Customer Reviews

Touch and Go: A Memoir

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Imagine yourself sitting on a front porch on a quiet summer evening, listening to a beloved uncle recount stories you've heard half a dozen times before. He rambles from time to time, and the names of the characters sometimes blur, but the tales are rich and populated with colorful characters, conjuring up vivid images of bygone days. That's the feeling one gets encountering Studs Terkel in his delightful collection of reminiscences, TOUCH AND GO.

The son of immigrant parents, Terkel was born in New York City in 1912 ("three weeks after the Titanic blithely sailed into the tip of that iceberg. Make of it what you will."). In 1921, he moved to Chicago, the city with whom his life has been linked so intimately. There, his parents ran a series of rooming houses and small hotels; his mother Annie, the dominant parent, even beat up a pimp on one occasion. Studs spent his free time hanging out among the soapbox orators at Bughouse Square, Chicago's low-rent version of London's Hyde Park. Those familiar with Terkel's streetwise persona may be surprised to learn that he graduated from the elite University of Chicago Law School, although he confesses that a career in the law "just wasn't there for me." Indeed, his fondest recollection of his law school days was the transfer on his trolley ride in an area known as "Bronzeville," where he first encountered the blues, firing a lifelong passion for that music.

Although TOUCH AND GO follows an arguably chronological path, it's the frequent detours that offer the most pleasure. Readers looking for a thumbnail sketch of Terkel's career should be satisfied with this sentence: "I have been an eclectic disk jockey; a radio soap opera gangster; a sports and political commentator; a jazz critic; a pioneer in TV, Chicago style; an oral historian and a gadfly." Perhaps one key to his long life that emerges from these pages is that whatever he did was done with zest for the task of the moment and for the people he engaged as he performed it.

Best known for incomparable oral histories like WORKING, HARD TIMES and "THE GOOD WAR" (Ida, his wife of 60 years, insisted he put the title in quotation marks), Terkel's attention always has been focused on what he calls the "etceteras of history," unknown men and women to whom he has given voice through his work. Befitting his down-to-earth style, Terkel doesn't reveal any sophisticated interviewing techniques. "Respect," he says, is the gift he brings to the encounters with his subjects. "The person recognizes that you respect them because you're listening. Because you're listening, they feel good about talking to you."

As entertaining and sometimes touching as Terkel's stories of his colorful friends and acquaintances are (the writer Nelson Algren and television pioneer Dave Garroway make their appearances, as does John Scopes a generation after the Monkey Trial), TOUCH AND GO doesn't consist merely of one man's web of memories spun from a litany of entertaining stories. Terkel, an unabashed liberal who calls himself a "radical conservative," is harsh in his judgment of our apathetic political culture, even going so far as to invert Hannah Arendt's famous characterization of Adolf Eichmann's "banality of evil," to accuse our age of embodying the "evil of banality." He writes: "Basically, there is an affront going on, an assault on our intelligence and sense of decency. We have a language perverted, a mind low-rated, and of course, the inevitable end result --- forgetfulness. This is what haunts me at the moment." From a lifetime of advocacy for the underdog, he has earned the right to express those blunt sentiments.

"Oh to be remembered --- isn't that what this is all about?" Terkel writes. By that standard he has little to fear. At age 95, the survivor of quintuple bypass surgery and a heart valve replacement (at 93), it's doubtful we'll see another book by this remarkable man. Studs Terkel has had the dual blessing of longevity and wonderful experiences to fill his years to the brim. TOUCH AND GO is more than a memoir of a long life; it is one man's account of a life lived honestly and well.

--- Reviewed by Harvey Freedenberg (mwn52@aol.com)

When I picked up TOUCH AND GO, I wondered how Studs Terkel was going to compress his 95 years into 256 pages. It (sort) of does it by recollecting a time in history--the Depression, for example--and falling in and out of it, or spinning and refracting it, using the kaleidoscope of his life.

History buffs (of which I'm not) will enjoy this book (he includes an extensive index), and so will people who've strong ties or interest in Chicago, and Terkel fans. I'd never read anything of Terkel's before so I was introduced to his:

* Dry sense of humor: "The last time I saw Bernays, he was approaching the century mark. He was frail and hard of hearing, and his memory played hide-and-seek at times, but he still had almost all his marbles."

* Grasp of Chicago vernacular: "Who you? Dis seat's mine. Possession's nine-tent's a da law, ain't it?"

* Descriptive sense: "Lowell Sherman immediately comes to mind. He was among the first. Brilliantined, patent-leather black hair, with a mustache that also appeared patented; evil-eyed; a cad in a class by himself. Lew Cody, a fair-skinned, craven toady up to no good. Their mustaches gave them away. What the scarlet letter was to Hester Prynne, the damnable facial adornment was to them." (He's noticed a lot of mustaches over the years.)

* And most importantly, how Terkel has chosen the people he wants to write about: "When I look for people, I'm not looking only for those who share my views; I'm looking for those who have grown to think a certain way, who have changed their views. A number of conservative people are in my books; not as many as more progressive thinkers, but that's not the point of my books at all. I'm looking for those who can talk about how they see their lives and the world around them. Who can explain how and why they became one way or another."

I enjoyed being introduced to Terkel through this book. Reading it I realize there is STILL more "stuff" I don't know a thing about, but probably should look into. Gee thanks, Mr. Terkel.

I'm a bit prejudiced, I love Studs--I love listening him on WFMT, and I love reading his books.

He really loves and respects people and they respond to him--he is great listener and storyteller---this book is sort of a conversation with a really interesting guy over a couple of martinis in a noisy bar--

I really liked this book, and if you like Studs, and are interested in people, you will like it too,

I enjoyed the book. It brought back memories of times past, I love Chicago. While not as liberal as Studs, I appreciate his passion, kindness and thoughtfullness for those less fortunate. Studs has always been fun and so interesting. I always feel enriched, after reading his books.

Studs is a national treasure. That he's a great listener anyone who is familiar with his "Working," "Hard Times," "Race," etc. already knows. His story telling skills haven't diminished a bit as he approaches the century mark. The only thing that I found disappointing was that it ended so soon. I felt like I was paying a visit to a great friend & I had to leave too early. Still, any time spent with Studs is a treat.

His observations, especially in some of the later chapters "And nobody laughed" and "Einstein and the rest of us" remind us that the madness that we're currently experiencing has roots that are both recent and back over half a century. His observations also, to the annoyance of many, refuse to be clouded by the hype from all quarters that we're constantly bombarded with. That Ronald Reagan and his administration's devastating policies still haven't been discovered by the very citizens whose lives have been (adversely) effected the most ("What's the matter with Kansas"), as we currently have presidential candidates falling all over themselves to "out Reagan" each other, don't cease to amaze. The selective amnesia that infests our society doesn't just border on the surreal, but has crossed the line with plenty to spare.

If you frequently find yourself having that uneasy feeling as if you were stuck in a dreamscape conjured up by Salvador Dali during a fit of madness, or perhaps find yourself carrying one of those Bush Countdown Clocks around to remind yourself that maybe there will be a beginning to an end one day, then a strong dose of Studs might offer hope that reality might still exist.

Fans of Studs Terkel will love this book. His radio voice leaps off the page: the same rhythms, the same w ay of telling a story. Readers who don't know Studs will be treated to an account of the twentieth century that is at once highly personal and local and at the same time universal in its subject matter. Highly recommended!

This is a stream of consciousness book and not particularly easy reading, but the experiences and stories and recounting of history contained in it is priceless. Studs laments how easily seminal people are forgotten and he has made it his business to let the forgotten ones know that he remembers them and knows of their importance in our country's story.

Anyone who reads this book will be richer for doing so and will be better able to tackle the current election and issues we face.

I'm from Chicago's Northside. N. Clark Street, Diversy, Division, and running around Fullerton in the 50's was a wonderful time. His book, "Touch and Go: A Memoir" was like a family reunion with the neighbors and merchants combined. The dialogues made me homesick as EVERYONE talked like Studs. However, he's the one who WROTE it up to give a glimpse to the rest of the world why a Chicago native may move (kidnapped by parents will do here) away but that luscious black loam soil from the city is still inside our galoshes. The blasts of frigid gusts "venturied" between the buildings could slide a kid across the icy street. Yet, walking up the blocks could still transport you to a myriad of cultural origins from the various homemade aromas from kitchens. Those gracious and loving Black Grandmas serving up the best damned BLT's in the world at the Woolworth downtown... His style brings it all home to me. I was primarily interested in his own descriptions of how and why he wrote. Although I ordered the book for creative writing class, I got a time machine. I also got my money's worth.

I read Terkel's oral histories "THE GOOD WAR" and WORKING many years ago, but none of his work since. I decided to try his memoir, TOUCH AND GO, after reading Roger Ebert's new memoir, LIFE ITSELF, because Ebert seemed to hold Terkel and his work in such high regard.

The truth is TOUCH AND GO simply did not engage me. I found myself skimming large parts of the first hundred pages or so. All of the "inside dope" on the political scene of Chicago from the 1920's and 30's was not at all interesting to me, although the too-brief parts about his parents and brothers were. And I especially enjoyed the brief chapters about his wife, Ida, and his "limited service" during WWII. And a chapter on Nelson Algren was mildly interesting too.

There was something too "cobbled together" about the book that created a choppy sort of read, as excerpts from a few of his other books were interspersed here and there. Perhaps the task of writing a comprehensive autobiography at the age of ninety-something was just a bit too much for Terkel, because I sensed the sometimes obtrusive hand of an editor trying to squeeze one last book out of him. Even the FBI investigations and surveillances of Terkel's left-wing lifestyle and friendships didn't quite work for me.

Perhaps the part, albeit extremely brief, that moved me most was Terkel's heartfelt tribute to his brothers and his son in the book's Postscript.

I know Studs Terkel is gone now, and I do have a tremendous respect for all he accomplished with his wonderful oral histories, so I'm not going to bad-mouth him. But maybe this is more of a book for Chicagoans, because - sorry, Studs - it just didn't work for me.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir BOOKLOVER

This was a wonderful and interesting book, I enjoyed hearing about Studs growing up and living his life in Chicago. As a young Chicagoan, I didn't know much about Studs' history or career before reading this. The only part that is a bit difficult is that Studs tended to try to relate people and situations in his early years (the 1910s and 1920s) to a newer and assumedly more well known counterpart. As in Mr. X was really the Mr. Q of his generation. Which would be great if I had any idea who Mr. Q was. However, because even Mr. Q was a figure from the 1940s, it did little to help. I recommend reading near an Iphone or computer.