INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 1343617 Bring Out The Thunder. [Original writing] Hartman, Steven Patrick, M.F.A. The American University, 1991 UMI 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 BRING OUT THE THUNDER by Steven P. Hartman submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of The American University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Signatures of Committee: Chair: D^an of /the College fludM - fly Dati 1 1991 The American University 1 \ U \ Washington, DC 20016 AMERICAN UNIVERSITY LIBRARY © COPYRIGHT by Steven P. Hartman 1991 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED For Dr. John Harcourt, an extraordinary human being. And in memory of Robert Pirosh, writer. 1910-1989 BRING OUT THE THUNDER BY Steven P. Hartman ABSTRACT Bring Out The Thunder is a novel in stories and vignettes. This thesis represents the first two sections (thirty-five chapters) of a three part novel (fifty chapters). Set in rural New York State, in an unusual town called Webb Mills, the novel examines this town and the lives of the people who inhabit it. Webb Mills is a cradle of violence, poverty and recklessness where the everyday mayhem of the townsfolk would be laughable if it weren't often so dangerous. Yet, Webb Mills is also a community of close-knit fraternal ties, of social interdependence: a village so small that the tragedies of one become the heartbreaks of all, the achievements of one, the mild successes of all. The stories are told through the eyes of a young boy who tries to make sense out of a world of nonsense, who tries to construct his own makeshift system of moral and social order through seemingly random experiences of trial and error. ii X \ ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS in April, 1990, Bring Out The Thunder won The Edwin Moses Prize for Literature, awarded by the Graduate English Program at The University of Southern California. The author wishes to acknowledge the faculty of that department, and es­ pecially T. Coraghessan Boyle, for the encouragement he has received on the project. Acknowledgement is also made to publications in which many of these chapters first appeared: "The Secret of Me," "Pool-Playing Pete," "I Remember," "The Margie Cramer Pre­ school," "Pearl Says," "Spanish Pirates," "Horseface," "Run­ away Busses and Criminal Leagues," "Boll Weevil," "The Baron of Zurich," and "And Pearl Says" in Coluiribia: A Magazine of Poetry and Prose; "The Spawn of Satan," "Icelandic Outlaws, Knotty-armed Men," "Walking the Woods" and "Mahalco Joe" in Folio; and "The Jack of Diamonds," "The First Time," "Dead Man's Curve," "The Stag," "A Time For Everything," "The Mohawks," "A Man's Gotta Do What A Man's Gotta Do," "Troop 43," "The Weed," "The Freedom Children" and "Buffalo Billy, Cochise the Eighth, and the year of many things" in VOX. Particularly helpful advice has been given on a number of iii these chapters by Elizabeth Thomas and Paul Gediman at Columbia Magazine. Finally, the author wishes to express his grateful acknowledgement to the members of his faculty thesis committee at the American University, and to Dr. John Harcourt, Ben Masselink, James Mitchell and Michael Wilds, whose encouragement and advice on this novel have been invaluable. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract................................................... ii Acknowledgements........................................... iii BRING OUT THE THUNDER The Secret of M e ........................................... l I Remember................................................. 7 Pool-playing Pete.......................................... 9 The First Time............................................. 10 Pearl Says................................................. 14 The Margie Cramer Preschool............................... 16 Dead Man's Curve........................................... 19 Horseface.................................................. 23 The Spawn of Satan........................................ 27 A Time For Everything..................................... 30 Mahalco Joe................................................ 39 Spanish Pirates............................................ 46 The Mohawks................................................ 52 The Jack of Diamonds...................................... 56 Dream...................................................... 7 2 Boll Weevil................................................ 73 Runaway Busses and Criminal Leagues....................... 77 Dinosaur Shit 83 Troop 43................................................... 90 The Weed................................................... 92 Icelandic Outlaws, Knotty-armed Men....................... 96 Walking The Woods.......................................... 102 The Stag................................................... 107 The Freedom Children....................................... 112 A Man's Gotta Do What A Man’s Gotta Do..................... 120 The Baron of Zurich........................................ 131 45's and . 38' s ............................................. 140 Eleven Ways To Die qjc. In Search Of The Eternal Silence.... 144 Agnes.......................................................157 The Beats.................................................. 163 The Faerie Changeling Child................................17 3 And Pearl Says............................................. 180 Buffalo Billy, Cochise The Eighth and the year of many things. 181 Maw.........................................................199 The Death of The Anti-leagues Movement..................... 201 "And He Who made kittens put snakes in the grass." — Ian Anderson BRING OUT THE THUNDER THE SECRET OF ME I was born on a grassy knoll in a place called Webb Mills. It was March, 1965, and they say it never rained that spring. The old lady who dried my bones was named Pearl and she had two thumbs on her left hand. Pearl eased me from the womb like a greased watermelon, then she tucked me tight in a burlap guilt. As for my Maw, she wouldn't look at me. Pearl cut the cord with tin-snips and Maw threw up on the spot. The grass always grew higher on that spot--where Maw threw up and where Pearl buried the placenta. It grew tall and green, but it doesn't anymore. There's a driveway there now. Pearl took me home and kept me in a closet for three months. I was supposed to be a secret, but that didn't quite work out. Webb Mills is kind of a small place and nothing is much of a secret there for long. In fact, the longest secret ever kept in Webb Mills was only for ninety-six days, just barely beating out the secret of me. Dexter McGarver had a secret. He buried his wife, Agnes, in eight different places. It's not that he buried her, then unburied her and then buried her again eight times. l 2 No, he buried her in all eight places at once, because Agnes wasn't what you'd call jointly bound anymore. Dexter took care of that. So, for about three months he was a pretty happy guy, walking around with a big goofy grin, singing loud and out of key at church. Some of the women would ask him after services. They'd say "Dexter, now what in the world is Agnes up to? It's just not like her to take the Lord's Day for granted." Dexter would smile kind of timidly and kick the dirt at his feet. He'd say, "Well gee, girls, I guess she's just feeling a bit detached these days." The women would shake their heads and mention how they were going to go on up to McGarver farm and have a talk with Agnes--how she wasn't taking it into account that she was putting her soul in jeopardy. On Sundays the atmosphere was especially good for talk about souls and jeopardy and the temptations of Lucifer. But nobody seemed to talk about those things during the rest of the week and no one ever made it up to McGarver farm, at least not until the floods. in the fall, a big storm happened along and in a short time the fields got flooded. It wasn't long before body parts were popping up all over the place. I guess it was her right shoulder that came up first and that must have been around day eighty-five of Dexter's secret. Before