Violent writing

The Monday morning quarterbacking has begun. In 2005 the student responsible for what is now being called "the Virginia Tech massacre" was writing plays for a creative writing class filled with violence so grotesque and disturbing that the professor showed the work to the department chair, who in turn took it to the dean. When the university said there was nothing that could be done about it, freedom of speech and all, the chair took it upon herself to tutor the guy one-on-one and to get him to go to counseling, which she believes he did. Here then was an early clue about the interior turmoil of his life. What a private heroic effort by the chair to help him. But it wasn't enough, or didn't take, or whatever. All tragedy follows from lost opportunities. A few students in the creative writing class even wondered aloud if the guy was a "future school shooter." One, now hearing the news, broke down. You can't blame her.

Of course, violent writing also can be very artistic -- I am thinking of the play and later movie Extremities by William Mastrosimone, a powerful play about women getting violent revenge against a rapist.

I don't participate in Monday morning quarterbacking. But here we go ...