Money for KAP House
Chalk one up (again) for the forces renovating the Katherine Anne Porter house. Bill Johnson, a trustee of the Johnson Burdine Foundation in Buda and co-chair of the Katherine Anne Porter House Restoration Committee, recently donated $100,000 for the restoration of the house, which is in Kyle. The Burdine Johnson Foundation primarily donates money to the arts and educational institutions in Central Texas, and has in the past given to the Hays School District, St. Stephen’s, and the College of Fine Arts at UT. In 1997, the Foundation helped Preservation Associates Inc. (Friends of the Hays County Historic Commission) purchase the Porter House.
Asked about his motivations for donating the money, Johnson cites this passage from “Noon Wine,” one of Porter’s short stories: “Mrs. Thompson sat down slowly against the side of the house and began to slide forward on her face; she felt as if she were drowning, she couldn’t rise to the top somehow, and her only thought was she was glad the boys were not there, they were out, fishing at Halifax, oh, God, she was glad the boys were not there.” “I’m certain this ‘Halifax’ Porter refers to is Halifax Hole, a deep, natural stretch of the Blanco River about four miles west of Kyle,” Johnson said. “When Katherine Anne Porter was growing up in Kyle (around 1900), Halifax Hole was accessible to Kyle residents via a public road. Today my home overlooks the same Halifax Hole.”
McSweeney’s
As I was trying to figure out a way to say that you should consider buying humor writing journal McSweeney’s for that “student of humor” on your list or that person who is very hard to buy for, I ran across the first sentence of a piece in McSweeney’s by David Foster Wallace and it goes like this: “Then just as I was being released in late 1996 Mother won a small product liability settlement and used the money to promptly go get cosmetic surgery on the crow’s feet around her eyes. However the cosmetic surgeon botched it and did something to the musculature of her face which caused her to look scared all the time. You doubtless know the way someone’s face looks in the split second just before they begin to scream. That was now Mother.” That just about explains McSweeney’s. Or how about the McSweeney’s take on what Camille Paglia might have to say about “the cultural signifigance of animal stars”: “Lassie is the eternal feminine. … The whimper is crucial.” “Like me, That Darn Cat was way, way ahead of its time.” Order McSweeney’s from its Web site, http://www.mcsweeneys.net
AWL Gifts
There’s a sidebar in this week’s “Books” section on some local authors’ books which use Austin as a setting or are Texas-infused works that might serve as good gifts. But if you’d like to give a writer the gift of continuing education, gift certificates are avaliable in any amount from the Austin Writers’ League for memberships, merchandise, or classes. Memberships are $40; beginning February 15, William Browning Spencer will teach the League’s 10-week intensive Novel-in-Progess workshop. The class is limited to 10 students and if you’d like to give this class as a gift to someone, you better make sure the recipient really has a novel in progress � two students’ works are featured each session. And beginning February 17, Debi Martin-Morris will teach a 10-week intensive workshop, “Breaking Into Magazine Writing Is Hard to Do!” Enrollment in this class is also limited to 10 students. Call AWL at 499-8914 for more information.
This article appears in December 18 • 1998 and December 18 • 1998 (Cover).