Porn writer responds ...thickly

I have been summoned from my vasty heights and lofty summit by the whimpering of the near-damned and the barely coherent. Jeffrey Cormier ["Mêlée Mere Musing," (e)Mail, Aug. 21] doomcries that "someone's going to get hurt" with all the "metaphysical musing" flying through the air like so many winged demons, after hoisting himself on his own postgraduate petard. That someone be him.

Paradoxically, Cormier is more paroxysm than paradox. His blunt-witted comment that irony is neither my "forte" nor my "strength" shows his Oxford is Oxfamished--as all students of more than one language, let alone one, will neatly recognize that forte is equivocal to strength.

Further, Cormier is no 19th-century theologian. Were he one, he might see little inherent contradiction in my employ as a pornographer for Penthouse publications and a Pentecostal with Pilate envy. I do love Jesus, and vice versa. Jesus embraced the stone-tossed Magdalene, a hooker with a heart of frankincense, and did business with sinners; it was the hypocritical Pharisees, not unlike Cormier, whom he threw out of the Temple. The body beautiful, and fully used, is a Temple.

Christ Incarnate had a penis and erections. Those in or out of the Church who deny the flesh in order to beatify the flesh make an ash of themselves. There is nothing wrong with my evangelism or my erotica--nothing, at least, that might not be cured by a good hairshirt.

In the meantime, I will leave the logic trees that crucify those of us who wish the best of both worlds--heaven and hell, innocence and experience--to the pedants, whose childish book-learning is just an intellectual form of pedophilia. That is, they prefer the small and unborn idea to the mature fully grown one. I have put away childish things to write for adults, thank God.

Todd Swift Friend of Jesus and Guccione

Druze, not surf

Commenting on the Klezmer Conservatory Band's latest album [Dancing in the Aisles, Compact Discs, Aug. 21], Mirror reviewer Rupert Bottenberg writes that "the languourous, deadpan cover of the surf classic 'Miserlou' defies explanation. Not that I'm complaining."

If Bottenberg had bothered to read the liner notes, he'd have learned that "Miserlou" is a traditional Druze Arabic melody with Yiddish lyrics by Miriam Kressyn that's been played at Jewish weddings since the 1920s. Other than the title, it has nothing in common with the surf song. To me, what defies explanation is how anyone who has actually listened to the record could possibly confuse this melody with a surf song.

Mike Regenstreif

Partition blows... up

With the partition movement, English Quebecers may find themselves beaten at their own game. I remember Eric Maldoff as president of Alliance Quebec some years ago, crying about how difficult it was to live in Quebec as an oppressed minority; I also remember all those interviews given in the streets of Montreal by people saying that they were oppressed, that they could not speak English in Quebec, and so on. The interviews were broadcast coast to coast at the time by the CBC. It had and still has its effect on English Canada.

Then I remember when the Charlottetown Accord was to be voted on, seeing leaders of ethnic communities in Quebec campaigning together in English Canada so the distinct society clause would be accepted and Canada would be saved. But Charlottetown did not pass, surely in part because of the hate campaign by some English Quebec radicals who opposed distinct society. It promoted a strong anti-Quebec feeling in the whole country and had a boomerang effect.

Now what do we see? English Quebecers promoting the partition of Quebec in case of a majority vote for sovereignty. Now we see the rest of the country giving support to this option by voting in municipal councils in favour of this radical solution. Here again, English Quebecers may be caught at their own game during the next referendum on sovereignty: if it passes, it may well be English Canada that, in a motion of anger, will destroy what English Quebecers have been enjoying and contributing to build for so long. It will be too late then. What is designed to be a threat to French Quebecers before the next referendum may well be a disaster afterwards.

Jacques Benoit

Manning is right

It seems to me that it is much easier to work out treaties based on reciprocity. Thus, for example, NAFTA negotiations worked because the parties involved agreed that their countries would open their borders equally.

One then has to wonder how realistic people are here in Quebec in wanting the rest of Canada to accept inequitable treaties with them, i.e. treaties which would give Quebec powers that the other provinces don't have. If Quebec wants certain powers to protect their culture, wouldn't it be more apt to get them if Quebec allowed the other provinces to exercise such powers? This, as I understand it, is exactly what Preston Manning is saying.

In other words, equality in a new Canada would also protect Quebec culture. Those people who feel the need for such additional powers need not give up on Canada.

Robert Feinstein