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A lot of people died in 1975. But only one of them was named J. Andrew Haknort.
The death of this avant-garde beatnik poet rocked the world, especially those who had heard of him.
His influence can still be seen everywhere, I'm guessing.
He left behind a massive body of work that continues to amaze and titillate drunks and the feeble minded alike.
But even a quarter century after his tragic end, J. Andrew Haknort remains a misunderstood enigma. Who was this dark genius? This affected poet? This insane, incontinent rogue?
When I first began researching J. Andrew Haknort for my biography "The Muse is Luse" [publisher inquiries welcome], I found out that there were many periods of his life where little is known. But this didn't prove anything, because I'm a really lousy researcher.
We do know that he was born in 1907 in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. His father, Jebediah Haknort, was an unsuccessful dirt farmer. Jebediah was fond of saying to anyone who would listen, "We're dirt poor. Get it? I'm a dirt farmer. You get it?"
Jebediah met Marcy Johnson, an Amish prostitute, in 1904 and lured her away from a life of
squalor with promises of abject poverty. They married in 1905.
Life was difficult, but terrible. Jebediah's misunderstanding that dirt farmers were meant to grow dirt left the couple starving and filthy. To feed her family, Marcy got a job at the local dogpound, but was soon fired when her superiors discovered her parboiling a Beagle.
It's a fascinating story how they were able to survive, I bet. All I know is that J. Andrew came into this world on March 29, 1907. Soon after, his parents joined an obscure religious commune in Iowa called Jesus's Eternal Love, where talking was forbidden and beatings were administered daily.
This impacted J. Andrew immensely, and when he entered school at the age of five his only method of communication was pointing and making whining sounds.
Other children picked on him mercilessly until he finally learned to talk, and then they picked on him
ceaselessly. His late start in language left him with a lisp. J. Andrew kept this impediment until his late teens, when a speech therapist told him, "All you have to do is stop making that 'thhh' sound."
School was tough on the dirt farmer's son, who knew of nothing except Christ's love through daily beatings. J. Andrew's report cards showed him to be a shy, introspective lad, blessed with low intelligence, who often touched himself when confused.
We know that J. Andrew's eighth grade English teacher, Mr. Adams, had a huge impact on him, when he ran him over with his Ford.
J. Andrew spent six months in the
hospital, and underwent a series of four operations to fully remove the steering
column from his rectum.
During this extended stay, J. Andrew's well-meaning slut of a mother brought him books to keep his mind busy. He had his first taste of verse in the form of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, on which he commented, "Is this even fucking English?"
Later, his mother brought him Mark Twain, but Mr. Twain filed a restraining order to get her to stop grabbing him.
On J. Andrew's twenty-first birthday, he turned twenty-one. Then, a bunch of stuff happened, and eight years later he wrote his first and only novel, "Long and Pink with a Hole in the Middle."
Unfortunately, the only copy of the manuscript burned in a fire, started by his editor. I can only wonder what the book was about, as I sit here, picking my toes.
The tragedy set J. Andrew off on a notorious eating binge that ended with his arrest in Boston when he ate an Anglican Bishop. Funny hat and all.
Deemed unfit to stand trial by those who deem those things, Haknort was sent to the mental ward, where he would stay until he was let out.
Locked away in an institution, J. Andrew was diagnosed by professionals as "crazy." He underwent shock treatment, trepanation, ice baths, psychotropic drugs, and sensory deprivation therapy every day, several times a day. Plus, enemas.
Psychotherapy had no effect, because it wasn't being used.
The story would end here, except that there's a lot more to tell. After seven years of having his brain pickled and poked, J. Andrew was released. Undaunted,
superfluous, and proselytical, J. Andrew once again entered society.
World War II was in full effect. Patriotism swelled in J. Andrew's mind, but that was later found out to be a subdural hemorrhage. Unfit for active duty, J. Andrew fought the war at home, using little plastic figures.
Then, a few years later, he wrote a bunch of poems.
I can relate to this, because I'm a frustrated poet myself. My collection of prose, "I Can't See Chicago Because of the Fog-o" was printed by J. Andrew's publisher Heinous House in 1993.
It was coolly received.
In fact, one individual got very sick after reading it and sued me. We settled out of court. I'm not bitter.
But this isn't about me.
J. Andrew published his first poem, the famous "Exploding Fish!", in the Mid-Atlanic
Appalachian Northwoods Missouri Southern Texas Review Quarterly in 1951. It was a semi-respectable literary journal, credited for discovering Charlie "Psoriasis" Scripitti and Jimbo Beans, neither of whom are known by anyone.
J. Andrew later went on to publish in other journals, I'm guessing. I know he got famous somehow.
His first poetry collection, "First Poetry Collection," was published in 1955 with an introduction by Ezra Pound as written by someone else.
I managed to track down the editor of the book, a fellow named Murray Christmas. (That's his real name, and though it may seem odd, it isn't nearly as odd as is sister's name, Groundhog Day.)
Murry attempted to be cooperative, but being a hundred and three years old, he'd forgotten many of the relevant details, such as his own name. After much patience, and some help from his nurse to understand his drooling wheezes, I got nowhere. So I have no idea why I'm telling you this.
But when the nurse left, I looked through his personal effects. This yielded a yellow, faded manuscript filled with scribblings, and a real nice gold watch.
The manuscript intrigued me. Could this really be an original Haknort document? I knew that I had to find out, after I pawned the watch.
Authentification is a painstaking process that requires a lot of research and determination. I immediately went to work. After work, I went to a movie. Then, a nap.
Discouraged by my lack of progress, I took the manuscript to the Smithsonian Institute, which has a large collection of stuff, much of it valuable. Dr. Wolfgang Schoppenschitzer, who worked on the authentification project, is quoted:
"Ja. Der fladermaus."
After the manuscript was proved to be real by someone else, the next job was to determine the year it was written. Dr. Mallory Proctor:
"Probably sometime before Haknort died."
This opens up a large topic for serious discussion, that I am
merely going to skip.
Later, someone discovered that the manuscript
was written in 1955, as evidenced by the scrawl on the first page "I wrote this in 1955."
This was a difficult year in the life of J. Andrew, because they were all difficult. It was also a year in America that will go down in infamy, because it was right after 1953, which was exactly 187 years since the start of the Revolutionary War.
J. Andrew Haknort's First Poetry Collection would go on into the annals of obscurity. It was followed by several others, his Second Poetry
Collection and his Fourth Poetry Collection. He never bothered to write the Third.
Sometime, during all of this, the public began to take notice. Haknort became a local celebrity in the town of Springfield, which was odd because he lived in New Brunswick. His books began to fly off the shelves, up until the publisher stopped tying them to pigeons. There was dancing.
In 1966, J. Andrew won the prestigious Woobie Awardİ for best poem of all time, ever, which he shared with eight others. The poem was the haunting "There Are Egglants on the Landing." What high school didn't have scores of children memorizing that one in English class? All of them, I believe.
The critical acclaim Haknort began receiving catapulted him into the adrenaline surging forefront of modern American poetry, along with William Shakespeare and Mao Tse Tung. Quote Yale English Professor Gregory Nesbit:
"If Haknort were a pound of bacon, he'd sure be a clever one."
The First World Poetry Symposium met in 1969 and J. Andrew was the guest of honor. Some of the top organizations in the world attended, including SAUPLIQ (The Society for the Advancement of Ugly People with Low IQs), WIMTHEA (Women for the Improvement of Mascara Technology through Harmful Experiments on Animals), SPWLA (Society for People Who Like Abbreviations), POETS (Pappy Or Eat Tables Stork), and LABIA (The Netherlips).
The Symposium brought many to tears, due to a chemical leak that gave most attendees second degree burns.
When J. Andrew Haknort read his final poem, the whole symposium broke into applause, because he'd finally finished.
Quote Harold Barnicky, one of the attendees:
"Those little crackers they had, the ones with the spinach and cheese-- mmmm-mmmmmmmm!"
The excitement must have been too much for J. Andrew, because he died only a few years later.
The mystery behind J. Andrew's death isn't so mysterious when you consider there was no mystery.
In 1975, or around there, he went in for surgery to help correct his life long affliction, know as USBD (Uncontrollable Squirting Bladder Disorder). The night before his operation, a nurse
inadvertently plugged his catheter into his IV.
During the autopsy, his blood urine level was found to be an astonishing 12.3%.
An ironic death for a man who was often told he had piss in his veins.
So what of Haknort's legacy? That's what I say-- so what? Quote Harvard University Professor Hans Endeeair:
"We may never know what drove a man like J. Andrew Haknort. But my guess is it was a Chevy."
If there were ten words to describe J. Andrew Haknort's brilliance, I would have a damn hard time thinking of them. I suppose all I can really do is honor him with a poem.
I first read this at the Third Annual Haknort Society Luncheon and Bingo Night in Peoria, Illinois, where hundreds or five people had come to honor the late writer.
Can Death Stop a Poet?
Can death stop a poet?
Can it? Can it?
Can death stop a poet?
Can it? Can it?
Huh? Can it?
Can death stop a poet?
I'm asking you a question, dummy!
Answer me!
Can death stop a poet?
Can it, jackass?
I'm talking to you!
It was coolly received.
Perhaps the best way to end this bio is with J. Andrew's own words:
"What makes a great man? Usually, it's when a whole bunch of people say, 'Boy, you're great.' But I think we all have things about us that are great. Whether you're a mailman, or a postman, or even a letter carrier, we all have greatness in us, somewhere, maybe in the loins. That's what I say, because the Pork People who live in my pockets tell me to say that, or they'll eat me."
Great, indeed.
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