Robertson Davies: A pat on the head, and a scowl

That time I met the Great Canadian Man of Letters, and that other time I met him

 

I met Robertson Davies twice: once when I was 10 years old, and again when I was about 25. I don’t remember the first time, but I understand my presence helped delight him; our second encounter was less pleasant, and I was complicit in a process that earned his scorn.

    In December, 1965, our Grade 5 teacher, Miss Ugolini, arranged to take our class on a filed trip to experience a performance of the opera “The Love for Three Oranges,” by Carlo Gozzi and Sergei Prokofiev. My mother volunteered as one of a handful of parents who would tag along to help herd the 30 or so children safely onto the bus, across streets and into our theatre seats, and generally keep us out of trouble. That meant I would spend the afternoon under the scrutiny of both my mother and my teacher. 

    On the appointed day, we boarded a chartered school bus that shuttled us from Cloverdale Public School, in the suburban utopia of Etobicoke, to the Edward Johnson Building, a recital hall set amid the exotic urban bustle of downtown Toronto.

    The real work for my Mum and her fellow parent volunteers came when we got downtown and, for some reason, had to walk a few blocks and cross busy intersections in order to reach our destination. The teacher and the mothers had to make sure we stayed together as a group and that we all got across the street while the light was green. When we crossed at the corner of Bay St. and Bloor St. W., as my mother recalled later, we created a bit of a log-jam on the other side, where we swarmed a bearded man in a flat-brim hat and a black overcoat. The man looked around at the sea of rosy-cheeked faces that surrounded him, raised his hands as if overwhelmed with delight, and then reached over and patted the nearest head, which happened to be mine.

    Fortunately, my mother, an avid reader, recognized the jovial stranger as Davies himself. She said later, with some irony, that the reason I became a writer was that Robertson Davies had patted me on the head.

    Fifteen years later, my nascent writing career had stalled after a few articles in a music magazine for which I was not paid. For a living I toiled as a cashier’s assistant in the Customs International Mail Unit, which collected taxes payable on commercial and personal goods entering the country by post. Part of my job was to stamp “Duty Paid” on the documents after the customer had settled with the cashier. 

    One day that giant of literature came into my place of work to pick up a parcel. By then I had read the Deptford and Salterton trilogies with relish, a literary journey that had begun when my parents gave me a copy of Leaven of Malice for Christmas when I was a teenager. I, of course, was the only one in the office who recognized Davies.

    He was accompanied by his wife, Brenda, and together they were, by then (1980), a slow-moving, distinguished-looking elderly couple. The cashier (a guy a couple of years older than me who once proudly declared that he hadn’t read as much as a newspaper article in his life) collected Davies’ money, rang the transaction through the cash register and passed the documents to me to stamp. I can’t remember what was in his parcel (it would have been noted on the document) but I recall it wasn’t anything literary or magical, such as rare books or vintage theatrical masks. It was something ordinary, like shoes or gloves, but expensive enough to trigger import duty and federal sales tax. Which probably explained Davies’ sour mood.

    As I stamped his papers my mind raced for something to say, to, at best, demonstrate a witty familiarity with his work, or, at least, show that I recognized him (“I hear Parlabane is back!” “A tax bill can be like a snowball to the back of the head!”). But all I could come up with was “Hello Mr. Davies!” 

    He didn’t answer. He looked down at the receipt I had handed him and shook his head, then looked up at me with penetrating distain. 

    I imagined he recognized me from our first encounter. I had such high hopes for you, he seemed to say. And now look at you! A customs clerk! A tax collector!

    The man who had patted my head at 10 and scowled at me at 25 stowed his receipt in his inside coat pocket, tucked his parcel under his arm and left.

 

That time I almost interviewed Bonnie Raitt 

(Part I)

 

 

In the early 1970s, when I was 19 or 20, I had a freelance gig writing for a magazine called Music Canada Quarterly — not a very lyrical title; it sounded more like a government database than a cultural journal. I interviewed some famous — and moderately famous — musicians, and wrote about them, for very modest, or no pay.

I had no journalistic training but I loved to write, and I was cheap. And I was a musician who had played in a pretty good band, so I could at least sound as if I knew what I was talking about. I had never really aspired to be a music journalist. As someone who had had shot at being the one on stage, I considered interviewing musicians a big step down. Still, it was better than working. 

One of the most famous people I interviewed was Bonnie Raitt. In 1974, she played at Massey Hall (Toronto’s main concert venue), opening for Jackson Browne. My assignment was to interview Raitt in her dressing room after her set, an arrangement made with the blessing of the publicist at Warner Bros., her record label. I was a huge fan of both Raitt and Browne, but was disappointed to learn that Browne was not doing press interviews on this tour. Still, an interview with Bonnie Raitt would be a great honour, even though the timing meant I might miss part of Browne’s set.

I had a good seat, about four rows from the front on the right-hand side. I had probably bought the tickets myself — as this job offered few perks — and I had come with my then-girlfriend, Vicky, who must have been impressed when I got up from my seat after the opening set to find my way to my interview.

From the backstage area an usher directed me to go down some stairs and pass under the stage then go up two flights to the dressing room. While I was going through the corridor under the stage, I noticed a man coming toward me. It was Jackson Browne, who must have observed my briefcase and figured I was with "the press." I wanted to say something, but he averted his eyes as he passed me. 

I found the narrow staircase leading up to a second floor. There was a traffic jam near the top of the stairs: journalists trying, like me, to get an interview. A short, stocky guy in his 30s with an overwrought walrus moustache, wearing a vest over a sleeveless shirt was grilling each person. The critic from the Globe and Mail, a slight, pasty guy with a soft, English-accented voice asked the gatekeeper if he could have a “brief word with Miss Raitt.” The Globe writer left, as he had to file his review, with or without a quote, that night.

The gatekeeper talked to somebody else then turned to me and demanded, “And who are you, sir?” I’ll never forget the almost incriminating, condescending sir.

“Music Canada Quarterly,” I said, then gave my name. Damn! I should have said my name first. Worse, my voice had quavered. I gave him the name of the publicist who had arranged the interview, and the prick with the Moustache seemed satisfied.

“Don’t let him intimidate you. He’s an asshole,” said a voice from behind me. I turned around. It was Larry LeBlanc, a freelance music journalist I had seen at other events. “He thinks he’s King Shit but he’s just the stage manager.” 

LeBlanc told me about a time he was lining up a photograph of a famous singer from backstage, and the Moustache came up from behind him and slapped him hard on the shoulder. “I turned around and told him, ‘If you ever do that again I’ll knock your teeth out’.” 

LeBlanc’s assignment tonight was to interview Raitt for CBC Radio. He told me he had done a pre-interview with her in his apartment that afternoon, and she had asked him if she could take a nap at his place because she was exhausted from travelling from the previous show. I was in awe of this guy. Bonnie Raitt had slept on his couch!

When we were allowed into the dressing room, I saw that it was actually a suite: a large outer room with a couch, chairs and a coffee table, where band members and others milled about, smoking cigarettes and drinking beer, and a smaller, inner room, which served as Raitt’s more private space. LeBlanc and I sat in the outer room waiting for our chance to do our interviews. The blue Fender fretless belonging to the bass player, Freebo, leaned against the wall beside me. I thought: “Wow! I could just reach out and touch Freebo’s bass!” Freebo looked over and flashed a friendly smile. Maybe I should interview him.

For some reason, (Toronto singer/songwriter) Murray McLaughlin was there, making his presence known, trying to be the life of the party.

A handler came over and told us Raitt was tired and didn’t think she could handle two more interviews. By now the roar of the crowd, followed by the music of Jackson Browne, came wafting in through the building’s 84-year-old walls and floorboards. I was going to miss his set. Vicky would be sitting alone in the fourth row, thinking her cool boyfriend was interviewing Bonnie Raitt.

(more ...) 

 

That time I almost interviewed Bonnie Raitt 

(Part II)

 

While the manager was talking to us, Bonnie Raitt came out of the inner room and approached us herself. “I just don’t think I can do it anymore. Answering the same questions, I’m starting to feel like a Chatty Cathy,” she said, referring to a toy doll, popular in the 1960s, that “talked” when you pulled the string on her back. She relented, agreeing to let us both interview her at the same time. Since Larry LeBlanc’s interview was for radio, he would take the lead, asking the first questions, but I could cut in later with a question or two of my own. We retreated to the inner room, LeBlanc and me on one side of a low coffee table, and Raitt on the other. 

 

LeBlanc had a professional, portable reel-to-reel tape recorder with a broadcast-style ball microphone. I had one of those boxy plastic cassette recorders of the time. Somebody offered Raitt a beer. She asked for a soda, and her manager brought her a can of Orange Crush and a plastic cup.

LeBlanc asked her about the tour, her latest album, “Streetlights,” and something about her relationship with her record label. On the topic of her background, she volunteered that as a child she was used to falling asleep amid a hep of fur coats piled on a bed at late-night show-business parties, as the daughter of Broadway star John Raitt. 

A woman entered the room (the door to the outer room was open) carrying a bouquet of flowers. “From Mary Martin,” the woman announced. “I’ll put them in water.” (Mary Martin was a Broadway star of the 1950s and ’60s who had co-starred with Raitt’s father in "Annie get Your Gun.") 

By now, Raitt had relaxed a bit and the exchange felt more like a conversation than an interview. McLaughlin came in hoisting a bottle of Champagne, possibly part of Mary Martin’s gift. The cork popped like a gunshot, interrupting the conversation. Without hesitation, LeBlanc said into the microphone, with an official, “announcer” voice: “And that, ladies and gentlemen, was Murray McLaughlin opening a bottle of Champagne.”

McLaughlin took a big swig of the bubbly, straight from the bottle, then handed it to me. I held the bottle up to Raitt, silently offering it to her, as she was talking. She tapped the rim of her soda cup and I poured some Dom Perignon into her Orange Crush before taking a pull from the bottle myself. Not entirely sanitary, but McLaughlin had started it. Music from the Jackson Browne concert still hummed through the walls. Rock Me On the Water.

I intervened with a few questions of my own, about Raitt’s band, about song selection and blues guitar styles. She answered thoughtfully. I was flattered. After LeBlanc wrapped up, I reached for my tape recorder to switch it off and realized to my horror that I hadn’t turned it on. I hadn’t made any notes. All the words spoken were gone (unless I tried to record the interview from the radio when the CBC aired LeBlanc’s interview). I didn’t dare ask Larry to let me borrow his tape. (In the end, I wrote a rave review of her set, with a few quotes from the interview.)

After we’d packed up, as I followed the route of stairways and hallways on the way toward the public theatre seating, the music of Jackson Browne’s band got louder, closer. My Redneck Friend. I realized I was passing the backstage area, and from where I was standing, I could look onstage: I had a side view of the concert. The promoter Richard Flohill was there, holding hands with his girlfriend, bouncing up and down like teenagers. LeBlanc and the stage manager were there, all of us forming a small, sparse group, taking a privileged, insider’s peek at the show. "This is the best spot to watch a show from," the Moustache said to me. "It's like the band's-eye view. And you're hearing the music through the monitors rather than the concert sound system." Just like that, we were allies.

Browne stepped quickly toward us from centre stage, grabbed a lit king-size cigarette from an ash tray sitting on an amp, took a drag, and returned to his position as the audience cheered from the shadows. The opening chords of “Take it Easy” swelled to life. This was the last of the encore medley. The tail end of the show I’d missed in order to almost interview Bonnie Raitt. 

 

The poet on the bus

 

While browsing in a big-chain bookstore recently, I happened upon the book Milton Acorn: The People’s Poet (2015), which includes essays about Acorn as well as the text of his book I’ve Tasted My Blood, first published in 1969. This edition also includes notes Acorn added when editing a subsequent edition in 1978. The book reminded me of an encounter I had with Acorn when I was a high-school student and aspiring writer in 1973.

One of the benefits of attending the School of Experiential Education (or S.E.E.) in the early 1970s was the opportunity to meet some of Canada’s most respected poets. Many of the English literature students, like me, were interested in poetry, and the English teacher, Barry Duncan, was very good at getting writers to come to the school to lead tutorials and read their work. Some people called an alternative school such as S.E.E a “free” school. It was run like a university: attendance was not mandatory but most courses had one class a week and you were expected to complete your assignments through independent study.  

In those days, there was a vibrant Canadian poetry scene. Margaret Atwood, Irving Layton and Al Purdy were the big-name poets, who got the more elite reading gigs at art colleges and were featured on CBC. But there were several recognized poets who were happy to drop in to our old school building in southeast Etobicoke and regale a bunch of long-haired teenagers in denim overalls with their wit and their published work. The names Earl Birney, Bill Bissett, Gerald Lampert and Joe Rosenblatt spring to mind as writers who visited our school.

One day Barry (we called our teachers by their first names, of course) told us he had lined up a visit by Milton Acorn, a popular local poet who had recently had the honour “The People’s Poet” bestowed upon him by a group of his peers — Atwood and Mordecai Richler among them — who were dismayed that he'd been passed over for the Governor General's Award that year.

Even though I didn’t have any classes that day, I made a special trip to school to see the visiting writer. The session was to take place in the early afternoon and the bus I boarded at Old Mill station to get to school was almost empty. I took a seat near the back and opened my book (probably a Kurt Vonnegut or a Richard Brautigan; I was a sucker for an easy read). After the bus left the station I became aware of some peculiar animal noises come from the back. Snorting, growling, moaning. I turned my head far enough to see that a shabbily dressed middle-aged man was huddled in a seat across from me and few rows back. He wore a coarse brown shirt and a pair of old black dress pants that looked like he’d bought them at a charity shop. The waist was secured by a belt that was way too big for him; the long slack end of the belt flapped down at his knees. His brown hair was greasy and disheveled and he resembled a huddled wretch from a Dickensian slum. This man might have been homeless, but we didn’t say “homeless” in those days; we used more clumsy words like “winos” and “bums.”

As the bus rolled on, the man lolled from side and groaned audibly, never uttering a discernible word. Was he a mental patient or a drunk? I wasn’t sure. I considered getting up and moving farther away from him, but I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that his brown eyes burned with a kind of fiery torment, a dark blaze of passion. He moaned and growled some more and whined like a dog and swayed in his seat until we reached my stop. I stepped quickly toward the centre doors and leapt off the bus, glad to escape the remote chance that this frightful specimen might speak to me. 

I didn’t look back until I was inside the school (an old two-storey brick building constructed as a primary school in the first years of the 20th century). I was a little early, so I had time for a quick visit to the washroom and to look in the students’ common room to see if any of my friends were around. Then I went up to the second-floor classroom where the poetry reading was to take place. There were a few students in the hallway outside the classroom door and about 25 were hanging around inside, smoking cigarettes (because it was allowed) while Barry chatted with someone, probably the guest speaker, at the front of the room. When I got a better look at the person Barry was talking to, I realized it was the scary guy from the bus. That growling, moaning, tortured soul was the People’s Poet, Milton Acorn.

At first, and to my surprise, Acorn’s behaviour in the classroom was pretty normal. He was lucid and well-spoken and fulfilled his role as a mentor to young aspiring writers. But when he began reading from a paperback copy of one of his books, he seemed gripped by a kind of spiritual possession. He shouted some lines so loud and abruptly that some of the kids flinched in startlement. After one particularly dramatic line, I noticed a tear had flown from his eye and landed on his cheek. At another point, he shrieked a phrase with dramatic volume, then stared at the page for a few seconds, silent, his eyes fixed on the book with an expression of utter horror, as if the words he himself had written were the source of his torment.

And then he snapped out of it. He took some questions from the class (sorry, I don’t remember any) and I sensed an air of condescension toward us. He turned to illustrate a point on the blackboard and, searching the ledge for something to write with, quipped, “Is this school free of chalk?”

His sarcastic wit now intact, that furious emotion he had displayed during the reading seemed to have been switched off. But I knew it wasn’t an act. I had seen that fire in his eyes, heard his troubled voice on the bus, when he thought he was alone.

 

---

 

Milton Acorn (1923-1986) was born in Charlottetown, P.E.I. He lived in Charlottetown, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. Notable books: I’ve Tasted My Blood; I Shout Love and Other Poems.