Anti-Censorship Attorney Edward de Grazia -- RIP

Edward de Grazia
(photo: The New York Times)

Attorney Edward de Grazia, whose trailblazing legal initiatives expanded free speech in the United States, died recently at age 86. The New York Times' obit offers a succinct overview of the barrister's active, profoundly influential career.

He successfully represented Grove Press in its 1964 landmark censorship case involving Henry Miller's novel Tropic of Cancer. De Grazia was also the attorney who led the fight against the U.S. Postal Service's attempt to prohibit dissemination of William S. Burroughs' Naked Lunch. He also won a court case that permitted public showings of the movie I Am Curious (Yellow).

It's easy to look back at these cases and imagine there was something quaint in the legal issues and moral fervor they generated. However, at the time, de Grazia's work was absolutely essential to establishing free speech in literature and motion pictures. This was serious business, with high stakes for open, creative minds. Had de Grazia lost these key cases, the cause of artistic and literary freedom would have been stunted. The consequence of de Grazia's extraordinary legal work can be found today in libraries, bookstores, museums, movie theaters, the stage, the ballet, television, radio, music, and the Internet. The politically conservative forces opposed to de Grazia's legal positions survived and have even prospered. So has the nation, which religious and political ideologues falsely asserted was simply dissipating in a morass of what they considered "pornographic works," such as those of Henry Miller and James Joyce.

De Grazia's passing is a reminder that the struggle to maintain free speech continues. It's the present generation -- people such as you and I -- that must carry the torch that Edward de Grazia so proudly and decisively held high for all Americans.

Kansas Duns Sperm Donor for Child Support Payments

Many years ago, the author William S. Burroughs speculated there would be a need for biological courts. At the time, the concept seemed connected to some far away event that might not ever materialize.

The circumstances that influenced the writer of Naked Lunch and The Ticket That Exploded may be upon us now. According to an Associated Press story reprinted in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, a Kansas sperm donor is fighting against a state ruling that he must pay child support. The case gets entangled in Kansas law, which mandates sperm donation must be conducted via a licensed medical doctor. The donor in question, William Marotta, gave his jizzom to a lesbian couple without benefit of medical sanction or assistance.

The story is definitely worth reading, as the details add texture, philosophical weight, and legal gravitas to this tale of unplanned, unwanted consequences. The journalist noted one unintentionally funny moment, when Mr. Marotta "dropped off a container with his sperm at the couple's home..."

Now there's service!

Turkish Government Prosecuting "Soft Machine" Publisher

Sometimes publishing is a rough business. That observation gains greater credence when one considers news outside North America and Western Europe. The most recent example comes from Turkey, as reported in the LA Times. The government is taking a publisher to court for printing a Turkish language version of William S. Burroughs' The Soft Machine. According to the Times piece, which cited an account from a major Turkish newspaper, the government alleges that Burroughs' novel promotes "'attitudes that were permissive to crime by concentrating on the banal, vulgar, and weak attributes of humanity...'"

The International Publishers Association made a statement on behalf of the Turkish defendant. The organization also noted other writers, in other countries, who have been legally or illegally bullied, coerced, beaten, or murdered in an effort to silence them or distort their message. The IPA, and similar groups, continue to stand up for writers and publishers. They need our support.