Book Review: Television, A Memoir (OT) (quirky reminiscences of a poet)

Television, A Memoir, by Karen Brennan (Four Way Books, 2022, 151 p, $19.95) 

Is Television, A Memoir a book of poetry or prose? Or, perhaps poetic prose? Or a collection of prosey poems? Whatever, it is slightly askew.

Regardless, it is fun and sweet with three sections of short chapters - would you believe 76 of them, mostly one-pagers, single paragraphs? However, the author's clever quirkinesses will bring a smile to your face unless you are reading this in public, in which case you will embarrass yourself by laughing out loud.

How long is a short story after all? (or a short short story, if there is such a thing?)

The answer: 1,000 to 10,000 words. That is from 3 to about 30 pages. Pretty long in my opinion. Flash fiction is 500 words or less so perhaps this is a flash fiction book that is not fiction.

Author-poet Karen Brennan tells us the story of her life, from living with three siblings and a mother in a wheelchair (polio) to her own marriages, being on welfare in grad school with a child, living in the desert, and other situations which, if you lived through them, you will think again. For example, how many of us remember the nightly TV news reporting on the number of troops killed in VietNam? Or, where we were when we first watched television? For the author, it was at a neighbors' across the street, a small black and white screen, 15 people watching, standing up. (For me, all I recall is that I was four and my brother was six and our two channels were 4 and 6.)

Two chapters are titled "Television" as depicted on the front cover, which will make sense as you read about the author's children.

You will have your favorites, among a very few you may not understand. I recalled, reading "Bomb Scares," how we would file out into the hall, crouch down against the inner wall and assume the nuclear bomb position, heads tucked. In California, however, the author merely crawled under her desk.

And what about when you are teaching elementary school, and a man enters your classroom, interrupting a lesson. Thinking he is the person to fix the air conditioning unit, you immediately tell him to wait outside, and he does. Of course, you do not recognize Paul Newman, whose son is in your class.

Television is an entertaining, fun book that will cause you to reminisce, if you are old enough. If not, ask your grandmother about things like typewriters!