WHAT'S FUNNY TO ME is how most New Yorkers don't realize what they have in Curtis Sliwa. A legitimate American folk hero, like Davy Crockett, Buffalo Bill, and Woody Guthrie. Someone from the people and of the people, about whom myriad tales have been told, some true, others maybe not. The Kris Kristofferson quote: "part fact, part fiction, a walking contradiction." He even survived a "hit" from the mob!
Missing from conversation about this year's New York City mayoral election is any appreciation for, or acknowledgement of, those who operate outside accepted channels. DIYers who color outside the lines. Uncredentialed, uncertified, unregulated. Yet this is where the authentic voice of America is always to be found, via those who've seen this society from every possible angle; upside down and sideways.
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In the literary realm, the authors who've interested me are those who wrote beneath or outside official channels, because that's where you'll find the raw unpolished reality of this madly chaotic country. Expat Robert McAlmon for instance, escaping from cowboy country into the Lost Generation of the 1920's. Aben Kandel, writing about the flood of immigrants into New York City in the early decades of the 20th century-- or writing about gamblers in early 1960's Las Vegas-- in-between crafting screenplays for low-budget direct-to-drive-ins monster movies. Or perhaps the rawest voice of them all, Erskine Caldwell, whose rough, often brutal, sometimes hilarious stories from the underclasses of the Deep South during the Great Depression were banned far and wide. Not just from libraries! These three men are definitely not in today's literary canon-- which is why people should read them.
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In a true democracy, the nation's underclasses must get a voice of their own once in a while. Shouldn't they?
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