An hour with Kevin Willmott and Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg

lawrence filmmaker and university of kansas professor kevin will not received an oscar nomination this week i'm kate mcintyre and today on k pr prisons will visit with kevin willmott about like a klansman which is up for six academy awards including best motion picture of the year best director and best adapted screenplay in just a minute we'll hear my conversation with kevin walmart from the movie's release last year but first sam zeff of kcur caught up with kevin will not just after the news broke that he'd been nominated for best adapted screenplay you know you no stranger to stars or accolades but how was an oscar nomination different you know when you are you're kidding you watch those shows and i remember watching that what the mother is going to appeal to you that is about you know all the fur of you know and when you're interested in movies a year

lawrence balaban on panama but it all the people that helped me to make my movie for the economy to recover surf your career oh my career might go out because we're going to do we're going to know what it's going beyond more than anything and maybe have to look at look you're a guy who left hollywood to do what you wanted to do didn't make your films the way you wanted to make them and now you're just smack dab in the middle of the park they would of this hardwood mania right i mean with all the stuff that goes with that the promotion and you know how the three or four day oscar extravaganza whatever

happens what's it like to go back and they're in into the military well you know who knew all the money and then i never expected to be years and if i if i want to be your it would never have yours if workload and america played by your dream come true and just finally enjoy it as in your quota home i'm really where the part of the home and it's a really important moment in time that report by a focus on the oklahoman we'll kind you know he calls i i want to get toppled and more about what you just said about their y black klansman is important for this time why is unimportant for this time

the country's in trouble and not in the flesh will require was really proud that the film really kind of address that and i think when we go back and we look at that period huge amount will please we're like where i've been and will be even more shocked than we are now banned just like i'm english we filmed be going on during the mccarthy euro or a great film through an important film to ooh ooh ooh you're going to learn i want you do enjoy the us were experiencing entity that for me go on that's lawrence

filmmaker kevin welna speaking with kcur is sam's that will my head just received word that he'd been nominated for an oscar award for best adapted screenplay for his latest film the black klansmen i spoke to kevin walmart in august two thousand a team when the black lamps came out in theaters kevin it's great to see you again great uk always good and it's based on the true story of ron stallworth the first black policemen in colorado springs to us back to nineteen seventy nine and it's incredible story well he's kind of an average cow a job you know a nice guy a young very young your roles a conservative in terms of what was going to the seventies and on he sees an ad for a real policeman in colorado springs and so he applies in any behind and he's the first black guy they're undone the farm is a little you know it's a you know there's a reason why there have

been some like four am and so he you know they and he knew he was going to walk into some things and any quickly to he kind of goes undercover man deeply million to cover thing and and his job was really to tom archer although radical groups in the area and it was the seventies so while radical groups koran and size of it in a newspaper and he sees an ad for the car it feels like you're looking for members kkk called this number an answer because he's young and he's a rookie year he discovered calls a number uses israel named ron stallworth and they follow similar phone and eventually they say may you gonna come and join in and of course that's a problem at so us so they end up kind of creating a to run stores due to rule was sort of blackwell's stories and integrate a white

were ron stork that will go into treatment so so black run stores on the form continuing his relationship on for the clam and then what ron stallworth who infiltrated not been an nfl he's actually jewish as well so it complicates things i'm guessing that there's some irony here that he's he's asked infiltrate these radical groups but i'm guessing that they were assuming that he was with me infiltrating like student radicals and protest on campuses or not the ku klux klan and yet then the thinnest back his first assignment is is maybe having to have to go to a meeting with the stokely carmichael and in any any pew finds out he's changed into quote literary and so that was kind of you know for what they thought he would be doing and then he gets into this clamping and it can always ups and some big errors the medley by klansmen is based on ron stallworth says two thousand fourteen memoir while some of the challenges of bringing his story to the big screen

well there's a lot of great stuff in the borderline stories really skills two crazy to be true kind of thing and so we we pull all that stuff out and then what does mike and i usually do is we go back and we researched her what was going on during that period as well and so as we learn that the iroquois a major update in a chase day mcqueary teresa carmichael have their time and elsie this kind of eternal look for all the really good stuff that's happening in the whole world at that time and and pull from and then of course you know you always have to make a few things out because it's a movie but there was a lot of great stuff there and so they gave us a you know a nice kind of signpost or that we could follow were you familiar with his story before you know i actually i've heard about it i think i've seen the book so that echoing at the fed read something about it but i didn't know the specifics about you a curse me that

unlike some of her other movies like csa confederate states of america which is a satirical but that purity fictitious or a documentary like your recent film about william allen white had that this story has it's got it's fictitious mom is because of the film but it's based on a true story does that poses and so the challenge is will you know it i think the narrative film and in you really have to make a lot of stuff up an end and but you know you you make it based in the reality or what the story really our fridge so in that sense it's not it's not like you know you just you know are literally pulling things from anywhere you know it's if you follow the controlling idea of the film and actually idea the film is up there to run stores and npr that in the end and they're infiltrated this clan n ends so the two ron stalwarts you know was a really interesting thing to kind of explore and kind

of we kind of expanded that concept in the film selma and anna's will spike so from very beginning it did would be a period piece so he wanted to be very contemporary and so we're always looking for things that really linked it to today in various ways an unfortunate week we follow the film the black and then opens in theaters on august ten to me about the significance of that date well despite wanted to connect to our the charlottesville you know the ensign affair or wherever i was was killed and you know it that we connected in the film was well i won't give anything away but there's a connection to the film as well and it's just watching all that that these groups are are are still real and they have support now from the white house in various ways and and they're finding their voice again i mean there is this kind of been several clans in the country you know the one that

started after the earth the nation and the one that started before that with the after the civil war in and you could argue that there's kind of a new rebirth now going on and so i think the film is a program that you know is it really works in addressing that issue kevin willmott is my guest today for keep your prisons were talking about his latest film the black klansmen directed by spike lee a couple of clips from the black klansmen kenya set this first one up for me yeah so that clip what's happening in the film of that moment is that the investigation has started and i flip the jewish white cop who is do you use the white ron stallworth an indian the real ron stallworth the black run store are having this kind of you know argument about the investigation and and flip as just had a gun pulled on him an end and to really kind of debating you know flip doesn't think that it's worthy

of all this danger that they're putting themselves that he's putting himself in for some guys are just burning crosses and so forth and an end one of the issues that the film deals with is is passing an end that did that you know ron confronts him with a conference live with the fact that he's passing his passing as the anglo saxon white protestant and so that's going to cut deals with that lesson away from pulling the trigger and he did it really could have been i would've been dead for what i'm in my life to someone that's from a couple succeed for this is the job of the problem that problem for you which a crusade for me it's a job it's a personal issue today while jawad and this why should i because you're jewish brother the soul called chosen people in passing for a wasp white anglo saxon protestant cherry pie high doughboy we saw some lesson what forced to a pass for white

doesn't hate you didn't hear the klan so does the tissue off course there was no one like to like investing in the game that might miss thomas i'm gonna get your membership card say can go the cross burning can get any deeper with these guys thank you so so one of the cool things in the film is that flip is jewish and he's kind of buried his us self an end you know the klan is maybe more anti semitic and even as anti black bass and either kill us but they hate jews were deo end the un they have a day have a debate about this anymore we are wrong confronts flip about that is passing and that ended during a course the film you know flip has to kind of come to terms with this

lead yourself that he's that he's had since he was a kid that's kind of fallen away and buried him and now he's hearing all these anti semitic things are regular basis coming amount of these guys he's investigating an e astor finally confront a lot of the buddy cop movies out there where you have a black cop paired with a white cop who is black klansmen fit into were challenged that will it's not about a couple from a night in close and and i don't think you get a sense of that or all media it there two cops but you know we deal with that the emphasis is not on the procedural cop stuff i mean we have a little bit of that film just kind of moved forward but the emphasis is really on exploring hate and for treating hate and kind of you know how how i hate you know how it challenges all of us

in various ways many challenges wrong in certain ways and challenges flip in certain ways and challenges of the characters in the film as well and so that's really what the movie's about i think it's it's it's more exploration of nbc evening kind of crazy situation that they we haven't feel it's an exploration of a really kind of how it works in america you said as a perfectly for our second clip and this is one way air and flip is that the klan meeting today we are privileged to be among white men white women such as yourselves in real warriors for the real america the american ancestors fought and died for the true white american race the battle from whence came our great southern heritage oh i thank you

for thank you so much for never putting your country second america first america first kevin talk about well because senior well so so what the clip code these shows is a moment in the film where we're flipping is initiated into the klan it's a big ceremony and then issuing new members into the klan and arm oh one of the great things we have in the film is harry belafonte and harry belafonte is in the film and for me was there's like a huge the audience is like a huge thing for me because you know as a kid the audiences are huge mr bolton and inspiration and end any he we're cut that the klan

initiation with that with her book on tape and he is telling the struggle and shame that he saw when he was a young man and we heard areas ninety one know and so you i would give too much away but there's an actual lynching that we use in the film that he talks about and it cuts back and forth and it's it's a very very powerful kind of moment in the film and it let's you know kind of you know what does what the stakes really aren't all of this and how how it functioned and american mean in some ways you could even argue how how still functions you know especially after charlottesville and so anyway it's a it's a really kind of very powerful moment one of the things that struck me about that clip is david duke is referring to are white southern heritage and yet this film takes place in colorado yeah the thing that is important for americans to remember is that america was founded in the self virginia you

know the carolinas you know duty that's that's where washington jefferson and all those guys are and it's not it's not founded in new york or i will or kim says he helped or new jersey at me as valid it's fun and in the south an end and that's why slavery was held on to you know that through the country was founded because all the founders are also it's really and they had a southern point of view and so their clan and the nazis in those groups they they go they used that part of the american story to really kind of identify with and so they they love the whole southern american kind of heritage thing and i celebrate the atlantic about the confederate flag is so important to them and that's you know i mean we dont think of them get washingtonian jobs into southerners but they are settlers and they had a certain point you to a large

degree and the solo that's one of our media the black lantern opens august tenth but it's gotten a tremendous amount of critical acclaim already premiered at the cannes film festival in may it where was nominated for the palme d'or and it won the grand prix can tell me about that experience while those low when they do you know we have about a ten minute standing ovation in and unload the debate is really beautiful and you know it was very very very moving to me and i've never experienced anything like that and was the first time in france the first time again you know and then to have that responsible assisted israel in unity feel very fortunate to be part of it was just incredibly powerful an annual is one of those things that that i like to

you know try to say that you know i'm from kansas and i still live in kansas and i never went to new york or la to live and an alicia know you know new dreams can come true wherever you live and if you said kennedy had to keep working to to me it was they were saying how concerned that world with america it was a message he was sending with that that the world knows that america is in trouble right now and they're very concerned you know i think of our film as kind of like a high noon you know that village really by mccarthyism in a loin and the invasion of the body snatchers tells about mccarthyism mean there's a lot of movies that he's a pretty and kind of you know it's the movies about this but actually it's about that also you know anne and i think our film is kind of turning into an the last time you were out like a purist at as it is to talk about a documentary you had done about

william allen white the famed editor of the emporia does that youre here today talking about your latest film a black klansmen the common thread between those two films the kkk right yeah and and you know it's funny because i know that we talked about as a little bit i didn't really can make the connection between the two of them i mean you know the time basis i work on them or were different you know i was working on building the same time occasionally but but you know you kind of you know you they overlap and all of that and but you know it was it was kind of get to know it all fed into each other in a lot ways and there are things that that i learned from the wee mel white documentary that are in black and you know specifically the american first kind of stuff that that was the the klan smart on a nineteen twenties and is now a new motto pretty ministration we have now the country and so so you

know you couldn't help but kind of those connections and then we have a lot of fun with them feel end and you can see you know the thing that white was concerned about we can talk about that in the film when one thing when you know i worked on the script i was reminded when i was the president a student body of merrimack college and those uncertainties and and i go in and david duke and the letter will you know you know i was one of those letters he sent everybody you know on and on you know every scene by pressing is one is let's not just in the country then was a big form letter but it was his organization was the innate day bp the national association of investor white people and this was when he was making a transition from both taking the hood off in the end the sheet and putting on a three piece suit and becoming a politician and and

that's the area we deal with in the film it's that's the transition david duke is a character film played by tova grace and is a great job of just really nails and n n n word dealing with their transition between from from really where the klan is a hate group out here using violently cairo speech and all that too more political talking points and to talk about immigration and production and crime and taxes and they are interested in those kind of things in and they wanted to become mainstream and i think you could even argue now that they have become mainstream that that they've they've introduced their talking points into into regular political world and that was that was really a success for forty to do because he was talking about that when i got that letter many years ago and singing an outlier he is making the assumption that you're like of course of course

doesn't sound like rock n roll star or you know in you know and he wouldn't he didn't he would have cared if i was black leaders wanted to get out you know get the message out that he wanted someone to bring him to campus and put him up in and letting talk and now and that's where you can parallel here that you just touched on with william allen white that his concern back in his day they were wearing the hoods but it was also i was that necessarily mainstream it has alarmed was that these were a businessman and people that he knew in emporium throughout kansas very much you know he was prophetic in essence are you saying hey you know you know we don't identify the stuff now and the way that we need to identify this thing will become normalized more and more moral become just an accepted part of our society and that's caught one of things we're fighting

it kevin well that's my guest today on keep your prisons were talking about his latest film the black klansmen when a third clip from the film where ryan meets the president of the black student union you know that this one up for me yes so this is an early film and he is undercover and he's undercover to really kind of infiltrated the black student in a colorado college and a broad sloppy carmichael and he's changed and kwame terrain at this point and an independent and ron eventually kind of falls for countries who has to present the student union and so that's a kind of romantic but the principal says he's out

as a president as an adviser to the president and there's no you know we really have a lot of fun with decreases character because she's kind of based on angela davis and kathleen cleaver them and those militant kind of old school black women of the movement at that time and in you know the whole thing of old calling greece pigs back then you know we do about a bit and it's a it's a you know it i think it's still very contemporary the whole thing of

you know you could easily kind of you know dismiss the police as all bad because of the the events that happened you know we were the innocent unarmed people being killed the issues that black lives matter is you're dealing with but you know we all know there are great policemen as well an end and so that struggle we kind of support there are the romantic relationship so there is a romance their glorious and there's a great scene in the trailer for the black klansmen it's only maybe four or five seconds long run start is walking toward the police station i'm guessing maybe it's his first day on the job and he pauses for a moment taps his hair jane platt afro good intent and nods to himself later i look good i got this report it and so so badly days when we're all we froze

you know if you knew you had to keep and raul mean the whole you know you did you want to get raul to me if it was they got a lopsided or you know whatever that was always a really ben think so so he always as pat view from a bit and so it actually i think that that you know we in the phillies can i pet his fro because as a family going as you were shoddy year and you know he's got a weed ecologist from its that what's run stallworth up to now i've got a normal orbit and now he's a great guy i think he's retired now and really enjoying this whole ride with his book in the field in many of you did something really brave really special and really just loses weight and yet i understand that he didn't talk about his role in this investigation for decades would like i told him not to they kind of they kind of wanted to put away and that's

you know that's one of the most typical during that period is that you know he would return or infielders other side of american life even in police work or other things and an mp would you know the authorities see in elite is political leaders and so forth we just have one output over the table and i get an end and so we thought what that the field but that's so that's you know i think that's more years i think i need to talk about this this is something that was really important in his life and every time you came came out with that kevin and your films you've dealt with racial injustice gun violence you've done biting satire documentaries alternative history late romantic i mean that would do that you know i would do that if i have something to say about that you

know i mean you know i i have i have cameramen so i've written you know years ago that of course is got close old stuff and problems and all the icons of go away to do both but in any any john will you use to kind of you know express the things that you want express it as it is as a matter of is the story of the canister it really provided an opening to do that and you know romance of romantic comedy to do that i mean the thing about the thing about romantic comedy our age i mean you know there's like this is cleaners are humor and they're still is very funny is very entertaining but there are no jokes in the movie you know ann and that's that's kind of this thing that that that i die do more than anything is that my humor has to come out of that ugliness and the seriousness and the drama all of situations and ineffective fire romantic comedy that i could do that i would i would i would do

that at at at and we've had are really busy year with this film and in a series of the critically acclaimed film i'm just curious because you often have many bold in the air at a time how do you keep everything straight were you know sometimes sort of the you know i think you know yeah you know like i would turn to keep that separate parts of my head you know usually i'd be almost are at the same time so so that helps a lot you know and and you know you just you know scanner unity to finish of a legal right to the other and sometimes you were you know both at the same time occasionally it does have a lot but occasionally have to divert any nba really it's it makes you just a better writer i think every new this week in japan so sharper and i just it's so challenging at times you know it's two hours before kevin you teach at

the university of kansas as well as your filmmaking career what do you try to teach your students about doing film or your own work well actually i think the thing that i say overall more than anything probably is mp was all about write what you know and that's very true but has also write which you believe that an end in and that's m e r and it really kind of toll we set out to do that but that's kind of what i believe that doing really an end so you can to develop of philosophy of theology and a point of view you know three arriving and any kind of use of guiding you and contracting un and you can become known for that you know and i think it's i think it's a not a bad thing to become known for some type of writing you know it's like he does this really well you know and most of the opportunities i've got no excuse to come out

of the stuff i wish doing because i believed in that i wanted to do that i cared about and an ennis into the campaign although it really set out to do that only but doesn't it up that way and i don't think that's a bad thing i think you know you should cause tree on the thing that you do best and maybe that you care about the lost wise words kevin thanks so much for coming in today always good to think you we got more keep your presents coming up right after this from the university of kansas this is kansas public radio ninety one by florence and ninety point three senate support for k pr percent and kansas public radio comes from downtown lawrence and local restaurants posting restaurant week to celebrate diverse dining options in downtown lawrence with special menus through january twenty six more at warren's restaurant week dot com whether you're

passionate for unbiased in depth news beautiful music are fascinating conversations you can feel that passion right here on kansas public radio show your passion for k pr and the programs that feed your mind and news that matters gift now at kansas public radio dot org slash support and thanks karen miriam goldberg is the author of numerous books and a frequent guest on k pr presents her latest novel is miriam as well a modern day activists it is always great to see you karen oh it's so wonderful to be here carrie thanks for all you do with this amazing show before we talk about your work mariam let's back thousands of years to the story of miriam the older sister of moses many of us know that she was instrumental in helping hide moses and the bull rushes in helping save

him but many may be unfamiliar with the story of marion's well absolutely we know that maryam when it was decreed that all jewish boys would be killed put her little baby brother in a basket and sailed him down to his next home and cheek may have kept her eyes on him for many years to come and i owe i believe she was very involved in just the grassroots organizing of the exodus but any old testament she's referred to several times one is with miriam as well it's sad that were ever the wandering jew slanted in there forty years looking for a home she did some type of cosmic magic trick with a stone and made a well a puritan went so well was there and people could water their animals grow crops so it literally felt them the other thing she's known for in a hebrew prayer called them me come out is leading the women

singing and dancing read the desert for forty years so it's no surprise that my fictional mariam cooks banks and she can sing like nobody's business let's jump ahead to nineteen sixty five your mariam the protagonist of marion's well her story opens in brooklyn of nineteen sixty five is a quick overview of her story miriam was born and grew up in a small section of brooklyn called flatbush very much a neighborhood in so many cities especially more than others or just collections of neighborhoods and she grew up in a jewish family but her father was african american and her mother was white her mother was also and we learn this very early in the novel really afraid to leave her home very much we can recall her agoraphobia now we certainly would and miriam has a younger

brother aaron and very soon into the novel her mother is pregnant and we can guess what that baby's name her story it will take her all across the united states and in fact well all across the world and millions well you know way reminded me a little bit of forrest gump in a way the main character happens to be at crucial places at key points in american history susan york city during the blackout of nineteen sixty five in berkeley during the nineteen sixties new orleans during hurricane katrina and new york city on september eleventh two thousand one talking about her journey answer of what you were trying to encompass as you have her travel around the united states i describe this book sometimes as forrest gump meets the rent and miriam just happens to be every place where not everyplace but many

places were something really major historic is happening whether a terrible tragedies such as the aids epidemic in san francisco or even some little whimsical historical no such as the keys succeed seceding from florida in a whimsical way in the nineteen eighties course five minutes later they applied for foreign aid so she keeps showing up at these places but it's not like she's aiming herself specifically for these places her motivation throughout the book is to follow her very strong purpose she knows she's supposed to go someplace off and she doesn't know why or she knows she supposed to leave a place she knows that her role in life is to help people and to just drop everything and really be there in any way that she can but she's also very much a wonder where she's looking

for home she struggles a lot with not having a clear sense of her people and of her place all that said i did have all kinds of outrageously bad drawings of maps with lines and charts in all kinds of ways to try to keep track of where she might end up mr lande and i also made it my business to have her go places where if i hadn't been i would just have to make a special trip while i was drafting the book to get a deeper sense of so that i could write about each place with greater authenticity so you did some research on the road for this book i certainly didn't i also read a big pile of books about historic events and key testimonies oral histories out everything from the oklahoma city bombing two people who witnessed though whittier narrows earthquake in la and other places where she's been like a biblical marianne

you were miriam in marion swell and they share the gift of prophecy an effect that the biblical marin has been often called the first woman prophet absolutely what this your miriam do with that get a time and putting gift in air quotes because if you think she's she's not really sure what she's supposed to do with it she definitely struggles and at one point she's talking to an older lakota woman who also has the same deft and she says this is a curse to have a glimpse of what's going to happen or just have a sense something awful sterling to happen without knowing why and the woman she's talking to says never curse always against always a blessing but it's very difficult to know what to do with that and i think for anybody who has those channels open in them in this culture it's painful difficult awkward at best and sometimes excruciating at worst i mean to have nightmares that

eventual e makes sense as giving you some glimpse that nine eleven it's going to happen is something extremely hard to live with and so from myriam a lot of times what comes to her plays out more in what seems like her instinct she knows she has to be a certain place or she hears about something that has happened somewhere and off she goes there's also time she tries to get away from any possibility of putting yourself in close proximity to a very difficult and difficult historic advance or natural disasters because it's too painful but ultimately she's led to where she can be of service and from a very young age she has such a strong drive to help people in ways that don't always make sense to people around here and readers will quickly find out how she

played hooky to work in a soup kitchen making outrageously delicious soups and belting out motown songs for other people who came through as you just mentioned and there's a lot of tension in this book between her desire to seek adventure and her trying to find a home and there's a quote in this book that i love that she had left place after place with the ease of the next adventures thrill calling her and yet there's this sense of wear where do i belong and now and we're like where are my people absolutely and leaving places with such ease as she does in her twenties and thirties gets much harder when she gets to be in their forties and fifties and she doesn't then surely sort of kind of subtle someplace and what she also

finds is a strong sense of who her people are and as readers move through the book they'll see how that comes together and at one point somebody toward the end of the book tells her that she has made her own people she has coalesced around her i'm very intrigued generational mall tae ethnic very diverse group of people part of the tension that she experiences also plays out in one of my favorite relationships in the book and that's between her and her brother aron and erin is a brilliant boy genius in let's just say he makes it very quickly and come at a very young age in the corporate world and is doing very well and is living the american dream and it drives him to it drives him crazy in a thousand different ways that he can get his sister to come back and settle down and so by the end of

the book they come to understand each other much better but i love how that relationship unfolds as a place where both of them are also working with each other to see come to some kind of healing from some family dramas that happened early in the novel and as much as he doesn't understand her journey she doesn't really understand that his motivations answer of what keeps him grounded in corporate america it's very hard for her and to stand and to play some of the places she lives are really beyond what we hardly ever see in the mainstream i mean she lives in an eco village you know at one point she lives in key west right on the edge of the country she eventually lives in an island off the coast of maine she lives in so many places where the common joke is oh canada leave this place and go america and i'll be right back even though

these are places in america and some right in the middle of such as extreme west texas which has its own sense of bean that's very different from wayne what we might see yet when we look at the news or magazines she continually finds herself drawn to you places where it's kind of difficult to reconcile what the essence of that place and the communities they're have to do with some of the bigger and more mainstream views of america and in many ways because this is a book about history and because this is a book about mythology the big stories we tell ourselves about who we are and how we are to live and what it means to be alive than what it means to be part of the community where miriam gun shows us many different myths in america many different big over stories that unfold for us of

propriety of visions of how people can make a life of meaning miriam stern he brings her to kansas but only briefly to lawrence where she says the rents are too high and the wind is to strike with lawrence for thirty five years why is that so little of her story in a place that you call home well that was hard for me i really wanted her to live in kansas and especially lawrence which to me is the center of the universe you know i always joke that the first rule of living in lawrence's don't leave the second rule is if you leave you have to come back but this just isn't who she is and as i've followed the character and where the character was kind of tagging each word i just saw that for a variety of reasons that probably neither she nor i can even articulate it just wasn't her place but she does have a connection in western kansas which people will find

out about and that also opens her eyes and some new ways and we can tell readers she kind of ends up in the middle of the country somewhere like i it's no small coincidence that you and your protagonists share and name her as being her first name in the your name being parents miriam colbert this work ethics in bed what's the relationship between you and miriam of marion's well will my hebrew name is miriam and i went through a time in my early twenties when i was kind of more distant with my father for various reasons that i stopped using goldberg and i went by karen miriam and then i realized the time i got into my mid twenties with a lot of us realize you can't run away from who you are son hyphenated my own name which made it very confusing and by the time i got married it was i just wasn't going to add another name allen but i always was very grateful that my hebrew name was

miriam and even though i was named after eid great grandfather i never met who seemed to be a bit of a despicable character his name began with the letter m so i was named mariam asper the jewish tradition up it felt a great resonance with her that she had kept the women singing and dancing that she helped people find spirit and in hebrew what we call throughout are you a page you know this sense of being alive of the joy and vitality of being here right now and to make art out of it so i figured it's set it's a great hebrew name for a writer anybody he makes art it's something to aspire to and at the same time i mean is really different for me i'm somebody he's a pretty darned territorial i love my community i love my house you know i it's difficult for me to not sleep in my own bed i have to be where i

am and i'm extremely tied to community and to make people and i'm very blessed to have enabled to have my people my place in my purpose all together but many of us struggle in it in one or more of those areas and she's somebody who because of how her life started out maybe because serve her life path for karma maybe because serve certain things that happened to her and her family and history of ancestry or a million other factors has extremely different life lessons than me i also can't really sing all that well and while i concurred i'm terrible at baking because i don't like to follow directions says she's as i said she is a different character and i will say that a lot of my writing my first novel the divorce carol included is very autobiographical but this novel not so much trying to get you to read something from your hands wash your hands

singing there's a light possibility is that in you know read one short scene at one point when miriam is in san francisco cooking baking and helping care for people living in a hospice i am a hospice runs out of starts to run out of money and they need to figure out something quick to do and she's doing this hospice with them a man who owns it named brother tom used to be known as thomas the beast in his wilder days and they decide that they're going to do a giant arts parade as a way to raise money and this was autobiographical because i organized an arts parade of cash twenty five years ago as part of harvest of the arts it was a lot of fun it was so much work i've never sensed it but it gave me a lot of ideas so they did this arts parade leading up to a

banquet and here is the scene two days later miriam was spreading sun dried tomatoes spread on aig or a plant debt bun toasted baguette slices they could hear the music outside getting closer the marching band that had come together surprisingly quickly called brother times brothers and sisters of mothers with their trumpets violins flutes drums and even big parts to hit with spoons as they played one song louie louie everyone in the kitchen stopped and raced outside to watch the approaching parade now they were moving toward the den or jugglers and minds shakespearean actors performing richard the third and a dance troupe of the man who wore tight black leotards and black berets and called themselves the existentialist as they marched in the shape of a question mark and called out where are the children some of the sisters of

perpetual indulgence that was a real group in san francisco tossed condoms to the crowd and several members of the local opera company belted at carmen a good distance away from a group of zen buddhist marching poets who take turns calling out phrases such as sun and leaf miriam was part of the flowing summer various parts her daughter was being pushed in her stroller down the street my brother tom's cousin jack at the back of the parade in front of two elephants lend to them by an exotic animal farm in arizona miriam and all the other kitchen volunteers sang along applauded and even cried at the totality of what all especially when they saw the nine muses each a drag queen who did herself up and silk and tovia some floral garlands while riding an anti convertibles or miriam could think about was how perfect this moment was even if it happened in a sea of pain but last singers a

gordon macrae impersonator riding bare back behind a drag queen shirley jones belted out oh what a beautiful morning miriam couldn't help but join in the dinner was a success and bybee and brother tom had enough money to carry the hospice another year pinch butts not pennies became the slogan miriam and brother tom tossed back and forth from then on this is a very different scene than this is just a scene about driving an it happens when miriam as living in extreme west texas and hears about the oklahoma city bombing and it's just one small moment and as somebody who is biracial she continually encounters people who and project onto her what they think she is and she passes as why some people think she's latino and some people think

otherwise and here she was driving like a fiend you know hours and hours and hours she's just she just has to do it let's just say she's married at the time and the person she's married to is not happy about the us and she's also in the middle of menopause oklahoma city oklahoma april nineteen ninety five marion's urgency anger toward her husband and heat induced hot flashes filled a long drive with so much tension that by the time she stopped to fill the gas tank her right shoulder was frozen yet she was amazed to see that in her fury she had driven over three hundred and forty miles and ninety miles an hour she rushed into the quick shop picked up a gallon of cold water and started drinking it right away and the store she remembered she had every fast and her bra before heading to the counter the water into a large chocolate bars she told herself a person needs to do whatever it

takes in such circumstances and you realize she also needed directions the clerk a young man from india unfolded a map of texas and oklahoma its about three hundred miles from here but drive a little slower when she get to america he said blinking out her it was a common joke that texas was its own country how many hours she was thrilled to be in air conditioning i think you could do it in three and a half you have someone marry one c is okay she shook her head i just want to help he reached over to the shelf and handed her a brand new map looked at her face then handed her a large bag of potato chips and a thick beef jerky take it all no money thank you so much miriam said starting to cry no problem my sister you from india to she shook her head you could be my sister he said smiling into her face she took his hand and squeezed it then headed out with her treasures so i showed that because it's just a little moment like a little beat him up and the whole song

her driving somewhere and meeting somebody and making a friend out of a stranger karen and it's always such a pleasure to have you here thanks so much for coming in the community so much for doing this and also for lifting up the writers all over the region we really appreciate you thank you karen miriam goldberg is a former poet laureate of kansas her latest book is miriam swell a modern day exodus kbr has a copy of marion's well to give away if you like a chance to win a copy leave a comment on k pr as facebook page i'm kate mcintyre k pr present is a production of kansas public radio at the university of kansas says physician patients