Selden Rodman, Writer and Folk Art Advocate
Hyfler/Rosner
By DOUGLAS MARTIN NYTimes
Selden Rodman, a polymathic poet, an iconoclastic critic of modern culture,
the author of more than 40 books and a tireless promoter of Haitian and
other folk art, died on Nov. 2 at a hospital in Ridgewood, N.J. He was 93.
Mr. Rodman, who lived in Oakland, N.J., played tennis two days before he
died, probably cheating as usual, his wife, Carole, said. In 1932, he and a
tennis partner defeated Ezra Pound - one of the many literary giants Mr.
Rodman knew in a unique intellectual life.
Mr. Rodman encountered, sought out and communed with some of the best known
creative people of the 20th century. Born into a monied family in New York,
he grew into a rebellious young man and ended up as a famous champion of the
Western Hemisphere's folk arts, particularly Haitian paintings, which he
called a "crystallization of joy." Intermediate stops included editing one
of the most successful anthologies of modern poetry, writing essays and
books on travel, and rocking the modern art establishment by branding
Abstract Expressionism "the cerebral put-ons of the avant-garde."
Mr. Rodman first received wide attention in the early 1930's when he and a
Yale classmate founded The Harkness Hoot, an acidic but celebrated detractor
of everything from professors to the school's gothic architecture. Frank
Lloyd Wright wrote to applaud when the publication printed pictures of the
steel girders underlying the university's new library along with a picture
of the finished product. The Hoot called the girders better architecture,
much to Wright's delight.
Rushing off to Europe without attending his graduation, Mr. Rodman looked up
Pound, as well as James Joyce and Thomas Mann, and ingratiated himself, a
lifelong talent. He would later write a book of essays describing his
encounters with the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Bertrand Russell and Leon
Trotsky.
"He could weasel his way in anywhere," said Gary Fountain, an English
professor at Ithaca College who is writing Mr. Rodman's biography.
When he returned to New York, Alfred Bingham, a leader of left-wing causes,
asked him to become his partner in a new magazine called Common Sense, which
criticized the New Deal while remaining anti-Communist. Arthur M.
Schlesinger Jr., in "The Politics of Upheaval," called the magazine the most
lively and interesting forum of radical discussion in the country.
Cary Selden Rodman was born in Manhattan on Feb. 19, 1909. His father, an
architect, died before the boy was a year old, and he came to regard his
mother as overprotective, Mr. Fountain said. But his mother's family
fortune, which provided him a trust fund, greatly increased his lifelong
freedom of choice.
His sister, Nancy, married Dwight Macdonald, the writer, who used her trust
fund to help finance the startup of Partisan Review in the 1930's.
After his return from Europe, Mr. Rodman was introduced to Mr. Bingham, who
was looking for a partner for his new magazine. Mr. Bingham wrote on
politics and economics; Mr. Rodman handled cultural matters. He also
persuaded W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender, Theodore Dreiser and Edmund Wilson
to contribute articles. The youthful nature of his and Mr. Bingham's
radicalism was suggested by an article in The New York Times in 1934 telling
of their trying to get diners at the Waldorf-Astoria to leave in support of
striking waiters. As they scuffled with house detectives, "Robert Benchley
and Dorothy Parker lent strong moral support at a nearby table," The Times
said.
Mr. Rodman published his first poetry book, "Mortal Triumph and Other
Poems," in 1932. He and Mr. Bingham published "Challenge to the New Deal" in
1935, and in 1938 he published his "New Anthology of Modern Poetry."
The anthology drew immediate attention for including selections not usually
considered poetry, including African-American folk songs, light verse,
choruses from the experimental theater and Bartolomeo Vanzetti's last plea
to the court.
In 1938 Mr. Rodman visited Haiti for the first time and wrote a play about
the Haitians' successful slave revolt against the French in 1803. Nelson
Rockefeller, as the State Department official responsible for Latin America,
delayed his induction into the Army so he could attend the premiere in
Port-au-Prince in 1942. Mr. Rockefeller believed the play would foster
pro-American feelings.
From 1943 to 1945 Mr. Rodman served in the Office of Strategic Services, the
wartime spy agency.
Mr. Rodman's interest in art deepened after the war, and in 1947 he wrote
"Horace Pippin, a Negro Painter in America," the first monograph on the
artist. He also became co-director of Le Centre d'Art in Port-au-Prince. It
was the main exhibition center of the naïve, voodoo-inspired art at the time
its popularity was blossoming.
Mr. Rodman wrote many travel books as he prowled the Western Hemisphere in
search of folk art. In "Mexican Journal," published in 1958, he demonstrated
a favorite technique: asking leading personalities remarkably direct
questions. For example, he asked the painter Tamayo what he thought of the
painter Siqueiros, and vice versa.
Mr. Rodman was married to Eunice Clark, Hilda Clausen and Maia
Wojciechowska, the author and onetime matador, all dead. His wife of 40
years, the former Carole Cleaver, who is also a writer, survives him along
with his daughters Oriana Rodman and Carla Oschwald, both of Santa Fe, N.M.;
his son, Van Nostrand Rodman of Oakland, N.J.; and three grandchildren.
Hyfler/Rosner
"Hyfler/Rosner" <rel...@rcn.com> wrote in message
news:aqnhk5$r4n$1...@bob.news.rcn.net...
My mother was one of the writer/editors of this magazine. She knew Rodman
and Bingham and Daniel Bell as well as many of the other contributors. I'd
dig out all the magazines to see exactly who, but every time I look at them,
they crumble.
So now you know how I come to left-wing causes and lively radical
discussion. Unless you prefer to think of me as one of the "stodgy old
group" and "the
pseudo-intellectual circle jerk" Or one of the people who "purport to have
seen everything, been everywhere, known everyone."
To quote "doc."
Bill Schenley
> lively radical discussion. Unless you prefer to think of
I prefer to think of you ... uh ... in a somewhat different
... light ...
> ...and "the pseudo-intellectual circle jerk" Or one of the
> people who "purport to have seen everything, been
> everywhere, known everyone."
Well ... I ... for one ... never heard of Selden Rodman ... So
he must not of been *that* important ...
Was he, by chance, related to that patron of the arts ...
Dennis Rodman?
> To quote "doc."
I ... much prefer this quote of doc's:
"I swear, there are about six surly,
petulant and underemployed
curmudgeons sitting on the
metaphorical ledge of this newspit,
bemoaning all human interaction as
vanity while refusing to
acknowledge the inherent sadness
of their own isolation, masked behind
a mostly unsubtle mantle of elitism
and smugness."
- doc (5/22/02) -
J.D. Baldwin
In the previous article, Bill Schenley <stra...@erie.net> wrote:
> "I swear, there are about six surly,
> petulant and underemployed
> curmudgeons sitting on the
> metaphorical ledge of this newspit,
> bemoaning all human interaction as
> vanity while refusing to
> acknowledge the inherent sadness
> of their own isolation, masked behind
> a mostly unsubtle mantle of elitism
> and smugness."
> - doc (5/22/02) -
"Mostly" unsubtle? I shall redouble my efforts.
--
_+_ From the catapult of |If anyone disagrees with any statement I make, I
_|70|___:)=}- J.D. Baldwin |am quite prepared not only to retract it, but also
\ / bal...@panix.com|to deny under oath that I ever made it. -T. Lehrer
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