Northwestern's Premiere Arts & Literary Magazine.
Helicon produces two magazines a year. Our winter issue came out in February and our spring issue will be out in May. We are currently working on a new website.
The swaying of the el gives us an excuse to lean into the curves of each other and I’ll pretend to need a nap on your shoulder a little more than I actually do.
The buzz of those stupid games on your phone is my alarm;
I will make eggs when we get home and you will insist on not eating them and I will pretend to be offended and she will eat them instead
And we all fall a little in love with each other.
The sound of her settling notebook pages like papercut wings is slicing up my eardrums, hyper aware;
the scratching of his pencils after two in the morning digs into my vital organs and I know what he’s writing; it’s on me and in me and
makes me believe that maybe you all have marked me
for good
(oh, I hope so…)
Pay money we don’t have for contraband somethings, give us an excuse to tell each other the truth:
That we all fall a little in love with each other,
every day,
with each of her progressively more unguarded laughs dropped like unexpected pearls
and every reassuring touch at the small of his back like a cup of tea you didn’t have to ask for,
Nah, I don't
That was just a wispy thought i had as i kissed you
Standing in the rain
Under the stars
And in my basement
It's funny that I thought about that
..right?
Cause that's the kinda shit romantics do
And i'm not like that (at all)
I'm not scared to tell you how i feel
In my selfish, veiled way
I think you're cute and funny and nice
And we're not dating
Cause that's complicated
And i definitely don't love you
Although, I don't see anyone but you
Even when I'm not actually seeing you
Which is kinda funny
Cause I didn't know it was possible
For one girl to steal the beauty
Of all the others
Influence and Imitation, in On the Road, in My Life
by Storm Heidinger
When I read On the Road by Jack Kerouac, it hit me immediately – the mad poetic prose and the descriptions of places that seemed to move with the furious action of Sal and Dean as they drove across the country, back and forth, east and west. I wanted to be able to write like Kerouac, and I even dreamed of living on the road or bumming my way across the country. On the Road was about spirituality and the search for something, in places like jazz joints and in people like Dean, and the highs and lows of life.
This passage encapsulates Kerouac’s sensitivity, his vulnerability, his romanticism towards people and place, and the rolling prose that beautifies the world. Most of all, it speaks to the experience of a person who is young, scared, and searching.
“I woke up as the sun was reddening; and that was the one distinct time in my life, the strangest moment of all, when I didn't know who I was — I was far away from home, haunted and tired with travel, in a cheap hotel room I'd never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, and the creak of the old wood of the hotel, and footsteps upstairs, and all the sad sounds, and I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn't know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost. I was halfway across America, at the dividing line between the East of my youth and the West of my future.”
In the summer that I first read On the Road, I found myself working at an animal hospital, and sneaking American classics when things were slow. I read Fitzgerald and Hemingway and Kerouac loved them all, and wanted to be able to write like an American great, with grandiose romanticism, with declarative sparse sentences, with uninhibited and confessional frenzy. It was a hot day and I stood outside, walking a dog, sweating in my scrubs, the cars stopping and starting at the corner of Route 35 and Route 116, with one hand holding the leash as the dog snooped around the lawn to take a shit, and the other typing furiously into my phone about “the restlessness of the mind of youth” and the “screams and symphony of noises”. It wasn’t original, and it wasn’t very good, but it was my best Kerouac imitation at the time. Even then, I knew that I was imitating those great American writers, as I had written in my journal, “The challenge is to surpass emulation”. This struggle is not unique though; many developing writers, including Kerouac, express concern with breaking out of the shadows of their influences.
Ann Charters, who wrote the first biography of Kerouac, outlines the importance of influences and growth in the process of writing On the Road. Kerouac had great difficulty with the form and voice of the piece, scrapping it over and over again. He found that his literary influences such as Thomas Wolfe were unsuited for conveying the nature of his experiences with Neal Cassady. Innovations in loose and free flowing prose replaced the conventional forms that restricted his ability to express himself in writing. By channeling the influence of jazz and Cassady’s energy, Kerouac finds his own voice and style in the form of “spontaneous prose”. His fascination with jazz appears in the essay Jazz of the Beat Generation, an excerpt of what would later become his famous novel.
“Dean was directly in front of him with his face glued to the bell of the horn, clapping his hands, pouring sweat on the man’s keys; and the man noticed and laughed in his horn a long quivering crazy mule’s heehaw and everybody else laughed and they rocked and rocked; and finally the tenorman decided to blow his top and crouched down and held a note in high C for a long time as everything else crashed along skittely-boom and the cries increased and I thought the cops would come swarming from the nearest precinct”.
The influence of music is clear - the scene is not stagnant but alive and moving, the pace of the prose picks up as the sound intensifies, and his beautiful frenzy is captured in the excitement of the words. Kerouac’s ability to build around an idea with words, before crashing down with clarity and understanding, speaks to the volume of this style. Kerouac finds perfect subjects in jazz, in Dean, and in America – they are riveting and unknown, filled with restlessness, the splendor of the search, and the wavering resolution.
This is not Hemingway, who took hours to write a single sentence, crafting the end of A Farewell to Arms thirty nine times because he wasn’t satisfied. No, this was Kerouac, this was spontaneous and fast and jazz, and his writing style espouses an entirely different notion of what it means to write well and write honestly. Some writers and critics expressed their disdain for this technique - Truman Capote said, “That’s not writing, that’s typing”. By moving beyond the literary standards of the day, Kerouac alienated critics and writers who dismissed him as anti-intellectual and talentless. With the insistence on moving on to different forms of expression, Kerouac and other writers of the Beat Generation paved the way for the emergence of post-modern writing. Instead of sticking to the formula, Kerouac took literary traditions and innovated, only truly reaching his potential through the discovery of his own voice.
After becoming famous, Kerouac produced “Essentials of Spontaneous Prose” and “Belief and Technique for Modern Prose”, how-to declarations of his writing style and literary philosophy. In terms of prose and pace, the way to write was “following free deviation (association) of mind into limitless blow-on-subject seas of thought”. He focused on the here and the now and the expression of the self – he wanted to put his mind on the page and let the reader into the experience of his consciousness. Kerouac felt that “the best writing is always the most painful personal wrung-out tossed from cradle warm protective mind-tap from yourself the song of yourself”.
I have used his two guides before, attempting to channel Kerouac into my own writing. This summer, I put a jazz playlist, not knowing much about jazz, and I opened up my grey thin notebook and assembled an army of pencils and beer to get me through the night. I proceeded to write for four hours straight in that notebook, filling up pages after pages, my hand cramping and sweating and collapsing, and then shaking it desperately into the air to get back to work. At some points I stood up and paced and tried to clear my mind, but I was totally entirely helplessly immersed in the writing and everything just seemed to flow out onto the page before I was even thinking it – as if my hand and my brain were fused in secret partnership, and the price was a future with carpal tunnel. Well, I thought it was beautiful, and then I read it later, and realized it was mostly shit, usually barely legible and sometimes incredible. At the very least, the writing was honest. It was really my mind on the page, and there were connections that could only occur in free flowing inhibition.
A unique voice is the culmination of influences that embraces a personal perspective – part skill and talent, part personality, part luck. Hemingway said “what amateurs call a style is usually only the unavoidable awkwardness in first trying to make something that has not heretofore been made” – in trying so desperately to attain this unique voice, the writer flails wildly and succeeds only in the way that they have managed to put their mind into their work. I don’t know if I can call myself a writer, but I know that I am amateur, clinging to the words of the minds that found their voice, and desperately searching for one of my own.
The movement to unique expression is evidence of growth, not only within the realm of writing, but also in personal development. Sal searches for meaning in life across America, in bars and jazz and cities and roads, always following Dean Moriarty, the mad saint who leads the way. At the end of the novel, Sal finally establishes a path for himself and settles down, in contrast to way he initially “shambled after” Dean across the country. The impact of influences, grappling with the world around us, and choosing a direction define the experience of being young.
I realize now that Kerouac’s work had influenced me too much, in both prose and content. I had written a story that begins “We liked to say that was the summer that we found it”. I was looking for “it”, which meant being young, the delicate and dynamic experiences of taking life in, and all that jazz. When re-reading On the Road, I discovered in horror that Dean Moriarty himself discusses an “it” too, one that he and Sal attempt to find, so what I believed to be an idea of mine was just the Kerouac’s words recycled for my life and stories.
Kerouac speaks to the young because of the incredible desperation and sincerity for his search for something real in life, in God, in America. I thought my vague search for “it” didn’t differ much from Sal’s, with him blowing back and forth across the country, always thinking that he would find what he was looking for in San Francisco or Denver, though the places were never quite what he expected. I was young and restless, a kid home for the summer. I wanted to drink with my friends and know the nights and experience, really experience, things. There were times of transcendence, like the “it” of Sal and Dean – sprinting naked across the beach, gritty sand in my toes and spraying my calves, shivering and gleaming with the light of Lake Michigan, and standing on rooftops in Brooklyn, seeing the glow of the cities and the stars.
I did those things, and yet I felt the same sort of dissatisfaction that Sal feels after spending time in cities across America. I had been so focused on the “kicks” that I didn’t realize Sal was lonely and unfulfilled much of the time, arriving at a city thrilled only to later leave restless and depressed. The ideas that appealed to me then seem idealistic and flawed – the life of the road seems empty despite the excitement and the mystery of it all. I knew that I needed to go somewhere - I needed to pick a road, any road, but not the one that followed in footsteps without deeply considering the implications of that life.
On the Road is also about the escape from responsibility as the idealized experience. When re-reading the novel after time had passed, the depiction of race and gender in the novel made me uncomfortable, an element I didn’t focus on before. Sal romanticizes the lives of blacks and Hispanics in Denver as embodying the excitement and freedom of America, in contrast to the “white world” that “was not enough ecstasy for me, not enough life, joy”. Dean and Sal seem to abandon families and children throughout cities and work as a means to get back on the road again, acting rather careless in the process. This idyllic life of the road is romantic, capturing the spirit of youthful searching and wanderlust, but also immature for its rejection of opportunities and responsibilities. I’m on the verge of adulthood and I look towards embracing responsibility, whether that’s a real job or relationship, and Sal and Dean’s recklessness no longer appeal to me as it once did.
There comes a point when you recognize that it’s time to move on from a certain influence – out of their shadow, and into yourself. Sal realized that he wanted something different than Dean, Kerouac broke free from literary expectations, and similarly, it’s clear that I have a different road to take. Kerouac is a beautiful writer, a French-Canadian, a mystic, a Catholic, an athlete, the voice of the Beat Generation, an alcoholic who died young. As much as he has been an influence on my life and work, I am not those things. I am a student, American, young, intellectual, curious, and trying to be a successful person, whatever that means. I’m no member of the counterculture, and as much as I love On the Road for its prose and unabashed exploration of America, so much of that lifestyle is merely a fantasy for me. The closest that I get to Kerouac’s experiences are driving from New York to Chicago, or weeks spent in the woods hiking with friends, drinking and staring at the stars, on short vacations from my otherwise stable life as a student. Still, the idea of a road is appealing – it’s part of this narrative of finding your way in life, and the question still remains as to which road I will take.
The nature of a search, whether it’s the attempt to find a voice or to find meaning in life, requires a bit of recklessness and disregard for the destination. This search is the echo of a call for the West, for transcendence, for shedding the structures of the past, for escape and excitement, only to realize that the true movement takes place in personal growth. As in On the Road, the road is not about the place that you are going to, which often disappoints and fails to meet idyllic expectations. The road is about the journey, and also the recognition of the influences that have paved the way to find “It” – whatever it is.
baby love me like a bony model who has city habits split ends from too much
straightening
and bright pearly teeth even though her days are just
coffee to stay conscious speed to stay thin men to stay loose
baby love me like dipping your feet into big fountains
not just your toes because that’s not enough and feeling mist graze your skin sometimes in the morning-afternoon-evening sunshine moonshine
baby love me like big movie stars with even bigger egos who like
elvis ‘cause it’s trendy and hot and he’s pretty good actually and bad neighborhoods because they’re “dangerous and i’m dangerous” because “people don’t understand me”
baby love me like tongues getting to know every groove in someone else’s mouth and the silence
that settles between ripples on lakes
baby love me like shrieking babies in hospitals where mothers can go down two roads
cribs incomes gerber’s baby formula and toys that rattle, or shit
baby love me like stereotypical criminals who like sex and drugs and fuck up
fuck up hard with guns and end up in jail after they robbed a couple bucks from the bank of america but really
who robs a bank these days? the new thing is rape baby it’s trafficking and slow sexy murders with love letters written in blood on the wall
baby love me like white lilies on breathless teenage girls’ doorsteps
like timid bubblegum kisses and walks with baseball caps and neon converse sneakers
baby love me like white roses delivered to apartment doors of late-twenty-something
girls who are up late working but get to smile for a minute because their boyfriend is cute alright cute
baby love me like darts want so badly to lick away the wounds they give dartboards because after leaving that stinging adoration where’s the pain-pleasure balance just like
fast baseball bats whisper to faster baseballs i’m sorry i’m sorry i do like you honest
and fans get mad till they get red and holler like old school cartoons and seem drunk even if they’ve never drunk in their whole life but that’s funny isn’t it
baby love me like pastel chalk and hop scotch love each other disappearing away in the rain even more than they love each other in the sun
baby love me like empty bars at 4am where the last ones left glance at each other from across the room and drink to preoccupy their hands, wondering
if this is it, if they’re making too much noise when they swallow, why they’re alone in a bar at 4 in the morning
baby love me like light kisses darkness and nobody knows that really it just wants a little love everyone wants a little love even the dark baby even the dark
baby love me ‘cause everyone wants a little love and it’s not overrated at least i don’t think so
and maybe people dramatize magic but baby love me ‘cause we should have each other so just, love me baby, pretty much everything you are
March 10, 2014 marks the first day of Helicon distribution for our Winter 2014 Issue. The magazine is gorgeous thanks to the efforts of the Helicon staff and all who contributed to the issue or submitted work.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, the time we had to design our last issue had been cut dramatically. Though we stayed up late trying to check and double check for mistakes, a few errors slipped past us.
APOLOGIES TO:
Nicole Zhu- Her fantastic piece, The Family Reunion, was easily one of the highest praised works by many on our staff. Though it is featured in full on our website, the length was too long to publish fully in print. We forgot to add a note stating its continuation online and apologize that there is no suggestion that the piece is incomplete in the magazine.
Paige Park- A misprint resulted in one of our wonderful staff members printed with the name "Paige Prk" rather than "Paige Park"
The Office of Residential Academic Initiatives- Having been uninformed of a change in structure within the offices supporting us, we were unaware that "the Office of Residential Colleges" is now "The Office of Residential Academic Initiatives." We would like to thank you all for the incredible support you offer to our magazine. Thank you to Brad Zakarin, Nancy Anderson, Mary Dworak and all else who have helped with the issue.
Elzbieta Foeller-Pituch- Our fantastic Faculty Adviser should also be recognized as the Chapin RC Faculty Fellow and Assistant Director to the Nicholas D. Chabraja Center for Historical Studies (CCHS).
Susan Lee- As the Master of Chapin, Susan Lee has helped continue the strong link between Helicon and Chapin. Having started within the Residential College, Helicon will always be tied to the building and its residents. We honor this relationship with meetings, open mics and other small workshops in Chapin.
dededos
ellievsbear
jacobvanloon
annaxmalina
izzy806
baratheonpilled