{"product_id":"my-creative-year-in-the-army","title":"My Creative Year in the Army","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn his new memoir, \u003ci\u003eMy Creative Year in the Army\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eDavid Madden tells a story of creativity and conflict.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn 1954 during the Korean Civil War, when nineteen-year-old Madden showed up at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, he set in motion a series of creative acts and conflicts, sometimes comic. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA romantic, an idealist, an agnostic, and a liberal, he had actively attacked racism, censorship, the death penalty, and tyranny. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDuring basic training, he befriended Rooks, a disturbed farm boy, and Jacob, the company's Jewish scapegoat.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen given an order, his response frequently was to ask, \"Why?\" \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe refused to sign the loyalty oath that Senator Joseph McCarthy imposed upon the military, causing a prolonged investigation of him as a possible communist. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn a free-writing hour in Clerk Typist School, he wrote an essay on Jesus that shocked the officers of his regiment. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen someone stole his cartridge belt, he refused to obey a direct order to pay for another.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMadden includes lively letters to and from Iva Lee, his childhood sweetheart, Vera, his intellectual friend, Hope Savage, a bizarre Greenwich Village bohemian, his teachers, his many friends, his mother, and his two convict brothers. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDavid Madden's memoir will appeal to creative writers, veterans, and the general reader. When he entered the army, he had already created many stories, poems, plays, and nonfiction. In reading and in writing, his focus was on technique, style, and imagery. Throughout his Army ordeals, Madden worked on his first novel, \u003ci\u003eCassandra Singing.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"University of Tennessee Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57261071401304,"sku":"9798895271001","price":23.99,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/agendabookshop.com\/products\/my-creative-year-in-the-army","provider":"Agenda Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}