Cheetah, Tarzan’s chimpanzee sidekick, died today at the age of 80. Yes, it’s remarkable that a chimp could live to be that old. But more remarkable is Cheetah’s legacy. Bear with me. Cheetah was the first famous friendly ape. He introduced generations of children to the notion that 1) animals can be our allies, 2) our primate cousins are bright and should be given some consideration, even respect, and 3) we can love a creature that isn’t quite human and isn’t quite animal. In many respects, Cheetah was one step away from ET and R2-D2.


We Baby Boomers grew up watching Tarzan movies on Saturday morning TV. When we played “Tarzan” in our back yards, many of us took the role of Cheetah and channeled the wild, monkey-smart side of our selves. This helped us become more empathetic. It made many of us into animal lovers. Ultimately, playing Cheetah embued some of us with the kind of humane optimism and feeling that gave rise to PETA and other animal rescue societies. If most people today find chimps and their brethren cute, Cheetah — and his many successors in film — was instrumental in shaping their perception.


It wasn’t always so. With the discovery of the “new world” in the early days of exploration (1500-1700s), monkeys fascinated Westerners, who brought them back as curios. But the great apes, like chimps and orangutans, were always considered suspect. Edgar Allan Poe’s short story, “Murders in the Rue Morgue” (1841), features a killer orangutan, for instance. Never mind that you would be hard-pressed to rouse the ire of any orangutan (a thoroughly peaceable tribe), unless, say, you stole its banana. When white explorers disovered gorillas in “darkest Africa,” in 1847, these apes were considered to be man-killers, based solely on their fierce appearance. It is but a short hop from this early perception to the 1933’s film King Kong, the sad tale of a giant ape taken captive and ill-used by Westerners.


As sympathetic as King Kong was to the great ape, the movie nonetheless perpetuated the myth that apes are killers — a myth that movie makers exploited fully in a spate of killer-gorilla films of the 1940s and 50s, like White Pongo (1945) and Bride of the Gorilla (1951 — starring Raymond Burr of “Perry Mason” fame). Cheetah’s kind and humorous example stood in opposition to all of this. Cheetah often saved the day, braving great danger (lions!) to carry his message home. Cheetah was always good for a smile and a friendly pat of your hand.


It is rumored that, in real life, Cheetah was something of an asshole. So it is, and has been, with many Hollywood stars. It is rumored too that this incredibly long-lived chimp was not the real Cheetah. No matter. Whether this now-dead chimp was the true Cheetah or a pretender, we acknowledge today that Cheetah is gone. In doing so, we acknowledge that Cheetah made a different, helping us humans think more kindly of our extended primate family and, in turn, of all creatures who, from distance, look not quite like us.

Related posts

• No related posts.

If you haven’t heard of book trailers, that’s understandable. They’re something new and, so far, untested. But they appear to be growing in popularity. Book trailers are like movie trailers, except they’re for books. You may wonder why anyone would produce a trailer for a book because, at first glance, it doesn’t make sense: a video that promotes a text? A movie trailer, on the other hand, make sense because it’s simply an extension of the movie: excerpts from the film itself. But there’s no rule that says a certain medium, like text, must confine its advertising to that same medium. So, video trailers are to books what audio (radio) trailers are to movies or print ads are to music albums. At bottom, the book trailer is an indication of how we’re mixing media to good effect these days.

I made an animated trailer for my illustrated novel, Kiss Me, Stranger, because a trailer made sense — it brings the book alive and puts the story in front of readers in a very direct and (I hope) intriguing way: Kiss Me Stranger trailer. Think of the book trailer as a pitch to prospective readers. It’s the most direct, effective pitch you can make because it employs sight and sound, music and motion. Static text can’t compete at this level. If you send an e-mail blast out to 1,000 prospective readers, chances are more of them will take the time to view a brief video than read a paragraph synopsis.

Still, many writers look askance at book trailers. Terese Svoboda, who made a trailer (her fourth) for her latest novel, Bohemian Girl admits: “Making a book trailer can be very expensive and time consuming, the time which could be better spent writing or in conversation about your new book.” Bohemian Girl Trailer here.

Steve Almond, who made a trailer to promote his latest story collection, God Bless America, adds, “Trailers probably are a waste of time and money — if you spend time and money on them. Mine cost me a grand total of maybe ten hours to make. Given that I waste that much time avoiding writing most days, I figured it was worth
a shot. My ‘pay’ to the amazing young women who filmed and edited (Burnt Twig Productions) is a gift basket that will include books and homemade CDs”: God Bless America trailer.

Even though I don’t have a filmmaking background like Terese Svoboda, I made my own trailer, animating it still-by-still in Photoshop, simply because I had no other resources. I asked friends to serve as voice talent, then recruited a splendid composer friend, David Smooke, to do the score. All for free. My second trailer — From Animal House to Our House: A Love Story – was also low budget, except this time a filmmaker friend, David Grossbach, offered to shoot it for me: From Our House to Animal House: A Love Story.

Obviously, it helps to network. Or, better yet, like Jessica Anya Blau, to be married to a filmmaker. The trailer to her first book, The Summer of Naked Swim Parties, is the work of a professional with an auteur’s flare (the same David Grossbach) : The Summer of Nake Swim Parties trailer. The trailer for her new book, Drinking Closer to Home is something completely different.

Carolyn Parkhurst was willing to pay for production to make a trailer for her novel, The Nobodies Album, but found “most … video production companies … were looking for corporate projects, not a quirky, low-budget, one-time deal.” So she emailed her friends for help and one of them introduced her to just the right filmmaker, Gabriel Rhodes. “He and cinematographer Hope Hall were great at throwing around ideas and putting the whole thing together”: The Nobodies Album trailer.

Michael Downs, for his debut story collection, The Greatest Show, enjoyed a similar experience with filmmaker Brian McDermott, who “shaped [my idea] in so many ways. . . . He found performers and scheduled the filming.” Downs is convinced that it’s more than worth it to “spend the money on a pro.” He also points out that making a video trailer is one of the few opportunities writers have to collaborate with other artists: “[My trailer] stands alone … as the collaboration of five artists, thrilling and disturbing in its own ways – far better than anything I could have imagined on my own”: the Greatest Show trailer.

Should every writer try to make a trailer? Carolyn Parkhurst says she’ll make another “only if I have an idea that will engage and entertain people.” “Don’t do it,” Michael Downs advises, “unless you have an idea that has a shot at going viral.” Steve Almond says, “If I do [make another trailer], it would only be to have FUN. It should feel like a creative act, not a promotional one.” I agree: if it’s not creative fun, why bother?

If you do make a trailer, Terese Svoboda says, “keep it simple and, if at all possible, funny.” And, cautions Jessica Anya Blau, “Make it shorter than you think–60 to 90 seconds. People don’t realize that three minutes is too long to ask someone to watch something that’s not about them!” “Try to find a student filmmaker,” Steve Almond suggests, “someone who’ll work on it with you as a creative act … Honestly, with the current technology, there’s no reason not to make your own trailer, if you have an idea that excites you.”

For me, it’s a creative challenge. I like making things. Why not a book trailer? Carolyn Parkhurst sums it up aptly for American writers at this literary/marketing juncture: “The book industry is at a weird moment right now. It’s less clear than it used to be what’s going to make people buy one book instead of another. We’re all throwing ideas around, and any strategy an author comes up with has as much chance of being successful as a strategy a publicist comes up with. But none of us seem to know quite what to do.”

This post originally appeared on the Baltimore Sun blog, Read Street

Related posts

• Got Music? (0)

In the spirit of Halloween, Jill and I watched a vintage Japanese sci-fi flick last night: Gamera, the Invicible. It’s about a giant prehistoric turtle awakened from its eon-long underground slumber by a wayward atomic bomb. From the 1950-70s, Japanese sci-fi showed an understandable obsession with the atomic bomb — starting with Godzilla, in 1956. In Japanese movies, the bomb didn’t create monsters, it just woke them up. But their monsters are not at all monstrous by American standards. A giant turtle? A giant moth (”Mothra”)? The difference between their monsters and ours grows from the Japanese’s deep and complicated relationship with natural things.

Japanese sci-fi has NEVER strived for convincing special effects. Their monsters are always stunt men in rubber suits cavorting through miniature sets made of painted paper and balsa wood. That’s part of the pleasure in watching them. Gamera, the angry prehistoric turtle, stands improbably, amazingly, on his hind legs as he wreaks havoc. He flies too! And spits fire!

American monsters have always been about killing and eating humans. Japanese monsters only start out irritated by meddlings humans, but then these monsters often turn friendly towards humans (part of that long and compicated realtionship with natural things that the Japanese have). And THEN these monsters get distracted by other monsters and leave the humans alone (a turn of events that we may attribute to Japan’s irrepressible optimism). In his sequels, Gamera goes on to fight 1) Barugon, 2) Goas, 3) Guiron, and 4) Zigra. Whew! This tag-team wrestling scenario — monster vs. monster — modeled a successful formula followed years later by to the popular Transformers franchise. Not surprisingly, Transformers first came to the U.S. as toys from Japan in the 1980s.

This monster-versus-monster formula was well worn by the late 1960s and gave rise to the lampoon “Bambi meets Godzilla,” popularly known as “Bambi Versus Godzilla,” made by then-art-student Marv Newland and now in the pantheon of the 50 greatest cartoons of all time: Bambi Meets Godzilla.

Which brings us to another Japanese sci-fi diistinction: the Japanese never kill their monsters! They’ll imprison a monster or thwart it somehow (sending it back to the bottom of the sea) or exile it (send it into outer space). But they won’t kill it — beacuse the Japanese are pacifists. Which is a stark contrast to the way Americans treat their monsters. The most heart-breaking American monster movie is 20 Million Miles to Earth, about a Venutian alien (a kind of lizard beast) that turns violent after it is abused by everyone that comes across it. We kill the monster before understanding what it is or what it might have taught us. (Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion animation in this film is brilliant, by the way.)

I enjoy Japanese sci-fi, in part, for the window on Japan during a heady time of growth: by the 1960s Japan had become America’s little alien cousin, seen by Americans as a harmless mimicker of American culture and a feckless makeer of cheap consumer goods. Woody Alien’s What’s Up, Tiger Lily? (1966) underscores how laughable the Japanese seemed to Americans, whio believed that the Japanese couldn’t do anything right, especially when they tried to do things the Westerners did, like make spy movies. Their sci-fi movies seemed to prove the point best of all.

In fact, most Japanese sci-fi were not allowed to stand on their own. They had to be intercut with American scenes to make the stories palatable to American viewers. This practice started with Godzilla, which starred Raymond Burr just before he was made famous for his TV role as Perry Mason. in Gamera, the Japanese story is intercut mostly with scenes in an American military command center, where American officers stare at radar screens and field reports about Gamera’s hijinks.

But look at the hip Japanese journalist, with his Roy Orbison shades and mod ‘do. Dig his shark skin suit and jet-setting style. And watch for the jaw-dropping sexism as the American General asks Sergeant Embers, a woman, to get him some coffee. And, of course, wait for it: Gamera doing a kind of shimmy-and-shake dance as he strides forward to trample all that paper and balsa wood.

Click here for the official Gamera theme song

Related posts

• No related posts.

I’ve been online a lot recently, looking for hardware and equipment to outfit the Houselove van — the van I’m converting into a camper for my book tour next summer, to promote From Animal House to Our House: A Love Story. Converting the van is a big project because it’s got to have everything in it—from kitchen sink to toilet, solar panels to fog lights.

So, in looking for equipment — specifically, an inverter (changes DC to AC power) — I came across this curious collection of photographs depicting attractive Chinese women regarding hardware in a provocative way. What makes these images notable is that the women are staring at inverters. Not drills. Not big machinery. Not your typical cheesecake fare. The effect is kind of bizarre.

On the one hand, it seems an indicator of where China is in the capitalistic mix: they’re still learning. They get the gist of the advertising ploy but not the heart and soul of it. It’s kind of cute, really. Yeah, I know, it’s easy to be condescneding to the new kid who doesn’t know the local slang.

On the other hand, it’s no joke. China has followed the West — with a large stride — into big-time prosperity and it’s trying on everything we Westernes tried on, including our sexist attitudes about what makes women look best: strip ‘em down, place a big car next to them — or a little electronic gadget — and you’ve got gold!

The objectification of women isn’t China’s doing. These Chinese manufacturers are carrying on a practice that goes back a long way. Sure, we can point to the Greeks. Or pick on the Rennaisance Italians and their depictions of the Madonna — depictions that got quite sensual as time went on. But here’s my question: when did Western culture decide that women and tools go well together? Probably the early 20th century when heavy industry was in full swing and men had enough leisure and money to indulge in this fantasy. Most likely, it was a fantasy that caught fire during World War II, when the American military painted pin-ups on the sides of bombers. The combination of nearly naked women blazoned on weapons of mass destruction was, apparently, irresistible.

The legacy of that practice is widespread and incredibly hard to discourage. What’s with the silhouettes of naked women on truck mudflaps, for example? I never understood it. Do the drivers of these vehicles think that, by advertising their lust in this way, they can somehow attract a woman to satisfy their announced desire? It’s bizarre, when you think about. The only conclusion I can draw is that the silhouette of a naked women is talismanic — a primitive form of magic that certain men cherish in the wild hope that it will bring good luck (i.e., naked women) their way. It seems to come down to this: the naked, or nearly naked, woman as decoration — whether on a mudflap or beside a voltage inverter — is never just about the naked or nearly naked woman. It’s about certain kinds of aspirations that run deep, deep in the male psyche. It’s about acquisition and dreams of success and the fervent hope for miracles.

Never mind that no man would want his sister or mother or wife to be depicted on a mudflap. That’s the disconnect — because it doesn’t have to do with people, it has to do with something wholly unreal and unattainable. So that’s why, when I go online looking for tools and electronic equipment, I find . . . nearly naked women. Some part of me is amused and vaguely distracted and then disturbed by this, and I have to reminded myself that this magical, overly wrought, highly fraught image is more about the psychological history of men than about who they think women really are.

Related posts

• Why I’m Back in School (0)
• The Shrinking Covers of Books and Albums (2)
• Sorting Through An American Dream (0)
• Our Victorian Back Yard (3)
• How to Sell A Book in America: the 66-City Tour (0)

I just got the cover art for my forthcoming book, From Animal House to Our House: a Love Story, and it’s great. Despite the old adage, “you can’t judge a book by . . .,” probably no single factor affects a book’s reception more than the book cover. This applies even to the tiny thumbnail images that must represent our books online. If you’ve tried to find a good photo of yourself for your Facebook page, you know what I’m talking about. Shrinking any image to that small a size presents all kinds of problems. I sent in a photo of myself to a publication not long ago and thought it looked fine until I saw it in print — thumbnail size. Whereas I looked like I had the start of a smile in the large, original photo, I looked kind of dour and thoroughly unsmiling in the thumbnail version. The shrunken photo had lost all of the subtlety found in the large one.

If you’re old enough to remember vinyl record albums before they became collector’s items, then you remember their glorious one-foot-square cover art. Record albums covers, with liner notes on the back, mimicked books. This was most clear in the gatefold design that allowed you to open the album like a book, offering many pages of text, photos, and lyrics. Back in the heyday of record albums (1966-80), you’d get a book of notes and lyrics, a photo spread, maybe even individual loose photos, and sometimes a poster. All of that changed with the advent of the CD in the 1990s, when album art shrunk to a 4 x 4″ size. Designers and producers still tried to give buyers a booklet of lyrics in many albums, but those little booklets got lost easily and their miniscule print was hard to read.

The art changed too. It had to because the small format demanded a more striking image that could be seen well — and vividly — at a glance. This was just one step away from the ubiquitous thumnail that now stands in for cover art on albums, books, and everything else. The online environment demands miniaturaization. Recently, when I put my first e-book on Amazon, I had to reconfigure the cover art several time to get it right and still it didn’t look right because I couldn’t include the full image of the portrait I used — it had to be headshots but the headshots didn’t convey the full atmosphere of the photo. It’s likely that we’re going to have to post alternative covers for our books online because the online environment just can’t capture what a full-sized book cover can. A book that has a lot of text on the cover, like the one for From Animal House to Our House, kind of loses definition as a thumbnail.

The point here is that the book — the physical artifact that we’ve lived with and revered for many centuries — has lost its place as an influential model of design. The computer is the new frame for all things visual. Soon it may be “hand-helds,” like phones, that dominate design. I don’t derive any pleasure from squinting at my smart phone’s tiny screen. It’s like trying to view the world through a peephole. This will change, of course. Phone screens will become a bit bigger and graphic formatting will be designed especially for those small screens. But there’s not a lot of joy in images that small. And what are you going to do with, say, a graphic novel on your smart phone? I guess we’ll figure it out. One possibility is that, along with your download, you get an extra — a big, sumptious version of the cover art, which then you can feed into your big screen TV.

Related posts

• Why I’m Back in School (0)
• Sorting Through An American Dream (0)
• Nearly Naked Women & Chinese Electronics (0)
• How to Sell A Book in America: the 66-City Tour (0)
• How to Sell a Book in America, part VIII: the e-book! (0)