By STEPHEN MOTIKA Special to the Palisadian-Post Each Californian pays just three cents a year to fund the arts. The budget of the California Arts Council has been reduced by 97 percent in the last three years, from $31 million in 2000 to $1 million last year. Due to this drastic reduction, the reach of the agency that provides grants to school-based arts programs, individual art projects, symphonies, and dance and theater companies has been decimated. This tragedy was the topic of discussion at a lunch last fall between journalist Donna Wares and book publisher Paddy Calistro. They agreed that something had to be done and the result is ‘My California: Journey’s by Great Writers,’ just published by Calistro’s Santa Monica-based Angel City Press, with all proceeds going to the Council. The anthology includes essays on the Golden State by 27 California writers. The pieces, ranging from personal reflection to sheer adventure, illuminate different areas of the state, from metropolitan Los Angeles to the rural Central Coast and the places in between. Each author donated his work, as did the book’s editor, publisher, designer, publicist, proofreader and printer. Even the cover, David Hockney’s ‘Pearblossom Hwy. 11-18th April 1989 (Second Version)’ was given by the artist and the Getty Museum, which owns the photographic collage. Now that the book is out, the many contributors are participating in readings at book fairs and bookstores across the state. Palisadian Carolyn See, who contributed to the volume, will be reading from and signing copies of the book on Thursday, July 29, 7:30 p.m. at Village Books, 1049 Swarthmore. See is thrilled with the book, praising its diversity and the fact that many of the pieces ‘are not exactly what you’d expect.’ Orange-county crime novelist T. Jefferson Parker has contributed a piece about fly fishing in the Owens River, but as the book’s editor, Donna Wares said recently, ‘It’s about a lot more than fly fishing.’ It marks a real journey up Highway 395, skirting the Sierra Nevada, the very backbone of the state. Wares, who has lived in California since 1986, was attracted to ‘Best American Travel Writing,’ an annual publication that reprints the best narrative travel essays to have appeared in magazines and newspapers the preceding year. ‘I always liked the sense of place in these collections and wanted to do a California version,’ said Wares, who approached Calistro about it, and they conceived of a narrative travel book to help raise funds for the endangered Council. With such a short turn-around time, Wares had little hope that many of the writers would be able to contribute to the volume. ‘These are enormously busy people and I was ready for a laundry list of excuses as to why they couldn’t contribute. Instead, most said immediately that they wanted to do it.’ One writer Wares had hoped to involve was Pico Iyer, whose travel writing she greatly admires. She sent a letter care of his publisher but did not hear back. Just as they were putting the finishing touches on the manuscript, he contacted her to see if he could still be involved (he had been in Japan and had only just received the letter). She agreed and when his piece came in, she realized that it would make the perfect introduction to the book. Wares said: ‘Iyer unintentionally touched on so many of the points that other writers had touched on. His piece made a natural introduction.’ Iyer’s cosmopolitanism and international scope represent the diversity of the authors in ‘My Californi.’ Wares is delighted with the ‘mix of newcomers and immigrants as well as the lifelong Californians.’ She notes the ‘range of the authors, from poet devorah major to novelist Michael Chabon, from nonfiction writer Mark Arax to journalists Patt Morrison and H’ctor Tobar.’ In the close of his introduction, Iyer invokes the state in celestial terms: ‘The gift of California, for those who have not just dreamed of it, but dared to stake everything on those dreams, is to look far beyond the everyday, and in the general direction of the stars.’ Indeed many of the pieces seem to wrestle with the dreams and the quotidian of the Golden State, of its promises and failures. For See, the very paradox of California, as a paradise and spoiled paradise, is ‘what makes it such a terrific place to write about.’ Her own contribution to the anthology, ‘Waters of Tranquility,’ dates from a few years back, when her life partner John Espey was dying and she took walks around Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine to release the stress and pain of caring for him and dealing with his relatives. The first time around the lake she would be cursing with rage, but after three or four times she was able to notice the beauty of the world around her. In short, the very secular Carolyn See was having a spiritual moment. ‘My California’ may seem like divine intervention to the California Arts Council, but it shows the amazing will and commitment of the state’s literary community. The Council is thrilled about the book and will apply all proceeds from it to fund student writing programs around the state. Now, as See says, ‘People need to go out and buy this book.’ ‘My California: Journeys by Great Writers,’ $16.95 For more information about its participants and upcoming events, visit http://www.mycaliforniaproject.org
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