Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,
Feeling brave, this past weekend I took my son Jukie to see and meet the US Poet Laureate, Philip Levine. America’s working-man’s poet came to American River College to participate in a reading and a day of workshops as one of his final acts as Poet Laureate. Levine is a genial and self-effacing man. In fact, the only people he will efface more than himself would be his former faculty colleagues and, evidently, the US Congress. We discovered this when Levine told the story of the time he responded to a reporter by comparing a public meeting of Congress unfavorably to the self-importance and pettiness that Levine had seen at faculty meetings. Evidently word of Levine’s remarks traveled quickly, for someone from the Library of Congress (which appoints the Poet Laureate) called Levine within the hour to ask for corroboration and further comment and explanation. At 84, Levine was not used to being rebuked, so he opted for just a single term in his honorary position.
Here is one of the poems Levine read Saturday night, a Central Valley poem called “Our Valley”:
Our Valley
by Philip Levine
We don't see the ocean, not ever, but in July and August
when the worst heat seems to rise from the hard clay
of this valley, you could be walking through a fig orchard
when suddenly the wind cools and for a moment
you get a whiff of salt, and in that moment you can almost
believe something is waiting beyond the Pacheco Pass,
something massive, irrational, and so powerful even
the mountains that rise east of here have no word for it.
You probably think I'm nuts saying the mountains
have no word for ocean, but if you live here
you begin to believe they know everything.
They maintain that huge silence we think of as divine,
a silence that grows in autumn when snow falls
slowly between the pines and the wind dies
to less than a whisper and you can barely catch
your breath because you're thrilled and terrified.
You have to remember this isn't your land.
It belongs to no one, like the sea you once lived beside
and thought was yours. Remember the small boats
that bobbed out as the waves rode in, and the men
who carved a living from it only to find themselves
carved down to nothing. Now you say this is home,
so go ahead, worship the mountains as they dissolve in dust,
wait on the wind, catch a scent of salt, call it our life.
Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions about soft drinks, video games, Mick Jagger, unpopular people, Cher Lloyd, the best places to live in the US, new Davis institutions, tall women, college football, astronomy, UC Davis, famous doctors who have not yet begun to practice, slopes and snakes and blood, gladiators, classical composers, teens who have been moonshot, fictional characters, figurative cradles, correct pronunciations, unusual morning traditions, famous transporters, secretaries and neighbors, beautiful futures, Irish literature, underperforming films, Brits, the institution of marriage, human anatomy, election day, baseball, and Shakespeare. There will be some simple math on tonight’s Pub Quiz (addition).
Rumor has it that a couple of my in-laws will be accompanying my lovely wife to this evening’s Pub Quiz, so I should apologize ahead of time about the additional raucous noise tonight. Rumor also has it that schools and colleges everywhere will be letting out soon for the summer, and that scads of former Davis High grads will be descending upon our fair city, looking for entertainment on a Monday evening. If you know such people, please invite them to join us.
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Here are five questions from last week’s rare Tuesday-evening quiz:
2. Internet Culture. Starting with the letter “S”, what is the name of the Swedish music streaming service offering selected music from a range of major and independent record labels?
3. Newspaper Headlines. We learned recently that the first woman to serve as U.S. Secretary of State (before Clinton or Rice) will be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Name her.
4. Four for Four. The first episode of which of the following TV shows, if any, premiered in the 1990s? Alf, Dragon Tales, Power Rangers Teletubbies.
5. Three of These Things are Just Like the Others. The comic book character Jugghead, the second greatest hero of all time according to the American Film Institute, and the cat from the film Alien all share a last name. What is that name?
6. California. What storied California city of 35 thousand people is the most musical city in America, with 3.14 musicians per thousand people (of the 50,000 top musical artists in the country). Name the city. Hint: San Francisco and Nashville are the second and third cities on this list.
P.S. Speaking of poets, As you can see at the website Poetry in Davis, Troy Jollimore will be the featured reader at the Thursday night edition of the Poetry Night Reading Series. Widely published and regarded, Jollimore will join us from CSU Chico.
P.P.S. Don’t forget to vote tomorrow!