Maine, Gay Marriage and Harvey Milk

On May 22, Harvey Milk will have turned 79 if Dan White hadn't assassinated him in 1978 along with the popular Mayor of San Francisco George Mosconi. Its a tribute to Harvey Milk that all the New England states have approved and now allow gay marriages.

Dan White was convicted of "Manslaughter" in spite of evidence that he climbed into an open window in City Hall because he knew his gun would set off the alarm at the normal entrance and that he also packed extra bullets so that after he pumped two bullets into the Mayor he could go across the hall and pump 5 more into Harvey Milk, 3 into his head after Harvey was on the floor. For this act he served only 4 years in jail thanks to his "peers" on the jury, none of whom were gay and a friendly and sympathetic police force and prosecutor.

Harvey Milk was instrumental in defeating California's prop 6 which would have allowed schools and other institutions in the State to fire anyone who came out and announced he was a homosexual. Harvey had been elected in 1977 as the first gay Supervisor for the Castro District of San Francisco. Nine others were elected to represent nine other Districts under a new governance plan that divided the city into 10 Districts for the first time in the city's history. Dan White was another Supervidor who was elected from a conservative District of the City.

The City mourned the death of the two politicians with a candlelight march that brought out thousands of people. The verdict brought a violent reaction which resulted in the burning of police cars and fires in City Hall. Two days later four cars full of police in riot gear entered a gay bar in the District and ended with 20 policeman and 100 citizens injured.

California turned down gay marriage last year when Prop 8 was defeated through a heavily conservative funded television campaign. I believe that that next year will see gay marriages approved in California when the Supreme Judicial Court rules on the legality of its ban. Harvey Milk believed that gay people should declare themselves and by doing that will change the country's attitude towards accepting gays in all walks of life. the 31 years since his death has, I believe, proven him right.

The Second Coming of J.K. Rowlings?

Irene Sage's article this morning in the Boston Globe described Reif Larson's first novel "The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet" for which he was reportedly awarded $900,000 by Penguin Books after a heated auction among nine publishers last June. This book, being released today, is about a 12 year old boy, an obsessive compulsive who uses margins notes and drawings to help recount his great adventures and inner journeys.

Unlike single parent Rowlings, Larson is a 27 year old doctoral candidate living with his girl friend in a Park Slope brownstone. he grew up in Cambridge (MA) and participated in improvisational theater at Brown University and graduated with a major in Education in 2002. He has taught creative writing and practices Zen Buddhism.

The interest in Larson's first novel without doubt is owed to Rowling's success with her Potter series which made her the richest woman in England (including the Queen. This book is in the "crossover" category, the hottest because of its attraction to both adult and young readers.

Larson will be at the Brookline Booksmith on Thursday may 7th and the lines to hear him read from his work is expected to be long. He has already started his second novel.