Linfield Magazine

Volume 1 Number 3 Winter 2005 Article 5

Winter 2005

Lipkin Wins Oregon Book Award

Laura Davis Linfield College

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Recommended Citation Davis, Laura (2005) "Lipkin Wins Oregon Book Award," Linfield Magazine: Vol. 1 : No. 3 , Article 5. Available at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/linfield_magazine/vol1/iss3/5

This article is brought to you for free via open access, courtesy of DigitalCommons@Linfield. orF more information, please contact [email protected]. A View from Melrose Student Profile Lipkin wins Oregon Book Award

Diverse cultures enrich life Shelly Lipkin ‘05 made a U.S. International University School of Performing Arts. few good friends as he He put school on the back burner after being accepted to Not everyone on our My life has been richer for having known so many penned his recent award- perform with the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. street was Swedish. people around the world. I have lived as a member of a winning play. He spent the next 20 years in Los Angeles as a tele- In fact, in the small minority in the world of Islam and the Jewish commu- Lipkin, of Lake Oswego, vision and film actor, appearing in numerous movies, mining and lumber town in nity in Israel. I have studied, traveled and taught in earned a 2004 Oregon Book commercials and sitcoms, before moving to Oregon in northern Michigan where I Europe. I am working with students at Africa University Award for Vitriol and Violets, 1998. Most recently, he appeared in the Sundance grew up, within our block from 21 African countries, with 26 tribal languages. a play he co-authored with Festival award-winning film Mean Creek. we had families who were And it all began on that street in northern Michigan. Louanne Moldovan and Lipkin was co-artistic director of Cygnet Greek Orthodox, German, Fewer American children nowadays grow up amid Sherry Lamoreaux. Productions from 2000 to 2003 and served as co-artis- Swedish, Finnish, Orthodox the kind of diversity that my childhood playmates and I “You kind of live it,” tic director of West Coast Ensemble Theatre. In addition Jewish and Polish. Most took for granted. This makes it all the more important said Lipkin, of the story. to his theatrical work, he is an adjunct professor at of the parents spoke their for them to be exposed to diversity later on and to learn Shelly Lipkin ‘05 “The characters become Marylhurst University and teaches drama for Lakewood native languages, and the to value it. We are living in a diverse world and it is your best friends, in a way.” Theatre Company. He is also a teacher and consultant at first-generation Americans imperative that we encourage our students to learn and Vitriol and Violets is set in the 1920s at Manhattan’s New Horizons Computer Center. tried to learn the languages, mostly so we could under- explore other countries and other cultures. We need to Algonquin Hotel, where a group of writers – future Lipkin said he returned to school “for my soul. I stand what our parents were saying to each other. help them appreciate the importance of living and Pulitzer Prize and Academy Award winners – gathered wanted to have a degree,” and found a good fit with Our hero was Adam Meliss from Poland, who learning in a multicultural environment. each day for lunch. The group, known as the Algonquin Linfield’s flexible schedule, weekend classes and top- owned and operated the popcorn wagon all summer If we can teach our students those lessons, they in Round Table, included writers like Dorothy Parker, notch faculty. long. We felt he had been the most successful immigrant turn can help others view the color of one’s skin, the Alexander Woollcott, Robert Benchley, Edna Ferber, “I’d heard great things about Linfield,” he said. “I’ve of all on the block. accent in one’s voice, the religious practices of one’s Harold Ross and Harpo Marx. They played poker been able to fit it into my schedule. That’s the best What a rich learning environment, and what won- faith, the special foods that we share as opportunities for and extreme croquet, and even bought a vacation island thing about it. It’s a great tool for people trying to do derful food we shared as we celebrated the traditions of growth, learning and enjoyment. together. two things at once.” the various cultures! In so many ways our alumni, students and faculty have “These were wild people who had lunch together Barbara Drake, professor of English, remembers In college in the early 1950s, I had my first oppor- helped us, from the Reach Back Mentors group to the every day in the Algonquin Hotel,” said Lipkin, who teaching Lipkin during a creative nonfiction workshop. tunity to study abroad. Much to the chagrin of my support group that our students provide for biracial families. also co-produced and acted in the play. “At the time, “Here was this guy who could act and write and Swedish parents, I traveled to Norway to study for a Our Hawaiian alumni still come to roast the pigs for none of them were famous. They were broke, the had all kinds of theatrical experience,” Drake said. “He term, and that began my life-long love of travel and the lu’au—an experience they want to continue to share. Algonquin was a pit, but they were brilliant writers. This had such a knack for making his stories come alive. learning about other cultures and other countries. Our Japanese exchange students dress in their beau- was the beginning of Broadway.” When he gave a reading in class it was a performance, That is when I began to understand how tiful kimonos to entertain the school children and the It took a year to write the play, which initially often a very funny one. He really knows how to use much we had to learn from each other residents of a retirement home. opened in 2002. Editing from early performances result- voice, on and off the page.” and how much our world needed that Our Spanish-speaking students reach out in many ed in the current version. shared understanding. It still does. ways to serve our changing community here in the valley. Lipkin, who is working toward a humanities degree – Laura Davis All of our international students, from over 20 through Linfield’s Adult Degree Program, recently fin- countries, come to share with us, as well as learn more ished writing a second play, Sylver Beach’s [sic], which about the complex, joyful and beautiful United States. has doubled as his Linfield senior thesis. He is now Our faculty, through their research and outreach, writing a third play, a comedy, focusing on how a man have led many of us to a better understanding of the rich deals with his brother’s suicide. diversity that is becoming a part of our everyday lives. “Literature has to entertain people, hold their This issue of Linfield Magazine highlights the expe- interest and capture their imagination,” he said. riences of some of today’s Linfield students as they “That’s what I think of when I write.” encountered diversity in the college’s international pro- With Vitriol finished, another play newly grams. The experiences themselves are diverse, as are the completed and a third in the works, programs that made them possible and the greatly Lipkin is making his mark as a play- expanded number of countries students can now visit as wright. He has been involved in part of their Linfield education. As varied as the experi- theater since age 20, when he ences are, they all share a common denominator: the took to the stage as a student at transformational effect they have had on the way these the College of Marin and the young people see the world, and sometimes themselves.

– Vivian A. Bull Shelly Lipkin ‘05, left, as Robert Benchley and Jane Ferguson as Dorothy Parker in a scene from President Vivian A. Bull learning the pipa, the award-winning play Vitriol and Violets, which a Chinese lute, at Wenzhou University he co-authored. 4 - LINFIELD MAGAZINE WINTER 2005 - 5