Woodstock

[Bekah]

You're right,  John.  IV is not particularly  nostalgic if you weren't  
there because the names and places are not the ones which have  
continued on in our collective media-induced memory (Manson  
excepted).     It was nostalgic for me in a very distinct sense,   but  
it in no way "covered the times,"  as you point out.  IV takes place  
in the late hippie era and imo,  Manson & company killed the good name  
of the hippies.  This book is not about the peace and love that  
defined the hippies of 1965 (or so) to 1969/70.  This is the  
aftermath.  (Yes,  there was a funeral in effigy in SF in September  
(?) 1967 but that just turned the interest higher for a  while - not  
necessarily a good thing.)

I remember that in 1967/'68 I went around in my fringe jacket and  
barefoot and people stared but they didn't say or do anything - many  
smiled.   After Manson,  in 1969 or '70,  my hubby was walking across  
the street from a parking lot and jumped over a curb thingie with his  
arms outstretched.  The fringe on his jacket scattered out and it was  
really beautiful to me.   However,  this man who was coming out of a  
store front there saw him and literally ran in fear.   That's what  
Manson did to the hippies (or whatever we were).   The term Hippie  
went from being a kind of funny but controversial label to a seriously  
bad thing to be.

August 8, 1969 - Manson Tate murders
December,  1969 -  Manson & Co. arrested
December 1969 - Altamont Concert
June 1970 - January 1971  - Manson trial


Bekah
http://web.mac.com/bekker2/

On Aug 16, 2009, at 12:09 AM, John Bailey wrote:

> 3. Where are all of those Popular Trademarked Sixties Nostalgic
> Milestones? Woodstock, the Moon Landing, etc? Apart from the Manson
> murders, IV pretty much seems to stick to surface streets, dropping
> names that might have slipped off the grid, or require a bit of
> memory-nudging or research to catch. It's not a nostalgic novel in the
> sense that it just namechecks the usual suspects; although it might be
> nostalgic towards a particular seam of 60s/70s America that isn't
> captured by your usual commercial Today in History retrospective. Or
> is it? I came in a decade or so late and half a world away.