Charity is Violence (Part 1)

An Excerpt from "College and the Boy: a Comic Epic Poem in Prose"

Headnote:

For this Rant post and the next, I offer an excerpt from my novel, College and the Boy: a Comic Epic Poem in Prose. Recently, my novel was accepted for publication by a mid-size press but, alas, that publisher went out of business before College and the Boy could be published. Such is the precarious state of the publishing world these days. I currently have my manuscript back out on the market, which is hostile territory for every author—but particularly for the fool who writes literary fiction with an eye toward social reality. Oh well.

To orient you as a reader, College and the Boy is a mixture of satire, formal innovation, and social realism. The story is told by a variety of narrative voices, and three of its twelve chapters are presented in the format of a stage play. This excerpt is the first of those “drama” chapters. The novel takes place at a small, southern, private liberal arts college in the year 1976. Just so you know, the professor in this chapter has just come from a very unpleasant conversation with the Dean of the College. In that conversation, the professor is strongly advised—as his tenure decision fast approaches—to adhere better to the conservative traditions and ideals of the College.

The Excerpt (Part 1):

BOOK III

In Hogarth’s Classroom

SCENE I

[The professor pops into class seven minutes late. He slams the door closed behind him. Literally slams it. Students jolt upright like so many startled bunnies.]

DOC H [pointing rhetorically at the little square glass window cut into the classroom door; there’s ferocity in his voice]. And just what the fuck is that there for?

[The professor then stalks to the front of the classroom. He slams his books down on the table and shoves the portable lectern violently to the floor. He spins and grabs a piece of chalk from the blackboard trough. He finds it too short. He spins back around and throws the chalk against the back wall, zipping it over the students’ heads. They all duck and cover. He spins again and this time locates a longer piece of chalk. With it he scrawls huge yellow capitals across the board.

CHARITY IS VIOLENCE

When he’s done, he spins one last time and throws that piece of chalk against the back wall, too. All twenty students flinch involuntarily.]

DOC H [meeting the widened eyes around the room]. Fun and games are over with, kiddies. Time to pull our heads out of our asses. Write on that for ten minutes. Go.

REYNOLDS [dressed in pressed khakis, topsiders with no socks, white polo shirt with the collar popped and SÆ stitched in gold over the heart]. Whoa there, Doc H. Hold on now just a dang minute. Just what in the heck do you mean by—

DOC H. Reynolds. Shut up. I said write. Not talk.

[Sociology 202: “Reading America: Class and Literacy in the United States.” It’s the only course in the college that runs for the full academic year. Each trimester, students meet two mornings a week for class and devote two afternoons a week to tutoring kids at a local elementary school. Not the nice, new elementary school southeast of campus. Out Concord Road where all the big houses are being built and where most of the faculty lives. No, not that one. Students tutor over in the shitty, old elementary school just west of campus, within walking distance. The one across Main Street, down Depot Street, across the notorious Jackson Street to put them literally on the wrong side of the railroad tracks. Tracks that divide the little town of Hesperia. That’s right. You got it. White folk here. Black folk over there. Oh, SOC 202. Sounds glamorous, even noble, when you register for it. Fulfills all of your social science G.E. requirements in one go, too. That’s a sweet deal, right? But then two, maybe three weeks in, you realize you haven’t signed up for a class. You’ve hitched up for a tour of duty. And you’ve walked into a cultural ambush. You realize you’re being walked straight toward fucking Kurtz in the jungle.]

DOC H [after students have been writing for ten minutes]. All right. You know the drill. Finish up the thought you’re working on. Exchange your paper with someone. Read what they’ve written while they read what you’ve written. Write some reactions at the end of their paper. Then the two of you chat about things for a while.

[Fifteen more minutes go by. They start in silent reading. Then tentative writing. Then murmurs of individual discussions. Then swelling to a classroom filled with loud and animated conversations.]

DOC H [having to make himself heard over the din]. All right, folks. What we got?

REYNOLDS [itching to get at it]. So just what are you tryin’ to tell us here, Doc? That we shouldn’t be feedin’ the hungry or shelterin’ the homeless or educatin’ needy kids? [Leisurely and affable patrician accent hailing from southwest Georgia.] Heck, I thought do-goodin’ is what this class was all about. [Straw-blond hair blow-dried into a nearly perfect dandelion seed-puff framing a hatchet face, glacially blue eyes emptily ablaze.]

DOC H [haircut long since gone to seed, bushy Fu Manchu cascading the corners of the mouth, no tie]. Have you ever received any charity, Reynolds? [Scans the classroom.] Has anyone in here ever received any charity?

REYNOLDS [snorting]. Heck no, Doc! Me or nobody else in here has ever got any dang charity. We all go to Babbittson, for Pete’s sake. [Grins around the room to his classmates as though making the point of the century.]

DOC H [taking candy from a baby]. Then how do you know it’s not violence?

JANE [jumping in]. I have.

DOC H. Received charity? [Looking at REYNOLDS as he follows up with JANE.] Would you care to tell us about it, Jane?

JANE [swallowing first]. Well, growing up, my teachers always liked me. I was, you know, Little Miss Perfect. I wore nice dresses and brought good lunches to school. I was smart and well-behaved. Everything like that. [Still looking the part: blond, pretty, doe-eyed; also sharp as a tack, Education major; voice now turning cautious.] But when I think back on it, I see now how I got all kinds of breaks because I was from a nice home. Breaks some of the other kids didn’t get. Like extra time on homework assignments or getting picked to do the fun stuff like hall monitor. All kinds of little advantages I didn’t understand at the time.

DOC H. Is this what you wrote about, Jane?

SUSAN [answering for JANE; they’d exchanged papers]. Yes. But there’s lots more. And it’s really good.

JANE [shy smile, almost blushing]. I especially got lots of breaks over the poor kids in our school. The ones from the bad neighborhoods in our district. They all wore, you know, old clothes. Some of them didn’t even bring a lunch to school. Most didn’t pay a lot of attention in class. [Face turning serious; SUSAN nods encouragingly to her.] Anyway, one morning on the bus to school, I copied off a math worksheet of one of those kids. I’d been working on a big art project the night before and just forgot to do the math homework. So I panicked. You know, I always did my homework. I was Little Miss Perfect.

DOC H. I take it you got caught, Jane?

JANE [ashamed]. Yes. But what was weird was my teacher automatically blamed the other girl for cheating. For copying off of me. Even though the worksheet was full of mistakes I never would have made in a million years. [Looking down at her hands folded on her desk.] She gave the other girl detention. All she did with me was warn me not to let “these kids” copy off my homework any more. I swear, that’s just how my teacher said it. She said it was kindhearted of me to try to help out like that. But that I shouldn’t feel sorry for anybody who wasn’t willing to help themselves. [Voice trailing off.] It was completely crazy.

DOC H [after a few moments]. And I take it, Jane, you didn’t set the teacher straight?

JANE. No, Dr. Hogarth, I didn’t. [Piedmont Carolinian lilt to her speech, unassuming and pleasing.] I was too scared at first. Then I got too ashamed. I never even told my parents about it. As a matter of fact, this is the first time I’ve ever told anybody about it.

REYNOLDS. Jeez Louise, Janie. Sounds to me like you caught yourself one heckuva lucky break there, girl. If I’d been that other kid, I’d of ratted the hell outta you.

JANE. I know you would have, Reynolds.

REYNOLDS. So why sweat it if she was too stupid not to?

SUSAN. Don’t you ever get anything in here, Reynolds? Jane didn’t catch a lucky break. She was given charity. And now that she sees that, it makes her feel like crap.

REYNOLDS [eyes rolling]. Ah, jeez. Here we go again.

DOC H [stepping in]. Why didn’t that other girl rat you out, Jane? Why did she keep quiet? Reynolds raises an interesting point.

JANE. I don’t know, Dr. Hogarth. [Has to ignore REYNOLDS puffing out his chest.] I was so ashamed of what I’d done that I never talked to that girl again. I just avoided her all the time. Even when we got up into high school.

JONATHAN. Maybe the other girl was afraid to contradict the teacher. [Squirrelly English major, mop-top of jet-black hair.] She’d already been labeled a “bad” kid. Maybe she wanted to avoid more trouble.

SUSAN. Or maybe the other girl felt sorry for Jane.

REYNOLDS [snorting again]. Sorry for her? Just how the heck you figure that?

SUSAN. Solidarity, maybe. [Econ major; wearing today her favorite t-shirt, one that reads: “A Woman’s place is in the House . . . and the Senate.”] Certainly nothing you would understand, Reynolds.

REYNOLDS [also an Econ major, but one with no leanings toward Keynes]. Dang right I don’t.

JONATHAN [moving hair out of eyes]. But how’s all this violence, Dr. Hogarth? That’s the part I don’t get.

REYNOLDS [holding one fist aloft]. Right on, brother Jon. Now we’re talkin’.

JONATHAN [ignoring REYNOLDS]. Unfair, yeah, and a major bummer. But violence? That seems like an awfully strong word to me.

DOC H [nodding]. Perfect question, Jonathan. Would somebody like to answer it?

[No takers around the classroom. DOC H always waits them out. Discussion voids are not teacherly failures to be filled. If you’re doing your job right, they’re education in the making. A reply comes just before the silence gets really awkward.]

JASON. She knew the teacher wouldn’t believe her over Jane. It’s pretty much like Gradgrind. From Hard Times.

DOC H. God love English majors. [JASON and JONATHAN nod to one another.] Can you explain your literary reference to us, please, Jason?

[JASON explains his literary reference to them. It pertains perfectly. Read how for yourself. This turn steers the conversation into a quick review of the social theory covered thus far by the class. Structure determines agency. Habitus. Cultural capital. Social reproduction theory. At every reminder of such distressing concepts, REYNOLDS grimaces anew. They haven’t even got to expropriation, commodity fetish, or alienation yet. But here’s the thing. Ideology is such an airy idea to get your head around at first. False consciousness, dominant discourse, the episteme, the battle for the signified, white supremacist capitalist patriarchy—whatever you want to call it—sounds like so much conspiracy theory when studied in the abstract. And HOGARTH knows this. But, lo and behold, one day at Hesperia Elementary School, every one of his students—even REYNOLDS to a slight degree—will see abstractions take flesh. In an epiphany, they’ll suddenly recognize these theories at work, merrily Gradgrinding away. And the hardest pill to swallow and the biggest shock to concede will be achievement ideology—seeing it at work not working.]

SUSAN. Sometimes it’s disgusting what I see them doing to those little kids over there. They’re just shoving the American Dream down their throats.

JONATHAN. Yeah, it seems pretty benign at first. Even, you know, like it’s for the kid’s own good. [Pushing bangs out of his eyes.] But then, if you think about it for a minute, imposing our reality on other people, and especially on little kids … well, that’s about as violent as it gets.

REYNOLDS. Jeezy peezy, Brother Jon. Lighten the heck up, will ya. They’re just teachin’ them little kids how to read ‘n write ‘n rithmetic over there at that school. Nothin’ else.

MARTIN [responding to JONATHAN, not REYNOLDS]. But wait a minute. What’s so bad about our middle-class reality? We all seem pretty happy with it. [Mussed carrot top; tufts of hair outspread over his ears, like small bird wings; earnest, perceptive, unhandsome; Philosophy major.] What’s wrong with introducing it to these kids? Even imposing it on them? Won’t it benefit them in the long run? Shouldn’t we share the good life?

[As far as he can reach, REYNOLDS hoists a double thumbs-up in the air.]

SUSAN [scowling at REYNOLDS]. But we’re not really sharing it with them, Martin. Are we? It’s more like we’re teasing them with it.

MARTIN. How?

SUSAN. Come on. Let’s face it. You know as well as I do that none of those kids are ever going to make it out of that neighborhood. They’re never going to go to a college like this one. They’re not going to be climbing up into the middle class anytime soon.

CHERI [deep-south drawl, baby-doll makeup, blond to the point of embarrassing]. Weull they caun if they waunt to. My Lourd, what’s stoppun’ ‘em? [Starting a chapter of Beta Beta sorority on campus.]

REYNOLDS. Thank you. Finally, a gal with her head screwed on straight.

[CHERI smiles crooked and wide, all but batting her eyes; fire-engine red lip gloss, pearly whites; one can see why her nickname on campus is Sperm Lips.]

SUSAN [to CHERI]. Put your pom-poms down, Barbie. We’re only willing to share our vision of the good life with them. Not the actual material wealth of it.

REYNOLDS [coming to CHERI’s defense, chivalrously]. Golly, Suzie Q. We got our kerchief tied too tight around our dirty hair this mornin’?

[CHERI giggles behind her hand. HOGARTH issues a gentle reminder.]

DOC H. Play nice, children.

JONATHAN [back to theory]. So what happens, Martin, is the kids end up chasing after a way of life that they can never have. That’s got to screw you up.

JANE. And all you can do is feel bad about yourself. Feel inadequate for not having what you think is normal.

DOC H. But isn’t something wrong with them if they can’t climb up into the middle class? Isn’t this a free country? Won’t hard work get you anywhere you want to go? Isn’t education the great equalizer?

[REYNOLDS raises another double thumbs-up. CHERI copies him. There is, indeed, a pom-pom-like flourish to her gesture.]

RUTH [angular, severe]. Not if you spend some time over at Hesperia Elementary with your eyes open. [Walks like a tall chicken, tail a bit too up in the air; Religion major.]

DOC H. And what are you seeing, Ruth?

RUTH [also with a kerchief tied around her dirty hair]. Dr. Hogarth, I gotta be honest with ya. I hate what you’re doin’ta us. I plumb hate it. [A South Carolinian timbre.] My Mama teaches third grade and she just works herself to the bone for her kids. She loves ‘em all to death and they love her back. So I sure don’t want to be seein’ any of this funny business goin’ on over to the school you got us tutoring at. [Holds up the book they’re discussing.] But, darn it all, I’m seein’ every bit of what this fella’s sayin’. Every last dang bit of it. And I hate it. I just dang hate it.

DOC H. Sorry about that, Ruth. Was it anything in particular that drew your attention?

RUTH. That the teachers don’t even know they’re doin’ it. They sure think they’re just educatin’ them kids, doin’ their job. But I sure see now how they’re indoctrinatin’em, too. Gettin’em to believe in a way a life that’s just never gonna be open to ‘em. Not for real.

DOC H. So there’s no evil genius over there pulling everyone’s strings? Oppressing like a fiend?

SUSAN. Not really that knowingly. No.

REYNOLDS [having heard enough]. Aw, come off it now, people. All y’all are soundin’ like a batch of whiners. Those nice lady teachers over there are doin’ the best they can. Heck, most them kids are like wild Indians, and you dang well know it. That sorry excuse for a lunchroom they got us tutorin’ in is crazy as Dodge City at High Noon. Don’t tell me it’s not. And it stinks like old socks on top of that. So heck, I say hang a dang medal around all those teachers’ necks for what they got to put up with. Far as I can tell, not one of them kids have parents who give two plug nickels about ‘em. Not two plug nickels. Just look at the way they dress ‘em for school. Golly. And don’t lie now. All y’all know how bad some of them kids smell. Like they never seen a bathtub. Gosh.

SUSAN. Reynolds. You shit-for-brains. [She’s beaten both RUTH and JANE to the punch.] Those kids’ parents used to be those kids.

[Eyes lock onto DOC H. Classroom swearing? Not the norm at Babbittson. The professor remains seated on the front table, legs dangling carelessly. Eyes swing back to REYNOLDS.]

REYNOLDS [blood rising in his face]. Nice potty mouth, first off, for a young lady, Suzie. Second off, you got to face facts like a man, darlin’. It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there. I hate to be the one to break the news to ya, honey, but it’s survival of the fittest out in the real world. My Daddy worked his hind end off to get his family to where we are today. I ain’t about to feel guilty for havin’ money and sure as heck I’m not about to start handin’ it over to the dang government for some bleedin’ heart welfare program.

[CHERI looks on the verge of orgasm.]

RUTH. Funny how you don’t seem to be workin’ your hind end at all, Reynolds. Especially not in this class. How’s that bein’ one a the “fittest,” exactly?

[A hit, a very palpable hit.]

REYNOLDS [muttering just loud enough for everyone to hear]. Damn dykes.

SUSAN [quite audibly]. Fucking Nazi.

[Eyes back on DOC H. He lets the awkward moment run. And run. Finally, his grin. The one he always hits them with at moments like these.]

DOC H. Well, at least we’re using our words.

[Mid-thirties. Looks like he’s been around some. Somewhere interesting, too. A touch over six-foot. A bit on the barrel-chested side. Walks like you might imagine Hemingway strolling through a piazza: lordly while enacting the common man. The eyes are smoky gray and twinkle at the edge of irony. The nose threatens to be long, but the chin makes up for it by being chiseled pleasingly. (Rugged good looks, he’ll describe himself, eyes twinkling.) Hard to notice, but there’s the slightest tremor in his hands. Not always, but there. Certainly not out of nervous tension. We jump ahead in the classroom conversation.]

JANE. We’re really not that much better than those nice lady teachers, are we, Dr. Hogarth? Isn’t that what this book means by “oppressor generosity”? Isn’t that what you mean by “charity is violence”?

DOC H. Potentially it is, Jane, yes. And here’s where things get really uncomfortable in this class. If we’re willing to apply social theory to the underclass, shouldn’t we be just as willing to apply it to ourselves? If most of us in here can see how American schooling indoctrinates students into a particular way of looking at the world, then shouldn’t we be curious about how we’re being domesticized into that same belief system?

REYNOLDS. You’re losin’ me, there, Doc.

DOC H. Simply put, Reynolds, are middle class kids any less susceptible to the storytelling of schooling than working class kids?

JONATHAN. We’re probably more susceptible to it.

DOC H. Why do you say that, Jonathan?

JONATHAN. Because we’re the heroes of the story. We’re the good guys.

EUBIE [pal to REYNOLDS]. I’m lost, too, Doc. [Hails from the sand-traps and trim greens of central Carolina.] Just what “story” we talkin’ about here? [Defensive back on Babbittson’s usually miserable football team.]

JONATHAN. Achievement ideology, of course. The American Dream. The story that if you work hard, you can achieve anything.

EUBIE [brightly]. That bootstraps business, huh? Well, I’m good with that. What’s the matter with that story, y’all?

SUSAN. It only works if you own boots.

CHERI [aside to EUBIE]. But anyboudy caun go out and buy boouts if they waunt. [Touches his sinewy forearm with the tips of her long, pointed, fire-engine red fingernails; EUBIE shrugs and nods keenly in confused agreement.]

JONATHAN. That’s why we’re so happy to believe the story. Not only does it make us look good, but if growing up you’re told that if you work hard enough you can do anything you want, and then you see everyone around you living in nice houses and having nice stuff, well, you’re just going to assume that’s the norm. That the American Dream is true.

MARTIN. But it is true.

RUTH. Or maybe it’s just true for us.

MARTIN [his Aristotelian brain triggered]. No. True is true. Something either is true or it isn’t. How can there be an in-between?

RUTH. My Lord, how can there not?

MARTIN [to DOC H]. Look, the schools we all went to are just a lot better than the schools they all go to. That’s the difference. The working hard part to get ahead is still the same.

RUTH [to MARTIN]. Then how come there aren’t oodles a kids makin’ it out of them schools and goin’ta good colleges like this one? Why isn’t “hard work” working for them?

MARTIN [answering RUTH]. That’s what I’m saying. It’s the fault of the bad schools, not the kids in them. In the schools we all went to, the facilities are better, the teachers are better. Everything about the kind of education we got was just, well, better.

JASON [from the back of the classroom, not particularly caring if he’s heard]. But why are some schools better than others?

End of Excerpt (Part 1)…to be continued

COMING IN TWO WEEKS: Part 2 of excerpt from College and the Boy

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