Jack Saunders wrote 265 books without
selling one to New York or Hollywood.
He published eight of them himself,
with the help of friends, and serialized many more, on the worldwide web, after he
gave himself a web page when he signed a 30-year mortgage on a house, at age 60.
A small press publisher, LitVision Press, asked to publish Bukowski Never Did
This: A Year in the Life of an Underground Writer and His Family. Saunders quit
his job, cashed in an annuity he had rolled his retirement from a fiber-optic cable
manufacturer over into, when they laid him off, in a recession, and went on the road,
barnstorming for Bukowski Never Did This, at zine fests, bookstore readings,
and book-signings around Florida's Northwest Coast.
August 31, 2005 is Saunders'
34th anniversary as a writer.
He plans to write UNDERGROUND WRITER: A LIFE
OUTSIDE THE MAINSTREAM during the month of August, finishing it on his anniversary.
UNDERGROUND WRITER is a one-volume memoir, like Angela's Ashes, Are You Somebody?,
The Liar's Club, or Lynn Freed's forthcoming Reading, Writing & Leaving
Home: Life on the Page.
Freed's book is a collection of essays, but when
Harper's published an excerpt, "Doing Time: My Years in the Creative
Writing Gulag," they called it memoir.
UNDERGROUND WRITER tells about
the life of an underground writer, an outsider, slogging away in the small-beer trenches
of events like Philly Zine Fest 2005 and Zine-A-Polooza 2005. Wanna-bes and has-beens,
like the two models at Glamourcon '99 who both claimed to be the first, that is the
oldest, Playboy bunny.
Still, Saunders was a headliner at the Underground
Literary Alliance's Legends of the Underground readings off-off-Broadway in May 2001.
The ant's a centaur in his dragon world. Even though his tits may sag.
UNDERGROUND
WRITER is about life off the page, a life excluded from the page because his life
is "off the rails," as Norman Mailer said. A life in self-published pamphlets
and homemade web sites, family akimbo, keeping the faith. Waiting for his breakthrough.
UNDERGROUND WRITER is his attempt to write a break-out book. To break himself out.
In front of a live audience. With no safety net.
An audacious performance.
As Brother Dave says, "Here, Julius--hold this."
UNDERGROUND WRITER
is the record of a performance. As it's taking place. Like Desi Arnaz's "Dance
of Desperation." It's Saunders' last ditch attempt. Before his do-it-yourself
grant runs out.
When Lee Child got laid off, and blacklisted, because of
his shop steward activities, in broadcast television, he wrote the first Jack Reacher
novel, The Killing Floor, before his separation package ran out.
All
you need is a goad.
I'm too old for the factories.
My Last Ditch
Attempt (LDA) grant is running out.