for these surprise endings. He called them twists at the end right but even at the end of that sentence he gives you the twist right. That's how he constructs the idea. He doesn't say I saw one girl and I thought she was the only girl in the world.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Right. He says it must have been a mistake in the census.
Speaker 1:Yeah, as soon as I saw May, I knew there was a mistake in the census reports and yeah, and then he, you know he goes on and it's I. So to pull out what you just said I think is really important. So part of the joy of oh Henry is not just the twist ending at the very end, which is, if you know about oh Henry, you've probably heard of the gift of the Magi, just the only story I think I read in K through 12 school and you know I won't give away the endings. So if you haven't read it, go read that. But that's. That's a well known story in general, like a lot, like you're more likely to find someone who's read that and in ever if they read anything. And again, the emphasis is always on that twist ending and that's it. Even the adaptations like every adaptation I've ever seen basically takes out all the joy of the language you know to make it more easily readable.
Speaker 2:And yeah, yeah, yeah, and it's like and.
Speaker 1:I understand the point. I understand what they're trying to do. Like if you're acting in a Hollywood movie, it's very hard to have people talk in the way that he does. You know, I'll just tell you, I had the experience recently of reading an oh Henry short story to somebody and it's actually a little challenging to read it out loud to some degree, because it's like it's it's great to read in your head and just kind of sit with it and read with it. But, man, like it's got some tongue twisters in there.
Speaker 2:Language right. I mean, he really does want to use great language and I think you know if you read it on an ebook and you can look up some words, that's great. But, as you said, I mean long stories for him are seven pages, but many of them are three and four pages long, yeah, so I just encourage people. I hope today will inspire people to go look. I will say gift in the major is a number of versions of it are on YouTube from where Kirk is saying about, but we really try to keep his dialogue.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I noticed, I saw the script. Would you be mad if I read the first line? This is this is from Cuban all the card. I also love this line. So Cuban all the cart is one that I've always loved. I think my I've also loved the last leaf and then that now has a lot of personal attachment to that one, and then I've always loved Princess and the Puma. Do you have favorite? Oh, henry Ford stories.
Speaker 2:Well, you know I thought about Princess and the Puma. But just to do that as as an on stage thing is just wasn't realistic for me to do it. But read that first line.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, the first. This is great. So this is how you're going to open the whole thing. So this is wonderful. So it's Jeff Peter saying the dispositions of women run regular to diversions. What a woman wants is what you're out of, and I think that he goes on like that. But again, I think there's a lot of us you know a lot of men maybe will have, I bet basically can definitely say that that's how it feels sometimes. To fall in love with the woman is like what she wants is what you're out of. And I think that you know he does that all the time. He just like snaps those off over and over again, and you know it's just worthwhile to experience. Oh, henry, read one or two of his or his column poems. There's kind of a poeticism to him, his short stories, you know every week he's written like 600.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So you know there's just fun to just pull one out and and see how you like it and know that the meal is going to go on and on and on right, there's lots to to read.
Speaker 1:So in Cupid all a cart, I want to try to help. I want to try inspire people to read this. Like, why should they read you but all the cart? And if you're in Austin you should read the play, the stories that and will be producing and directing, and then come see them so you can enjoy a little bit. But let's hone in on Cupid all a cart a little bit and what so? We've talked a little bit about some of the language, but I mean, what would you tell someone if you're saying like here you should read oh Henry, there's a story we're adapting, cupid all a cart. Do you have like a line you might tell them of why they should read this particular story or him in general?
Speaker 2:Well, I think I mean joy is such a strange word these days. Nobody knows what to do with it. But I will say the stories have a real sense of joy. It really is like bouncing a balloon in the air, right, and the characters are so free spirited, even when they're meeting with a trials and tribulations. It's not like you know one of the things. When I first started writing, I was like oh, things can't always be happy. It's like you have to have a conflict.
Speaker 2:And these people are having all sorts of conflicts and, oh Henry, has a blast giving you twists and turns to the very end and some of the endings actually are sad, but some of the endings are happy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's true, but they'll always you know.
Speaker 2:it's almost like reading a detective story there's always a change, that's all set up for you and you think you know where it's going. But our Henry is quite clever at that.
Speaker 1:It takes a man a lifetime to find out about one particular woman, but if he puts in, say, 10 years, industrious and curious, he can acquire the general rudiments of the sets. I mean, again, I just wanna pepper this talk with little quotes from him because it's just so wonderful and that again, is the joy, like you're saying, of reading this story, which I'll just say that I won't tell you the ending. But the story is about a traveling salesman, right, and, by the way, I'll say that there's something he sells that I actually don't know what it is. It's called like a Brazilian, something I'm like. What is? Is that a cat?
Speaker 2:Cigars.
Speaker 1:I was like okay, I thought it might like keep in, and I put it in our play, so it wouldn't be such a big deal with cigars. Okay, yeah, and I was like I thought it might be that like he's, because it sounds like it's Cubans almost the way he talks about it.
Speaker 2:The Cuban cigars.
Speaker 1:Brazilians. Yeah, so he's a traveling salesman. So I think that's one reason I love this story, because I've been a traveling salesman and I know this kind of idea and I connect with the character. The character is, to his misfortune of mine, be gotten by nature and travel to look deeper into some subjects than most people do, and I definitely think that I feel that way myself sometimes.
Speaker 1:And so he's a man who's traveling around. He's in Oklahoma City or in the region of Oklahoma City, and there's, like these shantied boom towns from, I guess, an oil thing, and he goes to this tent because he's, again, a man who I don't know how he puts it, I can't put it in oh Henry terms, but he loves food. Basically is how my pedestrian way of putting it yeah, and then so he loves food, he goes to this place and he falls in love with this main character, main character. As soon as I saw main, there was a mistake and I just want to point out and I don't know if you have examples of this yourself or from adapting it but one of the things he's really good at, besides the use of language, besides these twists Zoom just did a thumbs up is characterization in like one line. Like you get a sense of these people very quickly, not just the main character, but other characters as well. I'll give an example later, but do you have thoughts on his characterization and how he portrays?
Speaker 2:that Well they're really. You know, we have a term that we've made a negative, called caricature.
Speaker 1:Well, Caricature.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like C-H-A-R-I-T-U caricature Got it and that's how you really say it is caricature, but it's caricature.
Speaker 1:I don't know that okay.
Speaker 2:And there's a very famous cartoonist in the theater called Al Hershfeld and his are fantastic. They're of 20th century Broadway plays, but in a way that is what in a few strokes. There's a by Al Hershfeld, there's a movie documentary called the Lion King, a Lion King, and it's a pun on the Lion King because he has a drawing of the Lion King. But it's that whole idea that you can do something so quick and so stylized and it nails it.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, so, and I think that's what oh Henry is one of the best. That is what you're saying. It's basically capturing the voice and the sense of that person in just a sentence or two, and you know so, even though you have a, type but you also have very much an individual.
Speaker 1:It's not just all types they're typed with very specific characters. Yes, and so, like the waitress here, mame, for instance, she has this line that I think is and I do, you have this in the script the fried chicken, beef steak, pork chops and ham, eggs and papaya, like yeah. So basically you can't see it, but if you read it, basically oh, henry just typed in fried chicken, beef steak, pork chops.
Speaker 2:And no breaks.
Speaker 1:With no breaks, just all one word. So I can imagine that would be fun or challenging for someone to kind of like read out real fast as almost one silent word. But I think you know, in that one word and then a couple little lines here you get a sense of this, like that New York high-paced waitress who's moving around like oh okay, just going for one, and then everyone just turns into a stomach to her because she has so many mouths that she's giving this food out to. So you get a sense of like that's the caricature of this woman. Like if you were just drawing one of those boardwalk exaggerated paintings, portraits of somebody, you would just have her with a you know one hand with a sandwich, another hand with soup, coffee in her you know a waitress pocket or something like that, just serving everybody with like 12 hands.
Speaker 2:And she doesn't. You know, she doesn't. The only negative she has toward all these guys is well, I don't want to marry them, I don't mind serving them, I don't mind talking to them, but they're not somebody I'd want to marry and that sort of sets up their journey.
Speaker 1:Well, okay, so I'm gonna. That's interesting. You say that because I. Part of what's fun about this journey is her journey in particular, but it's also what the men do to win her affections. Can I say one thing that Ed does? I won't again. I won't say the very ending.
Speaker 2:So there are rivals in here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's another thing is there's two men and like, again, it's just, it's so beautiful. I wish I could just read the whole thing. Just go read this story. But it's really cool because they meet in between meal times. That's how, oh, henry indicates that they're in love with me is that they don't go when you're supposed to go because that's when there's too many people. So they go when no one's around or when less people's around, and that's where the main character goes.
Speaker 1:And then this other guy all of a sudden comes and they are walking out afterwards like wait a second, you're coming in between this, in between meal time. I'm coming in between. Why are we doing this? Right, okay, you're after that lady who's there, and so, yeah, they both are interested in this, this the same woman, and there's a rivalry. And one of them, at one point because Mame sees every man as a stomach and she can never marry him they start eating like women, they say, and they start eating like little crackers. And one of them even comes in on like leaves and comes in on a what's it called? Like a curiosity? What's the word I'm looking for? Like a circus? A circus, like they comes in with a circus. He's a freak show as the starving man, as the man on a fast, and I won't tell you exactly how that ends, but you should read to find out. But it's a great, you know. So he's like trying to win those women's. He fasts and then she becomes interested in him.
Speaker 2:So anyway, it's a fun thing, it is fun, it's a lot of fun. So, where you know, we have 11 actors doing many, many roles I'll have to count up each actor is doing five or six roles Because there's so many short stories and so many characters and we're also gonna use projections so that we can get you know sort of specific places rather than, oh, we have to change the scenery. So the style of it is very much in the style of our town, in the sense that there's mime and so on. But I hope it will be a lot of fun and, as I said, we have a couple of musicians in it, we have lots of singers in it, we're gonna have a tap dance in it, we'll have polka, we'll have waltz. So I wanna keep it, really that balloon, in the air. As I said, it's lively.
Speaker 1:That's fun, yeah. So the one thing is, how do you get the actors, in this case, to to like? Memorizing lines is challenging enough. Memorizing these lines has to be really challenging. I mean, even for someone who does Shakespeare, I feel like this is even elevated difficulty. I don't know if that's true.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll find out as I work with them. Honestly, there was one, the story about Bear County, where he goes to the land office. I don't know if you know that it's BXAR, but you say it Bear BXAR, and it takes place in a while. I really wanted to do it, but it was gonna have pages of narration and I not only was concerned about the audience, I was concerned about the actors.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:To just memorize paragraphs and paragraphs of narration isn't much fun. It's much more fun dialogue, but it's going back and forth. So I think that all their Shakespeare training is really gonna help them be facile with this quick talking. You know 1900s style, when it was. You know stride piano and ragtime piano and that whole style.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it's got that kind of lively, like you're saying buoyancy to the language and you're trying to convey that in the actors. A man in a sausage grinder and a pantry awakened me exactly the same sentiments. I just wanted to read a line from the waitress. So that's again that is one of oh Henry's ways of conveying this.
Speaker 1:Character is not able to fall in love with Met because she sees a sausage grinder in a pantry. They awake the same sentiments. She also said I will say and I'd be curious what you think about this. She says of I would never marry, never will be married man. Do you know what a man is? In my eye? He's a tomb. He's a sarcophagus for the internment of beef, steak, pork chops, slas, sliver and bacon and ambs and eggs. He's that, nothing more. For two years I've watched men eat, eat, eat until they represent nothing on earth to me but ruminant bipeds. Again, playful words all the time. But it's interesting because there's. I haven't read a lot of criticism of oh Henry, and not criticism in terms of negative, but I mean like no, there isn't a lot.
Speaker 2:There isn't a lot. There's a lot about his biography, his history, his impact, but I think he wasn't taken very seriously because he was writing for magazines and newspapers. So sometimes, when he goes on and on, it's because he's getting paid by the word.
Speaker 1:I think, yeah, I think that's although I wonder if they counted this as six words or one word. Beef steak chops.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:that's right, Is that one word or what is that? Yeah, is he gonna get paid by the letter or something?
Speaker 2:No, he'll get paid by the word he's paid by the word nine up.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I mean, what I found interesting in that and like reading, trying to learn more about oh Henry, and what is the critical analysis of him, is that there is so little, because I have read a few little comments people have had. For instance, you've kind of mentioned this, but the idea that he will take something that's kind of dreary, negative, maybe it could. That subject could easily be discussed in a very serious story and he, but he does it in such a light, playful way that it's you know, ayn Rand's term is that he's very benevolent, it's almost like a childlike gaiety in the world, even in subjects that are serious. And just one example of a serious subject is the short story that is also in your playlist, which is the cop and the anthem. And the reason I think it's a little serious is well, because, if you like, do you think it's serious, or I say Well, it's sad.
Speaker 2:I mean this, you know, or Henry ends at that period, would call these people bums or hobos.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And we now we can't even call them homeless anymore, we tell, we say you know people who don't have homes, but he really looks at it big picture. So, even though he's doing something extremely every day. I will say, though, this to me, of the film and cinematic things, is the very best one that was ever done, because it has a great actor in it. And that is, charles Lawton.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember this one very specifically, very vividly, and he really pulls you in. So the cop and the anthem is about a homeless bum, a homeless person named Sophie, who is trying to go get arrested in New York so that he could spend three months on, quote unquote, the island, which is a prison, so that he can be warm, be fed, be blanketed, all that good stuff. And now I think, one one again. This is one of the few times that I saw criticism in any sense. Is that because the risk here for Sophie, if you think about it, is possible death Right, like if he does not get into prison he could freeze to death in on the benches. And I think there's a line about that in here, somewhere in I don't remember exactly where it is, but there's a line. But here's just how. Oh, henry opens this again and I'd love to get again Anything you have to say about this. I'd love to hear just comments. But he says this is a very opening line of this. So be moved restlessly on his seat in Madison Square. There are certain signs to show that winter is coming. Birds begin to fly south, women who want nice, new, warm coats become very kind to their husbands and so be moves restlessly on his seat in his part. When you see these signs, you know that winter is near.
Speaker 1:By the way, I have a different translate. I have a different version which is interesting. Um, like I do, as I read that, I just realized, like I have this book which has all the unabridged stuff in there. It's a different line actually, really. Yeah, so I'll have to, I'll try and find it. But the line about women who want nice, warm, new coats, that's it's not like that at all. It's something like women without like uncoated women or something like that. That's right, that's. I did not realize this, but I've seen this before. We're like the online version is a little different, but I still think if you read the online version, you're fine. I think it's, it's fine. But anyway, sorry for the tangent, I love that opening because he's he's basically just setting a scene. He's showing you that it's winter and he's putting soapy in this natural world of birds flying south and women wanting coats, so they're extra nice to their, their kind, to their husbands.
Speaker 2:But he doesn't say it's winter.
Speaker 1:And he does not yeah.
Speaker 2:This is the show, don't tell right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a dead leaf fell at soapy's feet. That was a special sign for him that winter was coming. And again, okay, I don't like this version because in my version it says that's that it was Jack Frost's calling card. So if you can get some print books I'm not not that I'm seeing these online I'm not like this at all, cause Jack, jack Frost's calling card is 10 times better than it was a special sign for him.
Speaker 2:Well, you'll see, I mean in my version we may. I don't do that as narration. I do that as him talking to his friend and I gave his friend the name and they have a relationship and so on, when they go to eat together and so on. So I really try to eliminate narration when I can, but put those really clever words into some really fun characters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and, and so the main reason we're you know we're doing this for everybody is to excite you about these stories and to read them for yourself. And if you're an Austin, come to Austin Shakespeare. So this is so the fun thing about this story, even though I think it some people say it does take a serious turn. And or a serious background is that all the things that soapy does to try to get imprisoned and of course he fails, which is funny cause he's trying to get. You know, he'll try to eat food in an expensive restaurant. It doesn't work out for him, like all these things he tries to do and it never works out for him. Super simple premise Homeless man wants to get arrested, but what Henry does with it is really put it into this bright world I like the word you're saying buoyant, fun, light and then he'll often put these like little nuggets of great observations about human existence, life, morality, society, Like there's all these little nuggets in there that I think are valuable observations.
Speaker 2:Well, there's an expression in the New York area called you can't even get arrested. You couldn't get arrested, and I don't know if that's from this story where he you know, he hung out in taverns and really tried to talk to people and get a lot of the language of his period. So I wonder if something he picked up by ear.
Speaker 1:Oh, interesting, yeah, and I think so. Henry's life is very interesting too. We could say a quick word, because that is what there's a lot of information about his life. One way to think about him as a writer is just just buy a book, several books or the whole thing that I have that has all 600 stories in it, and just read one, like don't think too much about it, just read it and enjoy the language, the fun, enjoy, like, the, the, the, my asthma, the, my asthma, the twists and turns.
Speaker 1:Your mind will go to try to figure out, even sometimes, what he's saying. Sometimes I'll read something and I'm like I don't know what he's saying, so I have to go back and read it again, like, oh, and it's like there's a awakening thing, and that's that's to me part of the fun of the adventure of reading him. So just go do that. But he did live, live an interesting life and since we're in Austin, I think it's interesting maybe to say a few things. So I mean, for one, what do you know about his background in life? I mean, you've mentioned a couple of things, but do you think, do you think there's anything relevant to his besides the dictionary, his background and the kinds?
Speaker 2:of stories. I mean, he had a very complicated life and you know a lot of people don't think of him as a good man.
Speaker 1:And yet in these, stories.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, he was prosecuted and found guilty for as a clerk in a bank when he worked as a clerk in a bank for stealing money. Now some people think he was framed, but as he was traveling to go to court he got on a train and and left, so it was like he had bail and he scooted and then he went to Honduras and he actually has some stories about that part of the world but hoping that eventually they'd forget his case and he could come back to the States and it wouldn't work. But then his wife got gravely ill and he came back to Austin and he did get arrested and he went to prison and they think that might be how he got. The Ohio Penitentiary was where he wound up and that Henry was an anagram of Ohio Penitentiary is one of the stories.
Speaker 2:Hmm, I actually have a different story in our play, but you'll see.
Speaker 1:Do you know when he like what, how old he was when he went?
Speaker 2:to. He was young, he was like in his early thirties.
Speaker 1:I thought he died in his early thirties.
Speaker 2:I think he dies in his forties. Oh then, then he goes to New York. So, starting to get more stories published. His editor is in New York. Okay, he goes to New York and he absorbs all of these stories and that's part of what happens. So that's why I associated him with New York, because most of his stories are in that and the cop in the anthem is in Madison Square Park.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's a lot. I mean, there's so many good stories in said in New York. I don't remember the one where there's two caught or there's two friends, they leave and they promise to eat. And what's that one? Do you remember that one's called.
Speaker 2:I don't remember the title, but it's like yeah two friends.
Speaker 1:They leave, they are, they separate and they say we'll meet here in 10 years. And then one comes back and they are.
Speaker 1:They come back and I won't say the story, but I think they're very different and then it's you know what are they going to do? I mean it's interesting about him being a good person. I don't know like I can imagine somebody making a really bad decision getting punished for it and still being a good person. I guess I find that an interesting assessment of him. I mean, obviously, embezzling is really wrong and he did the wrong thing.
Speaker 2:Well, we don't know that he really did it.
Speaker 1:If he did it.
Speaker 2:They say that the banks was very, you know, loose the way they kept their books at the time.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But if he wasn't alcoholic, he dies of cirrhosis of the liver because he drinks. Those taberns were a little too pleasant for him. He does marry again after his first wife dies and he's from Greensboro, north Carolina. So there are. His tune is there. His grave is there and on his grave are many coins. Because of a gift of the Magi has deli counting coins, so people leave the amount of coins on his tombstone. This is kind of a flat. So lots of fun stories about O'Hanry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of fun stories about him. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if we're ever going to be able to assess his character fully. I think the relevant detail is what he wrote and to the degree that that was his real soul. I think he's a good person and if he did bad things that's unfortunate and I hope that he didn't do anything too egregious.
Speaker 1:I don't know, but I think the interesting thing, of course, is his stories and the way, because, again, it's not just the virtuosity of his writing, as Ayn Rand puts it, it's not just the pyrotechnical, it's the benevolence, it's the even turning something really sad into something hopeful and joyous, and even has some death in his stories. But there's something still very beautiful, because the reality is that life in life, we do have people we fall in love with who don't love us. We do have death in our lives, we do have to deal with sickness, but I think what O'Hanry shows you is it doesn't always have to be the kind of morose balled up in a corner crying type of sentiment. If you get imprisoned, wrongfully or not, you could still write fun stories about a homeless person who wants to go in prison to get warm, and I think there's something very lovely.
Speaker 2:He loves reality, he loves all those details of reality, you know yeah, it's very concrete.
Speaker 1:The way that he writes it's very specific. I mean, he has a lot of biblical, he has a lot of literary, mythical types of references. You know he loves Adam and Eve and the whole picking of the apple type that's used about a lot of his stories. You see that over and over again. Well, I thought we could end by just the lastly, real quick. I don't know if you had before I said anything again, this is one that I've always loved. I mean something very special to me today because of a special connection, but I'd be curious your thoughts before I said anything on this.
Speaker 2:Well, the curator at the Henry House really pointed this one out and it didn't particularly appeal to me at first and I thought, huh, staging this is going to be really weird. I got to have a girl in a bed. She's got to be looking at this thing, and what is she looking at? So we'll see how it works out, but in the end it is a really beautiful story and it's about art. It really is about art.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's the heart of it, which is, to me, why it's so beautiful. It's about the hope that art can give and the putting of your life into an artwork that inspires and motivates, and sometimes that's all you can do. I'll just say that the premise of the story is to women who become friends. In again, I'm just going to read the first line. I'm just going to say it's just so good, that's great.
Speaker 1:In a little district west of Washington Square, the streets have run crazy and broken themselves into small strips called places. These places make strange angles and curves. One street crosses itself a time or two. An artist wants to discover a valuable possibility in the street. Suppose a collector with a bill of paints, paper and canvas, should it should, in traversing this route, suddenly meet himself coming back without a cent having been paid on account. Now, that's one that like I've read that over and over again and it's a very confusing thing. And I think that last sentence doesn't even make sense really. But there's still an image that he is putting in my head of this is Greenwich Village, right, so to all quaint old Greenwich Village, the art people soon came prowling. That's that whole description is Greenwich Village, and I just thought that was such a great little twists and turns and angles and artists going in and out, and I don't know exactly what he's talking about. But just all the images that come into mind does paint something for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think he means it to be a fantasy, so it's like you meet yourself coming and going. I mean, you know, for me the village is always like getting lost, but it's so fun to get lost in. Those places he talks about are like Washington Square Place, right? Thank you.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, no, there's actual places he's specifically talking about. And so, yeah, you have these two artists, females, that come together, they go in and live together and they love art in the same way. And then right away we get. Mr Pneumonia was not what you would call a chivalric old gentleman. A might of a little woman with blood thinned by California Zephyrs was hardly fair game for the red-fisted, short-breathed old duffer. But Jonesy, he smote. So Jonesy's one of the women. So basically that's his way of saying she got pneumonia.
Speaker 1:And again, I wanted to read as much as I could today because I want you to get a sense of the language. He doesn't just say the thing, and some people have told me like, well, I don't like why can't he just say the thing? But again, that that's not joyous and they're like you could have that in a newspaper. You have that all the time in your life. You don't go to oh Henry to see the thing. You go to oh Henry to see the thing elevated and spun up in this wonderful yarn put by a guy who's able to just spit out some cool language and put something like Mr Pneumonia was not what you call a chivalric old gentleman, but she's not Right.
Speaker 2:Well, and I think the play obviously will make it easier to get into it because it won't have all that. The narration we're doing is much more direct.
Speaker 1:Oh OK.
Speaker 2:You know you'll see it happening, rather than somebody telling you about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't think you could have it like a narration. That would be. I mean, you might as well just listen to an audio book. Obviously, right, you have to to do an adaptation that you're doing. I think you have to try to capture as much of the language and I don't know if this is what you're doing, but it sounds like try to capture as much of the language as you can and then just get it into in front of people through the dialogue of the excitement and getting people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's no narration in the last leaf for me, I think it's all in the dialogue.
Speaker 1:It's all in the dialogue. Ok, are you going to use a projector? Projector for the last leaf itself. Yes, the leaf itself, ok.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so again, this is a very short story. Everybody go read it. Go read about Mr Berman and Sue and Jonesy and the doctor and this.
Speaker 2:And let us know in comments if you, if you did any of this, and maybe Kirk, could you give them a few titles in the description? Yeah, I'll send all the title recommended.
Speaker 1:Oh, Henry, not recommended, but the ones that you're going to be doing yeah, and I'll add a couple more Sure, by the way, pimienta, pimienta, pimienta pancakes.
Speaker 2:Pimienta.
Speaker 1:Yeah, pimienta pancakes. I've never read this.
Speaker 2:It's in Panama and I thought it was like Pimento, because, you know, when I came to Austin, I learned Pimento cheese sandwich, but no, it's Pimienta.
Speaker 1:I had never read that one. That one was a lot of fun. Good, yeah, I mean. The ransom of Red Chief is another amazing one. That one's so much fun. I definitely recommend that, especially if you have kids. You'll definitely love that. I read that when I was teaching at La Porte, so I was a teacher. I don't have kids Wow. But I read that one for that.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the Princess and the Puma wonderful ones. That one's you're not doing, but it's another one I love as well. So any last thoughts on oh Henry, that you want to leave people with of whether you've read it.
Speaker 2:Well, again, I think it's about you know, putting that searchlight on stuff that is getting lost. I feel like what's happening to all this and reading it to your kids. You know they could get a lot more out of it than you would think, and you'll definitely get a lot out of it from reading.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll just say on that note that I tell this to as a former teacher I tell this to parents all the time that oftentimes reading to your kids is not about them actually understanding every single word, and every second, it's one about them.
Speaker 1:seeing you read is as a big thing and having that connection with them. But it's also the joy and the pleasure and the fun of the words and the sounds, which is why I recommend poetry and I think, oh, henry is another great one. It doesn't matter if they understand what's going on, if you can get into the story, if you can read to them and get excited and exhilarated. And you know, bring up the, you know the different ways that they, that Henry is playing around with these words. Her old man, dugan, spent his time sitting in a rocking chair memorializing the great corn crop failure of 1896. Just even that. Just have some fun, you know, and just enjoy that. And I think that's a great family exercise that will have your kids fall in love with the sound of language, which is pivotal for them, later grasping deeper ideas about in language and their own consciousness.
Speaker 2:I think Well, thanks for doing this show, and I wanted to compliment you on going out to the park and reading poetry with a group of people. That's great.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, yeah, so 2024 is going to be a year of literature, although they're all like that, but I definitely want to increase it. So, thank you, and everybody, if you're in Austin, go. What are the dates? February 16 to 25, 16 to 25. This is 2024 when we're recording. That's of your past, the 16th when you see this. Sorry, okay and well, thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thank you, thanks for doing it.