Comments for Dektol's Weblog

Comment on Google and the Narrowing of Knowledge by Bob Flame

Bob Flame — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:01:43 +0000

Hi….stumbled across your post as I searched for Trinidad, NM after reading “The Wilderness Warrior” as well. What a wonderful book, but yes, it is full of editorial errors, that while not damaging the breadth and depth of the book or its main character, raise lots of questions about the quality of the editing. There is no Trinidad, NM. El Morro (I actually worked there for 2 years) is near Ramah, NM, or Zuni, or Grants, or even Gallup. Another one that got me was the discussion of “circumscribed fire”, rather than the proper term, prescribed fire. There’s another place where even “Roosevelt” is spelled incorrectly. Still a great book, but likely a sign that today’s troubled publishing industry is cutting so far back that these kinds of errors will be more common than less so.

Comment on “America the beautiful” by dektol

dektol — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 16:12:00 +0000

I have a lot of trouble with this. I grow apples, and I don’t spray the trees. Commercial farmers usually do, and of course the poison they use is passed on to everyone that eats the apples.
The first thing that makes me jump is that your comments repeat (as in Media Brainwashing) a lot of terms that have made a rational public discussion of the issue almost impossible. The man that delivered me in 1942, the doctor, was my uncle, who in 1905 came to NYC as an illegal immegrant. Among other things he was wanted for “murder one” back home in Russia, as his son,who became a lawyer, later put it. So send him back. My father, a German, who immigrated about thirty years later, told me he “smuggled in some diamonds” by coring an orange, and pushing them inside. So lets deport him too. But then I wouldn’t have become the the asset that I am to America, because I wouldn’t be an American — they would have refused entry to my ancestors, the “bad apples”. Maybe we should deport some of the Publo, Navajo and the Lakota? Some of them do bad things. But where would we send them?
Danny Lyon

Comment on “America the beautiful” by Doug Rickard

Doug Rickard — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 03:39:34 +0000

Yes, of course it is simple, grant them all citizenship, hire them legally, tax them, let them have our benefits as citizens and make them Americans. The only caveat is that you would want to screen out them “bad apples”, those that would do us and each other harm. You know the one’s, the rapists, the child molesters, the murderers, the armed robber’ers, the drug dealers and of course, the terrorists. Skin color has no boundries when dealing with “bad apples” so you wouldn’t want to single out by ethnic group or skin color type… you just want to get rid of the bad apples.

After all, human nature is a mother fk’er and you have to account for it and it’s ugly side. Try to minimize the downside of the mass immigration influx.

As long as we get all of the “good ones”, we have plenty of room here.

Comment on Danny Lyon by petebrook

petebrook — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 20:51:48 +0000

Danny. Your scuttling of any argument Google has to appropriate your work was swift. The situation is beyond ludicrous that they can acquire books without authors’ consent. I have enjoyed, and benefited from, reading on Google books, but I am disturbed if Google trampled on other author’s rights in order for me and others to read their works.

I reposted your statement. I hope we can fight Google’s theft.

http://prisonphotography.wordpress.com/2009/09/26/danny-lyon-vs-google-books/

Comment on Google vs The Bikeriders by Danny Lyon vs. Google Books « Prison Photography

Danny Lyon vs. Google Books « Prison Photography — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 20:41:15 +0000

[...] out last week about Google books’ disregard for rights, artistic craft and common respect. In Google vs. The Bikeriders he lays out a short and no nonsense [...]

Comment on Danny Lyon by sally norvell

sally norvell — Tue, 19 May 2009 19:12:07 +0000

Dear Danny,
I’ve just finished reading your excellent “Like a Thief’s Dream”. It was one of those books I couldn’t put down – I became totally caught up in Smiley & his movements. I think the reason is because you’ve so deftly humanized him, gotten inside his head (as much as anyone could). The way you present Smiley & his criminal partners is so interesting, because it more than detached journalism, and certainly not sensationalist. It is indeed, bleak but vivid with the pulse of life. You manage to present the circumstances of his crime without judgment, but also without glorifying. Here is a man, who really can murder, when and if the situation, in his mind, calls for it. And even tho it shakes him, he can justify it.

I’ve been researching a story about a man on Texas’ Death Row, whose crime is in some ways similar to Smiley’s and about the same time period. I’ve found the complexities of telling a murder story to be many and varied, and I’ve discovered that in prison, even on Death Row in the belly of the beast (Texas), there are very few men who are the true definition of cold-blooded killers. In fact most of them have come to their situation in frighteningly familiar & ordinary choices that have led them into our own system of vengeance and brutality.

I don’t pretend to know what the solution is to our incarceration addiction, nor what we must do to end the death penalty. But I do know that we cannot hope to become a global leader in human rights if we continue to treat our own citizens in this way. People like you, who can tell the stories of these men & women in compelling, humane, understandable ways is a very necessary part of the struggle, and I am so grateful to you for doing it.

I think the reason you are so successful, especially with your photographs, is that your eye is so wide open, and you manage to capture that which is within every human being. And we are compelled to look and look again, because we do see something of ourselves, even in the lowest of the low.

Thanks worlds for your brilliant work.

-Sally Norvell

Comment on Danny Lyon by Pete

Pete — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 20:24:20 +0000

Hello Danny

I would like to feature your work on my blog. You pioneered documentary activity that looked at prisoners and social transgressors. Now it can be perversely chic to look at gangs and it can be impossible get access to some prisons. Your thoughts on this would be interesting.

Respectfully, Pete

Comment on From “The Fisherman”, an unpublished excerpt by Mike

Mike — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 14:55:09 +0000

Just passing by.Btw, your website have great content!

_________________________________
Making Money $150 An Hour

Comment on Its good to be alive in Obama time by Mark Rudd

Mark Rudd — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 04:45:33 +0000

What a wonderful discovery to find your blog, Danny. Your clarity on the meaning of the civil rights movement is incandescent.

Comment on Danny Lyon by Nancy Andrews

Nancy Andrews — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 23:38:02 +0000

Blessings and greetings to dektol and readers,
My brother has a 1968 first printing, hardback/dj of “The Bikeriders,” Macmillian company.
The book is in fine condition with no writing, tears of soiling to the text. FOR HUGH EDWARDS is printed on the copyright page.
He is loathe to sell it, but a serious illness has forced him to sell many of his prized possessions. (Due to a previous bad experience, eBAy is not an option.)
Please pass this information and my email address along to any interested collectors of your fine, early books of photography.
All Best,
Nancy Andrews

P.S. YES WE DID!