Albuquerque Journal from Albuquerque, New Mexico • Page 11

ALBUQUERQUE JOURNAL Tuesday, April 11, 1989 R3 Novelist Describes Life of Harlem Renaissance By Gary Llbman "What (James) Baldwin said to me was that, 'We must create and disseminate the written word to perpetuate our own history. It's our responsibility to tell our Steven Corbin DOUGLAS BUnnOWSLOS ANGELES TIMES must write them. What Baldwin said to me was that, 'We must create and disseminate the written word to perpetuate our own history. It's our responsibility to tell our Corbin who, besides working as a legal secretary, took -jobs as a word processor, script typist and cab driver wrote a novel in 1982. It went unsold.

But he stuck to his work and produced "No Easy Place to Be" in 1984. Six years after he started writing, Simon Schuster bought his novel and paid Corbin an advance big enough so he could quit his other jobs, Malaika Adero, the Simon Schuster editor who bought Corbin's manuscript, said it had the elements of successful fiction: "It had glamour. It had sex. It had race. It had things that dazzle.

The uptown social life of Harlem in the '20s it's a very romantic period. That helped tremendously." Corbin wrote another novel in 1986, which the publisher is considering. If it does not sell, he will write another. "I knew I was going to be published some day," Corbin says, exuding confidence. "I knew there was a place in the American literary family for me.

That's the only propeller that kept roe going. "I think it's a very eclectic audience and that I write stories white people want to read. You do not have to be of the black experience. I meet all kinds of people and I try to write about those people. "I don't think it's any different than Larry McMurtry writing Lonesome Dove with one black character.

A story is a story. That is what readers want. I think I know what readers want and that is what I try to give them." stayed for two years before he ran out of money and left in 1977. He then supported himself by working as a legal secretary. He formulated Ideas for screenplays, which he never wrote, and finally figured what he really wanted to be was a novelist.

"I had to decide whether I could really work in Hollywood, in terms of writing something I could get made," he says. "At that time, there was a real dearth of black product coming out, so that was working against me. And everyone in this town was a screenplay writer. It was a joke. People would say, 'Oh, you're a screenwriter? That's nice.

What do you really So I just got up one day in 1981 and went to the typewriter to write a story, as best I knew how. It was a short story, which grew into a novella. Although I really did not know what I was doing, that led me into a segue. I thought, this sounds pretty decent, and if I can write this, I should be able to do a novel." His decision followed a belated introduction to literature. He read little before college but began devouring novels at school.

"I think college made me realize my life was not complete unless I was reading," he says, adding that after he left school, he began reading works of black writers, particularly James Baldwin. "I never had any black lit. in high school or college," he says. "I was catching up. People would talk about 'Invisible 'Native 'Black Boy' or 'Another Country and I would say, 'Oh, so I have a predecessor in black "From reading fiction I learned, yes.

you can write novels. From reading James Baldwin, I learned I LOS ANQELES TIMES LOS ANGELES Steven Corbin wrote his just-published novel, "No Easy Place to Be," on a desk next to the washer and dryer in the small laundry room of his Los Angeles apartment, where the phone sits on the floor and he must exert himself to answer calls. ilis spacious living room is bare except for an old couch facing the fireplace. In the large dining room, there's only an old cabinet and a dining table pressed against the wall. There's a reason for his home's spare decor and it's not just financial.

"I need space for my characters to walk around so I can understand them," Corbin, 35, says. "The characters are allowed to bring themselves to the surface where I can see and hear them. And I talk to them." He might, for example, chat with Velma, a character from his book. "I'll say, 'I don't know, Velma. Would you really do I need to play out their development." For Corbin, the latest twist in his development as a writer came with the publication of his first novel, set in the 1920s Harlem Renaissance, in which blacks from Africa, the West Indies and across the United States mingled their talents In a remarkably explosive, romantic, creative and productive way.

Corbin spent two years researching the seminal period of black life and wrote his 447-page work, which experts say is one of the few novels ever published by a Los Angeles black, in seven months. "I wanted to say something about black writers," Corbin explains, 'New Feminism9 Commitments providing for those needs, "it's not a problem. But when it's not real for her, it is a problem," he said. "Like any relationship, there are times when we don't fulfill each other's needs." Although Kohner said he believes that all relationships undergo a transformation after the initial glow has worn off the beginning, I was Mr. Understanding, and now I can be hell on wheels, just like she he echoed the sentiments of other men confronted with the idea that a woman could plot, step by-step, how to snag him.

"It's manipulation," he said. MOVE adding that he believes the Harlem Renaissance "is a missing chapter (that) I wanted to put back into American history. No one knows about the Harlem Renaissance, and that's a large error. That's offensive to me. "What's even more offensive is that the only thing we remember about the Harlem Renaissance is the Cotton Club, where blacks danced and sang and did buffoonery.

We do not remember our novelists, our playwrights and our great actors such as Paul Robeson." But as a youngster in Jersey City, N.J., Corbin recalls hearing his grandmother's riveting stones of the Cotton Club, where all black revues performed for white-only audiences. He heard her tales of thousands of blacks taking elegant Sunday strolls on Seventh Avenue. Later, he learned about the artistic How do today's husband hunting new feminists bait the hook and reel him in lor the catch? Here's a sampling of what hot. and what net: Got rid of that hard-odjed imago of Faye Dunaway in "Network and start cultivating a vulnerability ttke Metanie Griffith's in "Working Girt." Practice laughing a tinkling lauqh and giggling coquetushly. (Don't worry about what you're friends will think chances aro good they're home practicing, too.) Leave your opinions on world affairs and the destiny of mankind as far away from rum as possible there's onty room for one thinker in this relationship.

Besides, if you let rum be the profound one while you listen in awe at his grasp of complex issues, he's bound to adore you for your ttgh level of perception. Never, never, never be loo clever, (nemcmixsr what your mother tokJ you?) Become a virgin, if that's not possible, be the next best thing: chasio. HokJ out until there's a ring on your finger or he has rrvido his ctear commitment to you in writing. Don't be too avaiabio. or ho might think you're trying to snag rum.

Go out with friends regular or just stay home drives the man crazy. He says, Who am I dealing Women in her audiences, Allen said, are also encouraged to repeat a "pledge," designed to keep them from saying things that might bump them off the altar list forever: "I pledge, on my honor, to respect the man I have chosen even when I believe I am smarter." In "Love Tactics: How to Win the One You Want," authors Thomas W. McKnight and Robert H. Phillips take a slightly different approach to capturing a man's heart. One of the best ways, they say, is to become his closest confidant.

To accomplish this, the authors give an example of an active listening mode that allegedly will endear him to you because of your perception and understanding: Tim: You know, I've had it with the people at my office! Tina: Go on Tim: All they ever do anymore is pick, pick, pick on every thing I try to do. Tina: Sounds as if you're upset adding that Corbin has produced "an interesting but (Tawed treatment of a period of great social flux." Corbin seems unruffled by the faint praise. Of critics, the 5 foot-10 author whose rippling arms show that he has lifted his share of weights, says simply, "I never agree with what they say, and I don't know what they look for. So I don't worry about that." What Corbin is interested in is developing his writing skills, which he only recently began to tap. Corbin's mother was a housewife.

His father, who attended college, managed a supermarket. He has two brothers and attended Essex County College in Newark, before earning a scholarship to the University of Southern California's cinema-television school, where he on Men, said. "When it comes to man-trapping, women have a tendency to regress, to put aside the qualities that have made them successful in business and look for a man to take care of them. What happens is, the men become angry when they find out they have ken lied to." Rather than suggest that women resort to a mode of communication she believes is "emotionally stifling and false" for many women, Cabot advises readers to tune into the type of man they arc dealing with. Since everyone is predominantly cither a visual person, auditory person or a "feelings" person, Cabot said, a man will feel more corafortabfe and ultimately more susceptible to love when he is spoken to according to his predilection.

The idea, she explained from her Van Nuys home, is to mirror his method of communicating. "With a visual man, say things like i sec what you mean' or 'That looks With an auditory' nan, say things like, 'That sounds good' or 'I hear what you're saying, Cabot said. With a man more oriented toward his feelings, Cabot recommends using language like "I sense what you're saying is or "I have the feeling that what you're trying to say is What's the general response to advice from some authors and psychologists that women should concentrate on learning to fhrt, suggestively button their blouses, hang on his every' word and and let him thmk they are chaste? The jury, it appears, is still out. "Making a man feel tike a king, building him up and stroking his ego is fun to do, but 1 also let him know how I feel. It's not at the expense of who I am," said Nayra Perez, a AVycarold court reporter living in Sherman Oaks, Calif.

"1 think a man likes a woman ho has a lot of sides to her a woman, a tittle girl and a mother in her. I'm no bulldozer, but I'm spunky." Eric Kohner, a 36ycar-old North Hollywood actor, said the idea of a woman catering to his needs isn't unappealing "I like a woman who shows her intelligence, but I also have discovered I need to be king I need to be adored in a certain way and taken care of." Kohner said, adding that when his live-in girlfriend of six months fects like Street CAM and intellectual fervor in Harlem during the Renaissance, when singer-actor Robeson, black nationalist Marcus Garvcy, scholar Alaine Locke and authors such as Langston Hughes and Zora N'ealc Hurston all were powerful forces. He felt he could best capture the time rot with a historical study, but in a work of fiction "on a grand scale to show all that went on." He blends the elements into the story of three Harlen sisters: one who longs to return to Africa, another who tries to pass for white and a third who writes novels. Early reviews give Corbin high marks for his historical accuracy but criticize how his characters interact and cite other flaws. "While his dialogue is sometimes pointed and viviJ, too often the writing is stilted and woefully cliched." said Iublishcrs Weekly, Focuses watching television, after you've tokl rum that you absolutely, positivefy couldn't break your commitment to work that night at the orphanage.

Let him "know on a regular bas3 that he is the most wonderful, fascinating, exciting, handsome man you have ever mot. Whenever appropriate, lot rum know his dominant position in the relationship by saying things like. "Whatever you trunk is best" or "It's up to you. honey." Soften your edgos wan lacy lingerie that he only glimpses of as you cateulatodty bend over to retrieve an intentionally dropped artxrie on the ground. Then, pat a lacy handkerchief to your cottartone, unbuttoning the tcp button ot your blouse with the ether hand, whi'e you exclaim a soft, throaty voce: Gee, it sure feels hot in here." Be a woman of mystery, and don't tea him too much about your past.

Bosses, Ivs imagination is bkey to bo to be a hundred times belter than (he real th ng ever ccnikj bo. Be forever understanding of hts problems, no matrer hew many times he has told them to you or how boring they are. Remember to be a new feminist, you're there for HiM. because the people at work are overly critical. Tim: You got it! Notice that the new feminist doesn't give him advice, remark th.it this is the 10th evening in a row he has complained about his co-workers or even suggest that he check out the want aJs if things are so bad.

The new feminist holds her tongue. She's understanding. She's his pillar of strength. Cabot, whose book "How to Make a Man Fall in live With You" was bawd on a postdoctoral degree on the relationship between language and romance, said she also believes in nurturing through good communication techniques but to a limit. If a woman enters a relationship appearing to be something she is not, she said, eventually she will be found out.

"It's a fairly simple idea that a man wants to be mured, and that if you arc demanding and (nasty) you will drive him away. But I also think there is such a thing as phony feminism," she ana come surprised," liness, of worrying "It's kind ripping hustling," better instead Abbott castaway a broken aren't easily "If you FOR ALL THE RIGHT REASONS Others, however, express doubt about how long the masquerade of being a forever adoring, coquettish fantasy-woman could be maintained. "I think every woman has, at some time, acted a certain way because she thought it was the way a man wanted her to be. But if you do that, you are coming from desperation and desperation always ends in disaster," said Esther Petersen, a legal secretary and single mother in Los Angeles. "I personally could never keep it up for more than a week," she said, laughing.

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2, Grant said, is to let him know who's boss. "Men need to be right, even when they're wrong." Lesson No 3 could be the most important: Learn lo wait. Become virginal, chaste, willing to abstain until he has spoken the Big word: commitment. As for the assertive, aggressive career woman of the past now relegated to the ranks of what she describes in her book as the "Amazon" woman Grant, recently remarried to multimillionaire businessman John Bell, has even more advice for husband-hunters: "Submission can be downright relaxing." Not every proponent of the New Feminism, however, advocates such tactics even if it is all in the name of love. Balance, others say.

is the key. "Toni (Grant) is teaching women not to run away with the Amazon. My tack is how to be virtuous as a woman." said Pat Allen, a Newport Beach, psychologist who leads weekly jam-packed seminars in the Los Angeles area on creating successful relationships. "The Amazon simply needs to be backed down into a batanccd woman." Convinced that men and women both have feminine and masculine sides to them, Allen said she doesn't advocate any one particular type of behavior for women wanting en intimate relationship. Instead, she said, she advises consistency.

If a woman enters a relationship acting as the caregiver and protector, Allen said, stay that way If she enters being the protected one, stay that way, too. "What happens a lot is that a powerful woman will give and protect a man until she thinks she's got him, and then she completely collapses," Allen said. "Others go back and forth between automatic helpless mode and the Amazon. Either way it Free for CONTINUED FROM PAGE 81 search no more! into account, Camlu offer spacious studio, and one bedroom apartments utilities included delicious and nutritious home-C(K)ked meals served daily weekly maid and linen service All on Stanford GLL NOW 298-9976 0414 LU 0 After have the right to choose your own lifestyle Albuquerque 12101 Lomas Blvd. N.L people giving and taking without about coming out ahead.

of an ugly world with people each other off and stealing and she said. MI like to n.ike things of taking, takhp. taking." said there's always drmand for the items that end u.t on the porch. Even toy will, sooner or later, find a new-owner proof that for some people things acquired. drop it (clothing) by in the morninc else; they too get hungry.

Every winter she and Mr. Abbatt stock up on blankets and coats in Albuquerque's thrift stores. It's the only way they can keep their own clothes, she said. "If you're in a warm house and someone's out there "You see, that's my selfish thing," she said. "We want to keep our good jackets if something comes up." Pam Talley, who works at Yale Blood Plasma, lives four blocks from the porch.

She has been dropping things off and picking things up there for several years. Talley said she likes the idea of neighbor- sides, she loves composing signs. "Get onto this porch one nore time and you won't have to go to Graceland to see an Elvis look-alike You will meet the King!" one sign says. Another says: "You have the right to remain silent and you just may forever! if you climb on this railing one more time" Abbott doesn't worry that many of her visitors have red faces and unsteady gaits: Thev feel the bite of winter like everyone by the evening, you II Abbott said. "It will be gone be.