Last Thursday, the Efroymson Center for Creative Writing was filled with supporters and fans of Butler Professor Andy Levy. Levy’s most recent book, Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era That Shaped His Masterpiece, has earned national recognition and rave reviews, but Thursday’s event was more than a celebration of the successful book.

In his introduction of Levy, colleague Dan Barden explained the evening was “a party for our friend. A celebration of Andy Levy.” Levy was lauded for his genius as a writer, success as a teacher, and value as a friend. Preceding a short but captivating reading from the book, Levy delivered a beautiful thank you to the Butler community. He began by saying, “Butler is all over this book.” The idea for the book began in his days as a Teacher-in-Resident twenty years ago. Levy said the heavily researched book was written all over the campus and frequently discussed in class and with students, many of whom are thanked or footnoted in the book. He further stated, “I will never again write a book without the involvement of my students.”

Before he left the podium, Levy asked for a round of applause for his young son, Aedan, for no other reason than for being a cool kid. The rest of the evening emulated a true celebration with food, laughter, drinks, and conversation about Levy being not just a talented writer and dedicated teacher, but also an overall cool man.

Last Thursday, the Efroymson Center for Creative Writing was filled with supporters and fans of Butler Professor Andy Levy. Levy’s most recent book, Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era That Shaped His Masterpiece, has earned national recognition and rave reviews, but Thursday’s event was more than a celebration of the successful book.

In his introduction of Levy, colleague Dan Barden explained the evening was “a party for our friend. A celebration of Andy Levy.” Levy was lauded for his genius as a writer, success as a teacher, and value as a friend. Preceding a short but captivating reading from the book, Levy delivered a beautiful thank you to the Butler community. He began by saying, “Butler is all over this book.” The idea for the book began in his days as a Teacher-in-Resident twenty years ago. Levy said the heavily researched book was written all over the campus and frequently discussed in class and with students, many of whom are thanked or footnoted in the book. He further stated, “I will never again write a book without the involvement of my students.”

Before he left the podium, Levy asked for a round of applause for his young son, Aedan, for no other reason than for being a cool kid. The rest of the evening emulated a true celebration with food, laughter, drinks, and conversation about Levy being not just a talented writer and dedicated teacher, but also an overall cool man.

January 27th at 7:30, Butler University will screen Mentor, a powerful documentary by Butler Visiting Professor Alix Lambert. Lambert’s film takes viewers into the town and school of Mentor, a community with a “fit in or get out” mentality. Mentor, Ohio was voted one of the top 100 cities in the United States, but in the five years leading up to this honor, five students at Mentor High School died by suicide after relentless bullying. The independent documentary caught the attention of actress Ellen Page who recently tweeted, “If there is something 2 watch right now it’s @lixilamb ‘s film Mentor. So important and needs to be seen and shared.”

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBRnJITof44[/youtube]

Watch the trailer of the movie Filmmaker says is “both heartbreaking and soberly resolute in its inquiry into the institutional forces and ‘culture of conformity’ that fail young members of our communities.”

Although Mentor is set in one town, Lambert hopes viewers see bullying as systemic in all communities. “I’m not picking on Mentor,” Lambert says. “I chose an extreme example to show something that happens everywhere.”

Lambert chose to focus on the two families who brought law suits against the Mentor school district. Viewers will notice the film doesn’t name or center on the bullies themselves. This is because Lambert successfully presents the argument it was not just a handful of individuals that led to these suicides; it was the entire community. “Blaming a person or small group of people,” she says, “lets everyone – me, you – off the hook.” In her TED talk Lambert says, “Anytime we allow ourselves to be lured into the trap of believing a perpetrator caught equals problem solved we lose the ability to attack society’s problems at its root cause.”

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RMaD0_k7hc[/youtube]

Although she is far more comfortable behind the camera than in front, Alix presented a TED talk because she felt this idea of systemic problems was so important.

Lambert calls on everyone to be responsible to systemic bullying, but to do what you can. “I’m a filmmaker, so I make a film,” she says. “If you are a parent, go to the school and make sure there is bullying plan in place.” She believes everyone can do small things are important. “It begins with connecting with each other,” Lambert says.

The solution can begin with watching this film. It can begin a much needed conversation. Because independent documentaries aren’t usually shown in mainstream theaters nor have the resources to promote, most people don’t have the chance to see important films like Mentor. Butler is honored to share with the community the film TrustMovies calls “more important than Leviathan and a much stronger film than Bully.” The free screening will be January 27 at 7:30 p.m. in the Howard L. Schrott Center for the Arts.

[Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn] is taught more than any other American classic, is often discussed either as a carefree adventure story for children or a serious novel about race relations, yet Levy argues convincingly it is neither. Instead, Huck Finn was written at a time when Americans were nervous about youth violence and “uncivilized” bad boys, and a debate was raging about education, popular culture, and responsible parenting — casting Huck’s now-celebrated “freedom” in a very different and very modern light. – From Simon and Schuster

conversations@efroymson kicks off the spring semester series with a book party celebrating the release of Andy Levy’s third book, Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era that Shaped His Masterpiece. A favorite creative nonfiction professor in Butler’s MFA program, Levy practices what he teaches in his newest book.

Nonfiction student Susan Lerner says, “Levy uses research to show us a new way of understanding Huck Finn. In his workshop, Andy Levy taught me that creative nonfiction is supposed to do just that: expose the writer’s thinking so as to give the reader new lenses through which to look at a subject. I can’t wait to read Huck Finn’s America.”

As a professor Levy challenges his students to consider what is creative nonfiction. He explains how his Huck Finn’s America, which has been called part literary theory, part history, part biography, and all persuasive, is creative nonfiction. “This book is a hybrid of creative and critical modes– there are long narrative passages, components one would link to “biography,” a couple of small pieces of memoir, and a scholarly argument with documentation particularly ascendant at the beginning and end of the book,” Levy says. “I picked and chose among the genres available to me. The book is a kind of hybrid– that’s essentially a creative act in itself.”

Already beloved and highly recommended by his students, Levy believes writing this book has only made him a better professor. He says, “It increases the range of my experiences as a writer, my knowledge of process from beginning to end.  It’s more hours working, considering writing problems, how to get out of them;  more considerations of issues of structure, style, audience.  This is also a book about a writer writing a book– a distinctive writer and a distinctive book.  I learned a lot about his process, too, and that was wonderful.”

Huck Finn’s America is gaining buzz and earning rave reviews everywhere including Publisher’s Weekly where it made the top 10 list.

NPR calls Levy’s text “a richly researched, copiously annotated, fascinating argument that in all the debates over the book’s treatment of race and despite its position as both a widely banned book and a widely assigned book, we tend to miss some of the most important things it teaches.”

Buffalo News writes, “Levy argues persuasively [and] has steered the conversation of Huck Finn in a fresh, profitable direction, toward an intensive scrutiny of its roots. … Levy’s work reminds us that a fresh reading of Huck Finn might be a key to teaching us that we should not repeat the past, that we are capable of stifling our saddest echoes.”

Dozens more positive reviews exist, but Levy keeps a bigger perspective amid the praise. “Some of [the praise] is validation, excitement.  Some of it is embarassment– if the review is really nice, I usually won’t finish reading it, and I often take a certain perverse pleasure in a bad review,” he says. “And some of it is detachment– it’s all external validation, or criticism, or indifference, and we all know from personal experience that we’re not happier if we live for that.”

The book party is January 22nd at 7:30PM in the ECCW sunroom. It will include a brief reading, book signing, and lots of celebrating. Huck Finn’s America: Mark Twain and the Era that Shaped His Masterpiece will be available for purchase.