“Joseph Sutton, God bless him, writes in the grand storyteller tradition of Jean Shepherd and William Saroyan, both of whom would have been happy, I’m sure, to treat Sutton to a steak and a few martinis in exchange for an autographed copy of Morning Pages.” —Barry Gifford, author of Wild at Heart
Bedside bar mitzvah inspires an ‘almost true story’
Aleza Goldsmith
Jewish Bulletin
In a poll of the holiest places on earth, the foot of a bed might not make the list.
Unless, of course, Joseph Sutton were polled—because that’s where he celebrated his bar mitzvah.
As a 13-year-old living in Hollywood, the now 60-year-old San Francisco resident and author actually marked the rite of passage in his parents’ bedroom. His recently published novel, Morning Pages: The Almost True Story of My Life, recounts the experience, and many others, through a loosely autobiographical character named Ben Halaby.
Tackling the Dreaded “Block”
By Jonathan Farrell
The Sunset Beacon
Very few writers have the opportunity to share with readers the creative process involved in writing. This process is sometimes shared among fellow writers, but not often with the public.
San Francisco writer Joseph Sutton’s novel, Morning Pages: The Almost True Story of My Life, provides a rare glimpse into all the thoughts and feelings a writer has in the quest to do what writers do—write!
Yet there is one obstacle to the creative process that most writers know all too well—the demon known as “writer’s block.”
Ivri Nasawi, Sephardic & Middle Eastern Cultures
Syrian-Jewish writer and Los Angeles native Joseph Sutton (b. 1940) has just published his first novel, Morning Pages: The Almost True Story of My Life, a loosely fictionalized version of his past and present life. After a promising high school football career, Sutton won a football scholarship to the University of Oregon. It wasn’t until the late 1960s, while he was working as a teacher in South-Central Los Angeles, that Sutton realized he wanted to become a writer. And where else do aspiring writers go to live the boho life and write fiction? San Francisco. A familiar face on the Bay Area writers scene, these days Joe Sutton writes for a variety of magazines, including Writer’s Digest and Writers’ Journal. He has written many short stories and his first collection, The Immortal Mouth and Other Stories, will be published in 2002 by Creative Arts Book Co., the publisher of Morning Pages.
“Joseph Sutton has an eye–for navel oranges and red rubies, for heroic cats and noble geckoes, for perfect mouths and super-sized bartenders. He has an ear–for festival rhythms and regional accents, bedtime stories and cautionary tales. He has a heart–for the pull of tradition and the call of the road, for bright-eyed Greek beauties and unresponsive ladies of the night, for boys becoming men, and writers scraping by. Most of all, Joseph Sutton has a voice–that emerges strong and true in this remarkable collection of stories.” —Lynn Park, photographer and poet
“Joseph Sutton is an exciting writer. His stories are interesting, vivid, unique. He’s written two pieces about William Saroyan, his mentor, in this collection. He covers a lot of territory in 200 pages (29 stories altogether), from growing up in Hollywood to relationships to travel to sports to old age. This book is a must read.” —Gary Turchin, poet
“Joseph Sutton loads all the bases with such classic American themes as sports, travel on the road, and rollercoaster relationships… [and] brings these tales home with a literary grand slam in the title story that would have elicited a growl of approval from his celebrated role model, William Saroyan, and now evokes a howl of delight from us — the noisy fans in the bleachers.” —Ramon Sender Barayon, author of A Death in Zamora and A Planetary Sojourn
“Imagine taking your seat for a long flight with your favorite book. But the guy sitting next to you starts telling a story. A minute later, you’ve closed the book. You ask to hear more. In an hour, you’ve laughed, sighed, gasped, held back a tear, then said to hell with it and let it fall. You don’t want this flight to ever end. Joe Sutton is the guy talking, and he’s also your pilot.” —Joe Quirk, author of The Ultimate Rush and Exult
Friday November 7, 2003
by Jay Schwartz
Staff Writer
It’s not every day that someone goes from contemplating God to feeling like an average Joe in the same breath. But this makes perfect sense if you happen to be Joseph Sutton, who has a gift for bringing the cosmic down to a level that you can relate to and for elevating the ordinary to a higher plane.
When you think of Los Angeles, what comes to mind? Most people see a kaleidoscopic image of vibrant glamour, broken dreams, infinite variety, and cheap thrills. Having grown up in Hollywood, Joseph Sutton brings his expertise in the grind and shine of thrill seeking and small wonders from Los Angeles to the context of all life in The Immortal Mouth, his first collection of short stories.
What is the writer’s method? How does a writer get strings of inspired words from his mind onto the page? Not very damn well if you’re Ben Halaby, who’s filled with dedication but grappling with writer’s block. Halaby stumbles across a book on creativity: Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. The basic principle of Cameron’s book is to write three pages nonstop first thing in the morning for 84 days. Halaby heeds Cameron’s advice. And what we see, as the words come gushing out of his pen and soul, is not only the creative process in action, but we see a man turning into his old storytelling self again.
Excerpt from Chapter 5 “Artist’s Date”
Julia Cameron wants all artists to keep an “artist’s date” with themselves once a week. She wants us to do something adventurous and out of the ordinary. It could be for a couple of hours or a full day, with one stipulation: we have to do it alone. It’s supposed to nourish our creativity.
I went to North Beach for my artist’s date yesterday. Instead of driving, I took a Muni streetcar. I walked up and down Grant Avenue looking in store windows, noticing the creativity the Great Creator has bestowed on all of us. Just think: some human being created glass, pasta, pizza, pots and pans, cement, brassieres, paper, can openers, stop signs, chairs. . .the list is endless. We don’t even know we’re that creative.
I entered a couple of establishments in North Beach. One was a bakery, where I bought a sandwich roll spiced with rosemary for 35¢. The other was Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s City Lights Bookstore. I browsed through a William Saroyan book with an introduction by Mr. San Francisco himself, Herb Caen. Caen said Saroyan was always busy doing something—playing poker, betting the horses, going to parties, or bar-hopping. That Saroyan, he was on an endless artist’s date. And here I broke away from my desk for the first time in many a moon. No wonder I haven’t been able to write; my creative gas tank has been running on empty. I have to start filling it. Yesterday was a beginning.
As soon as I finish today’s morning pages I’m going to deliver 500 copies of How to Buy a Used Car Without Getting Ripped Off to a credit union downtown. A large check is waiting for me.
When you’re on a roll, you’re rolling. Yesterday I got a call from Green Apple Books on Clement Street. The manager wants more copies of my booklet. Should I try to sell it to other bookstores? No, I’d better not. It was that damn used car booklet that contributed to my getting blocked in the first place. I got into the marketing and selling of it instead of doing what I’m supposed to do, which is to write stories, poems, essays, and novels.