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1.
It started as a dusty typescript titled Jon+Merile, inspired by my own melancholia (typical of young GIs far from home). Almost published in NY but not quite. Made the journey home (ETS) with me (to CONUS) and languished in our garage in Grantville, San Diego, CA USA…
In 2016, as a self-publisher (now in my sixties) I started digging up early, unpublished manuscripts to add to my already 40+ published (50+ in all) books in e-book and p-book editions. The novel itself became On Saint Ronan Street, after a romantic street near the old Yale University campus in New Haven, CT. Among the major inspirations were the novels of John Updike, who wrote books like this: a love affair between a struggling young poet and a neglected, beautiful, lonely young faculty wife. Edited & published 2016.
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2.
I had wrapped up my 500-poem career as a published poet around age 27 (burnout for rock stars, poets, and other creative artists). Before ETS to CONUS in 1980, I self-published my first book (Pauses: 64 Poems) hand-made at the instructions of a German print shop. It came out real nice, and I registered my first copyright with the LOC/CO in 1980. In 2016, as I published On Saint Ronan Street, I decided why not also publish a companion volume of poetry, which became Cymbalist Poems. It's not just a little play on words; it reflects my love of the Symbolist Poets (early 20th Century) during my years as an undergraduate English major. Some of the 1980 poetry edition is in Cymbalist Poems, along with others of my sprawling oeuvre.
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