ENVELOPE, PLEASE: AWARDS & LATE BLOOMERS

Today the National Book Critic Circle announced its annual award winners. The winner of the NBCC fiction award is 52-year-old Ben Fountain for his debut novel "Billy Lynn's Halftime Walk," which has me thinking about late bloomers and awards.

Ben Fountain

     Fountain is the poster boy of literary late bloomers, first brought to national attention by Malcolm Gladwell who profiled him in a 2008 New Yorker article entitled "Late Bloomers."  By then Fountain had published a collection of short stories, "Brief Encounters With Che Guevara," which won the Hemingway Foundation/PEN award, but he was hardly an overnight success. His road to success, in fact, had been long and discouraging, which was Gladwell's point in an article that I hoped would finally put to rest the idea that Grandma Moses was the ultimate late bloomer.
     
      Not that I have anything against that sweet old grandmother turned painter, but late bloomers are not only those who late in life have suddenly decided to paint -- or write or sing or dance or play music or pursue any one of the creative arts. The term also applies to those who have toiled away for years with little or no recognition. The late-to-be-recognized bloomer.
   
      That label certainly applies to Fountain who quit his job as a lawyer to work on writing full time in 1988. "For every story he published in those early years, he had at least thirty rejections," wrote Gladwell in 2008. "His breakthrough with 'Brief Encounters' came in 2006, eighteen years after he first sat down to write at his kitchen table. The 'young' writer from the provinces took the literary world by storm at age forty-eight."
   
     And now in his fifties Fountain has won another major award for a debut novel. And, as an added bonus, that novel is being adapted to the screen by Simon Beaufoy, who won an Oscar for his screenplay of "Slumdog Millionaire."

     

Emmanuelle Riva

      A real triumph for a late bloomer, eh? The brass ring he was aiming for all along, right? Mmm, maybe not. As gratifying as his awards must be for him, I can't help but think that Fountain, who for so long looked like a "failure" to the outside world, would have continued to write even if recognition had not come his way.

     Which has me wondering: What motivates a creative person to keep on creating?
     
      
     According to Gladwell, Fountain was sustained by a wife who believed in him and urged him to continue to plow on despite all those rejections. But Fountain himself had to love the process or I'm sure he would have quietly returned to his law practice long ago.

     Awards and recognition clearly are not what nurtures real dreams.

     Awards, in fact, can even be bad for a creative career, particularly if recognition comes too early, giving the artist the false idea that their hard work is behind them. In filmdom it's called the Oscar Curse. Adrien Brody, who at 29 was the young man ever to win the Oscar for Best Actor in 2003, was one of 13 actors CNBC included among their list of "13 Actors Hit With the Oscar Curse."

     I can't imagine Emmanuelle Riva, who at 85 is the oldest actress ever nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress ever making such a list. The French actress -- who also is a published poet -- came to the Oscar ceremony (which was on her 86th birthday) already a winner. She had won both the BAFTA and the Cesar Awards for her role in "Amour" and, hey, who is going to forget the oldest actress ever to be nominated? It's as good as winning.

     "Everyone knows there are very few roles for older actresses. Almost none, in fact. And that is what makes all this so exceptional," Riva told the Guardian.
   

ANDREW YATES AFP/Getty Images

     Not winning also worked out for Susan Boyle. The Scottish singer took second place when she tried out for Britain's Got Talent in 2009. But Boyle's electric performance of "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Miserables catapulted her into a stratosphere of fame that few achieve.

      Boyle's debut album, "I Dreamed a Dream," became the UK's best-seling debut album of all time. She's had two more albums and a makeover. She's sung for the queen and returned in triumph to Britain's Got Talent to sing "You'll See." And today, The Hollywood Reporter revealed that Boyle -- she's 51 -- will be making her feature film debut in John Stephenson's "The Christmas Candle" -- with, appropriately enough, Samantha Barks of Les Miserables. Uh, and who were the winners of that 2009 Britain's Got Talent competition?

     I am convinced though that if Susan Boyle had not captured the world's attention, she would still be out there singing. Real dreams die hard.

     For every Susan Boyle -- and Ben Fountain -- there are scads of artists who continue to sing, write, paint, act, dance and play music for the sheer pleasure of it, concentrating more on the journey than the destination.

      I think the older we get, the more we can see how this works: Creativity is an end in itself. It's nice to have an appreciative audience, but it's not really a necessary ingredient.

      In a recent class I gave at the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg on Memoir Blogging, the participants --- all over 60 -- spent some time talking about what they wanted to focus on in their blogs. One was eager to write about life with her husband, an avid motorcyclist who had recently died in a crash, "doing what he loved to do." "He was such a great story teller," she told the group. "I want to write down the great stories he used to tell about his adventures so my grandchildren will know who he was." Another wanted to tell the stories of the risky travels she has been taking in her Eighties, including a trip to dangerous areas of Pakistan. "Risk at my age is not the same as for a younger person," she said. "At this age, wouldn't you rather go out in a blaze of glory than die in a nursing home?" Still another, who had been the primary caretaker of her husband during his long illness, planned to write about coping with being a widow at 60. She called her blog The Merry Widowhood.

     None of the participants seemed all that concerned about who would be reading their blogs. Some were not even interested in ever going public with their blog, but wanted simply to write a blog for family and friends. For others I imagine that the search for an audience will come later. For now, they are caught up in telling their stories the best that they can. Writing, it turns out, is its own reward.

THE TACO BELL SUPER BOWL AD & A SWEDISH CENTENARIAN: THROWING AGING STEREOTYPES OUT THE WINDOW

      The seniors who snuck out of their nursing homes for a wild night on the town in the Taco Bell commercial aired during this year's Super Bowl are professional actors, but the "octogenarian party animals" didn't have to fake their bad behavior. It "came naturally," Ernie Misko and Beverly Polcyn told CNN's Soledad O'Brien & company in this clip I found at Post 50.

     "We're no stick-in-the-mud people," said Polcyn. Was it difficult to shoot the scene where the seniors were making out in a bathroom stall? A piece a cake, according to Polcyn: "We've had some experience," she said batting her eyelashes.

      Even the idea of a nursing home escape wasn't that much of a stretch. There have been several real-life accounts of nursing home residents attempting to spring themselves from lockdown. Last year an 86-year-old pensioner fled from his residential care home in Ancona, Italy in the middle of the night -- in his electric wheelchair. When the police found him two hours later trying to drive down a busy motorway, he told the officers that he left because the home was "full of old people. I could not stand it any more...I may have lost my mobility but I have not lost my nerve and my sense of adventure." 

     Not all the real-life nursing home escapes though ended up as gleefully as it did for the wild and crazy bunch partying at a Taco Bell. In 2011, a Chicago man fell 10 to 20 feet to his death after he tried to slide down the sheets he had tied together and flung outside his nursing home window.

      Other fictional escapees, on the other hand, have fared much better. In The Great Nursing Home Escape, a motley group -- including a retired military man, a grouchy lady who used to work at the Department of Motor Vehicles, a talkative gossip, a former cheerleader, a Casanova and a "shy, sweet old gal" -- join forces and plot to leave their dreary nursing home behind and recapture their youth. The one-act comedy, written by Nathan Harswick, bills itself as "funny and heartwarming." A 2007 movie short promises much of the same. Written and directed by Jeremy Dehn (who also plays one of the minor characters), it's described as "a crotchety old comedy." It's title? The Grayed Escape. Ouch.

   
     My award for the most entertaining nursing home escapee tale goes to The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared. The author of that novel -- Jonas Jonasson, a former Swedish journalist and media consultant --  throws the prevailing stereotype that all Swedish novels are dark and brooding right out the window along with his charming protagonist, centenarian Allan Karlsson. The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared does involve several deaths, but they are all more or less accidental. And besides, those who are killed, as Arnold Schwarzenegger famously said in "True Lies," are all baaaad.

     Happily, Jonasson also throws out aging stereotypes as Allan Karlsson escapes via the window of his first-floor room at the Old Folks' Home. The home is just about to throw him a party for his 100th birthday and Karlsson can't bear the idea of celebrating without his beloved vodka, forbidden to him by the home's director, the bad-tempered Alice. The story of how he subsequently gets involved with Russian mobsters, a hot dog stand vendor and an elephant is highly entertaining, to say the least.

Swedish writer Jonas Jonasson (photo by A. Savin)

     Of course, it helps that Jonasson gives his escapee a colorful backstory, which he offers up throughout the novel in flashbacks. Karlsson rivals both Zelig and Forrest Gump combined in his uncanny ability to stumble into history, crossing paths with the likes of Franco, Truman, Churchill, Stalin and Mao. All thanks to his lifelong pursuit of a good meal and a glass of vodka. No wonder he's made it to the ripe old age of 100.

    The Swedes are making a movie out of The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared. The book was a bestseller in Sweden in 2010 and has sold more than 3 million copies worldwide. Hyperion Books published it in the United States last September.  And with the American penchant for remaking Swedish movies (see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and Let the Right One In), no doubt there will also be a U.S. version of Allan Karlsson's escapades. I hope so. I know some actors who will be first in line for the casting call. 

   

   

INTERVIEW: "JOURNEYWOMAN" EVELYN HANNON ON THE ART OF AGING DISGRACEFULLY

      Female travel bloggers now abound on the Internet, but Evelyn Hannon was a pioneer.  In 1997 at age 57, she launched journeywoman.com, an online travel resource just for women. Before then few people acknowledged a simple fact: Women have different travel concerns from men when traveling solo.

  Journeywoman first appeared in print in a mini-magazine Hannon started in 1994, but the real genesis of the site came in 1982. Hannon and her husband recently had been divorced. They had fallen in love at 14, married at 19 --  “Way too young,” she says now – and had two children. At 42, they knew they were going in different directions and had agreed to an amicable parting.  They would remain friends, but the pain of breaking that tie was “incredibly distressing,” says Hannon. “I felt that I had to go into the world by myself.”  She took a trip to Europe – alone.

    That solo journey would be the seed that would grow into Hannon’s late-blooming career as a travel writer and Journeywoman.

Evelyn Hannon

     As a writer, Hannon has had plenty of life experiences to tap into. During her marriage, she founded and operated a children's camp, worked at a recreational center for older adults and launched a company called Sorties that took older adults on trips to North America. After her divorce, she went back to school to study film and television. At 49, she got a grant to go to China to do research for a film on the way women do traditional Chinese medicine. In her fifties, she moved to Toronto where she started journeywoman.com. On her 65th birthday, she celebrated by running in a 10K race.

     

     Now 73, Hannon isn’t ready to slow down yet. Dubbed the Grandmother of Women's Travel (and now a real grandmother of four), she still manages (with only the help of a webmistress) her far-reaching network of female travelers (the website gets one million visitors a year) who keep each other informed and sometimes even meet up with each other in various parts of the globe. The site is peppered with good advice and articles written by contributors about their experiences. Hannon writes about her own travel adventures like the time she traveled to China with her daughter Leslie when she adopted a Chinese baby named Lotus.

Graphic from journeywoman.com

     Hannon tweets several times a day to her more than 22,000 followers on Twitter and writes a weekly blog – “Aging Disgracefully” – that appears on YummyMummyClub.ca, a website founded by her other daughter, Erica.

     This week, I caught up with Hannon by telephone at her home in Toronto. The following is an edited transcript of our chat:

     Creativity and travel have a lot in common. Both involve a certain amount of risk and putting yourself out there. How has aging changed your approach to your creative life as a travel writer and your actual traveling?

     As I get older, I get bolder. At this point I’m 73 years old and I pretty well speak my mind. I’m not afraid anymore. I’m not afraid to approach people. I’m not afraid to be playful. You know that whole thing about “when I get older, I’ll wear a purple hat.” Things don’t embarrass you and you know that you have the expertise and people know you are not just fooling around.

      You talk with admiration about your mother as someone who knew how to grow old gracefully. But your blog is called Aging Disgracefully.

     That’s right. My mother was an absolutely lady. I am a maverick. I don’t think anybody can accuse me of not being a lady. I’m never rude. I’m friendly. But my mother was a very sophisticated lady. I am a funky lady. I’m aging disgracefully  -- doing it a little differently than people expect.

     You started Journeywoman at age 57. What are the advantages to starting a project later in life and what are the disadvantages?

      I don’t think there are any disadvantages at all. The career moves that I had had in place before I started this company all gave me terrific background and access in order to create the new one.  So I was bringing forward all this lovely experience. I was saavy enough at that point. I had business acumen.  Yeah, it was perfect. I think that your excitement when you’re older is so much more because you understand that you are taking this on because you really really love the idea.

     What was your first travel piece about?

      My first travel piece was about Amsterdam. I didn’t really know how to do any of this then. So I cold call the Netherland Board of Tourism and said, “Hello. My name is Evelyn Hannon. I am going to be the first Canadian woman to start write about travel from a woman’s point of view and I’d like you to send me to Holland.” There was silence at the other end and then a woman said, “Evelyn, who are you? That’s not how you get assignments. Would you like me to explain how you do it?”  I eventually faxed her a letter of introduction and at the bottom of the letter I wrote: “Remember I’m a Journeywoman. My bags are always packed.” Four days later, the phone rang: “Evelyn, is your bag really packed? One of the journalists on our press trip just called to cancel, would you like to replace him?” That was my first travel story. It got incredible coverage. It was the first time someone had written a piece that said, “This is how you look at Amsterdam from a woman’s point of view.”

     In your piece Girl With a Grandmother Face, you describe your grandchildren’s negative reactions to your wrinkles. To counter that, because they called you old and weak, you challenged them to an arm wrestling match, which, of course, you eventually let them win. What can we do to change our society’s negative views of “girls with grandmother faces”? Or it up to us? Do we need to change attitudes out there or do we need to change attitudes within ourselves?

Graphic from journeywoman.com

      The concept of aging and of grandmother sitting in her rocking chair and knitting and all of the stereotypes are still in books. But our generation is slowly changing that. We’re living longer. We’re healthier. Many, many of us are single and therefore are working longer and choosing to work longer because it’s our way of being out in the world. I think we’re changing attitudes without really understanding that it’s happening. There are too many of us not to be changing the concept. Just by what we’re doing. I don’t think there’s a fight. When I meet up with younger travel bloggers, everyone is excited to see Journeywoman because I was the first one to start travel writing from a woman’s point of view. But when kids who are 40 years younger than I am say they cannot believe that I am 73 years old, I say, “Why? Age doesn’t have to do with your face. It has to do with what’s going on in your heart. It has to do with your spirit.” I think there are way more of us with that gumption, with that spirit than ever before.

     At 68 you joined 750 students and a dozen 50 plus lifelong learners for a 108 day voyage around the world with Semester at Sea. What did the younger students teach the elders on that trip?

    The energy. The excitement. The creativity. The crackling in the air because they were always so curious and wanting to change the world: It just invigorates you to be around that kind of energy. That’s what they taught me: Just get out there and try.

Some of the older people tried skydiving because all the other kids were doing it.

    What did the younger students learn from you?

   

     I was only supposed to be on that trip for half the time.  I had done some mentoring on board and given a few lectures. But when the kids learned I was getting off – six weeks into the journey -- they told me that they didn’t want me to go. “My cabin is being taken over by someone else,” I told them. “That was the contract.” Then one young woman, a medical student, came to me and said, “I’m not letting you go. I have a cabin with an extra bed and I want you to stay with me.” “It’s such a delight to have this invitation,” I told her, “but it’s going to be like having your grandmother in your room. Why don’t I just stay for one more port.” She said, “If you don’t stay for the whole trip, I’m not inviting you.” So I stayed. Oh, the fun we had. They just took me in. Nobody cared how old I was.

     I have noticed that the eligible ages for senior discounts vary wildly – ranging from 55 years on up to 70. Is that an example of society’s unwillingness to deal with age or is it a good thing that we don’t have a set idea of when old age begins?

     We have young…why shouldn’t we have old? But old has so many layers. It’s like the Eskimos who have many names for snow. There are so many interpretations of what old is. I think we can say what retirement age is – as long as it’s not mandatory. We can give people the option of stopping their profession at a certain time and collecting their pension, if they choose to. But in terms of society deciding what’s old is. No.

What is the age of your oldest contributor?

    I don’t know. So many of them are just a name. They send in their tips from all around the world. We have a deal. I don’t charge anything for my newsletters, but everybody who receives them needs to be prepared to send me one tip a year. That’s all I ask. And it’s amazing. This network is like the Little Engine That Could. And they just keep sending in their stuff.

Have you ever thought about writing a travel memoir?

      I can’t wait to put my story down on paper. But I’m waiting until I retire. I am so busy. I wake up at 5 a.m. and I force myself to stay in bed until 7 but for those two hours my mind is racing about everything that needs to be done. Because it really is more work than one person should be handling. I’m also blogging. I’m the resident grandmother on my daughter’s website, which incidentally just won a Digi award, the Oscar of the digital world. Then trying to be a good grandmother. And people are always calling me to ask me to give a post on this or that. I finally have gotten to the point of saying, if it’s a paid position, yes I will do it. But I can no longer do it complimentary. It’s too much for me.

      Wife, mother, business woman, divorcee, solo traveler, filmmaker, grandmother, travel writer, Internet personality, teacher, blogger, tweeter, Journeywoman: Evelyn, who are you?

     Every seven years, I kind of change. You know what drives me? I take on things that I know nothing about. I’m an absolute novice. I work at it until I perfect it in some way and get some recognition or an award or whatever and then I close the door and I say, okay I know how to do that. Life is short.  I want to learn how to do something else.

   So are you due for another reinvention?

  No. Journeywoman, it’s my love. I found my love.