Culture Archives - Page 21 of 35 - Pittsburgh Quarterly

In Richard Brautigan’s classic surrealist novel, Trout Fishing In America, the narrator visits a store selling trout streams by the foot. They are stacked in piles like pieces of lumber, each length corresponding to a different price. In Jez Butterworth’s 2012 play The River, produced by Quantum Theatre, it’s as if they picked out a …

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Books

Drue Heinz winner brings humanity to adversity

by Fred Shaw

When Melissa Yancy describes aspects of facial reconstructions, fetal surgery and kidney transplants in her short-story collection Dog Years (University of Pittsburgh Press), she writes knowingly, not gratuitously. The 2016 Drue Heinz Award winner and Phoenix native, comes honestly to this perspective as a fundraiser advocating for health-care causes. And while several of her stories …

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PQ Poem

For James Wright

by John Stupp

You write about shyness the shyness of daylight along the Ohio River like a girl brushing her hair in a boarding house looking for privacy— in one of your poems morning arrives naked uncomfortable shivering in the valley offering only a glimpse of herself to ironworkers electricians millwrights carpenters for the first time like a …

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PQ Poem

Avalon Creek

by Tess Barry

Slung over one sturdy branch hung low but high enough Swing that rode June skies for months that flung us up and out Above cool awnings shaded trees swing that bent the back of oaks Thick rope wound tight knotted twine stolen from Clarence Weingartner’s barn Strung by brothers sworn enemies awful boys Frayed ends …

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Books

The Challenge of Fighting Back

by John Allison

Reading the latest novel by Stewart O’Nan, the Pittsburgh-born writer who boomeranged home several years ago, is like watching the performance of an experienced athlete who makes it all look so easy. “City of Secrets” is his 16th novel since 1994, and the first to take place entirely outside of the USA. Like 2015’s “West …

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Books

Short Takes: “Whiskey, Etc.” “Death by Cyanide”

by John Allison

Sherrie Flick’s latest collection is described as “short (short) stories”—that parenthetical “short” preparing you for one page tales, even one-paragraph blasts. Scholars of marketing might see this as evidence that fiction creators are getting with the short-attention span condition of the modern consumer, offering an efficient product that can be noshed like a meal replacement …

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History

Molded Tooth Staggered Gear and Worker, 1913

by Jennifer McNulty

The Mesta Machine Company churned and smoked on more than 20 acres of land along the Monongahela River. Though its central product was steelmaking equipment—supplying some 500 mills around the globe—Americans had Mesta’s 3,000 employees to thank for their working cars and refrigerators, ship hulls and power plant turbines. During the Depression, then-president Lorenz Iversen …

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Opinion

Smart City

by PQ Staff

Certainly, it’s not great news that Pittsburgh didn’t win a $50 million federal Smart City Challenge grant to redesign its transportation system. The grant would have helped “plan, design and build the next Pittsburgh,” Mayor Bill Peduto said. Pittsburgh’s proposal envisioned a combination of big data working with electricity microgrids to create an “electric avenue” …

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Architecture & Neighborhoods

A Monument Then and Now

by Charles Rosenblum

Did the demolition of the greenfield (really the Beechwood Boulevard) Bridge feel like the passing of an era? The urbane, concrete arch span of 1923 was crumbling far too ominously above the speeding traffic of the Parkway East to be able to stay in place, so it was ceremoniously demolished. A replacement will be completed …

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Arts

A Long Romance

by Margaret J. Krauss

At first, the performance was delayed because ballerina Carlotta Grisi was recovering from an injury. Then the conductor was battling a tumor. And then safety concerns slowed the set construction. But finally, on June 28, 1841—a Monday night—“Giselle” premiered at the Paris Opéra. After its Paris premiere, the two-act Romantic ballet entered almost immediately into …

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Arts

Hidden from History

by Vicky A Clark

The life of Esther Phillips (1902– 83) would have languished in obscurity, at most a footnote in history, were it not for the dedication of a few friends and supporters. Her story, which intersects with ideas about women, class and mental health in the 20th century, is all too familiar. An obstinate, free-spirited woman, she …

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Opinion

The Best of Intentions

by Elizabeth Wiethorn

I just hope my mother doesn’t testify against me… if she does, I am in deep trouble. I was gathering all the necessary items to bring into my son Joe’s preschool class for his “birthday week” extravaganza: “Manuelo the Playing Mantis” book to read aloud? Check. Praying mantis “hat” craft kits for all 25 students? …

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History

Once Upon A Tunnel

by Tom Imerito

The calamity began at the stroke of midnight on May 10, 1924, when Pittsburgh Street Railway Company employees walked off the job. The streetcar strike threw commuters into a tizzy, and the following morning South Hills commuters jumped into their cars and headed for the recently opened Liberty Tunnels. Between 7:30 and 8 a.m., a …

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Opinion

Advice to a Would-Be Reporter

by Douglas Heuck

I was talking recently with a friend’s son who’s interested in journalism, which today seems like a very uncertain proposition. Perhaps it always has been— my parents certainly thought so. I gave him the lay of the land and noted the difficulty of making any money, but I added that reporting does provide great training …

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PQ Poem

Sleeping Apart

by Jennifer Jackson Berry

Sometimes he decides to sleep in the spare room & there is a part of me glad. He wants the TV on I don’t. We both snore & bother each other with it. He says I steal covers, I say he moves past middle if I get up for the bathroom In summer, there are …

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History

Oakmont Camping, circa 1910

by Jennifer McNulty

For Pittsburghers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Oakmont offered the next best thing to paradise. During the summer months, while the city baked in heat and soot, visitors set up camp on the banks of the Allegheny River, relaxing in the fresh air and making merry on the water. Oakmont boasted a …

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History

What Happened at Thompson’s Island?

by Ben Moyer

Were you to launch a canoe at the U.S. Forest Service Buckaloons boat ramp, where Brokenstraw Creek enters the Allegheny River, then float down toward the borough of Tidioute, the setting would appear much as it must have to a party of Seneca Indians paddling the same route in the late summer of 1779. Carried …

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PQ Poem

Zen or the Art of Trying Harder

by Robert Walicki

When the yoga instructor tells me to relax, she uses the word Vinyasa, and that almost helps, as I unfold the jigsaw puzzle of my body, the old house of my bones, creaking. But it’s ok, because this is gentle yoga, meditation for the inflexible. And I know this act has something to do with …

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History

Elie Wiesel and the One Indestructible Human Quality

by Douglas Heuck

In each issue of Pittsburgh Quarterly, I write obituaries of notable Pittsburghers, and over the past 10-plus years, the percentage of those whom I knew in life – some very well – has been growing. Last week came the news of the death of Elie Wiesel, who steadfastly bore witness to the Holocaust for more …

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PQ Poem

Jack Gilbert (1925-2012)

by Scott Silsbe

When I was 18 years old and knew next to nothing about poetry besides Bill Wordsworth and Ed Poe, my composition teacher passed a photocopy of one of your poems out to our class and it changed my life. I knew I hadn’t ever read a poem quite like it before. It seemed like everywhere …

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Opinion

The British Vote and Pittsburgh’s Demographics

by Paul Scripko

We’re all trying to figure out the implications of the somewhat surprising news that UK voters decided by a comfortable majority to leave the European Union. No matter what side you identified with in this grand referendum, it’s always invigorating when democracy’s voices speak. With a record high voter turn out – over 70% of …

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Books

Going Back in Time to Ambridge

by Fred Shaw

Growing up in the early ‘80’s as a native-son of a local borough named after a steel-magnate, it’s easy to recall how mill closings affected my hometown. Layoffs were followed by hushed talk of unemployment checks, and later on, businesses shuttered leading to diaspora when folks looked to start fresh elsewhere. In a swath of …

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