Dream of a literary review fulfilled

By RICHARD HANNERS

Whitefish Pilot

Brian Schott's dream of publishing a literary review reaches fruition this month when copies of his 128-page "Whitefish Review" hit the bookstores.

The spokesman for Big Mountain Ski Resort and other enterprises around the Whitefish area, Schott calls the book "our slippery baby."

Schott's been doing this for a while. He won a literary prize for a piece of fiction as an undergraduate at Dartmouth College. With pieces on travel and outdoor recreation published in newspapers and magazines across the U.S., he's back at his alma mater enrolled in a graduate program in creative writing.

Schott took the lead role in the "Whitefish Review" as editor, but he was assisted by co-editors Mike Powers, Ryan Friel and Tom Mull and art director Ian Griffiths.

Schott also contributed a disturbing 11-page short story that begins at a road construction site near Durango, Colo., and concludes with a hunting trip that tragically ends before it begins.

Twenty-four writers and artists are "reviewed," including several local artists. There are 12 color plates in the center of the book, followed by several pages of text with additional information on the preceding photographs and graphics.

Somers-based photographer Ed Gilliland shot a still-life color with a Western theme, and Whitefish artist Pete Thomas inked "The Drinker" in a remote Cooke Inlet cabin after he broke up with his girlfriend.

Noting how art imitates nature, Alex Volvorth, a geologist-mineralogist from Dayton, photographed a piece of Jurassic sandstone in homage to Edvard Munch's 1893 work "The Scream." Volvorth got his Ph.D. at the University of Helsinki, and studied moon dust for NASA.

Tim Cahill, the Livingston outdoor writer who penned the critically acclaimed "Everest" and does work for National Geographic, wrote about his four-year-old Brittany spaniel Grace and Trusty, a neighbor's golden retriever, in "Shed His Grace on Me."

Like Guillermo Arriago's script for the recent film "Babel," Cahill's story bobs and weaves all over the place, eventually transitioning to a young girl's successful spinal operation — paid for by the Shriners. The story is like Grace, who "leaps and bounds" through the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness at speeds reaching 25 mph.

Whitefish City-County Planning Board member and poet Kerry Crittenden provided "Waiting for the Test Results." Crittenden, a ski patroller at Big Mountain for 17 years and inventor of the popular butt-flap, spends time in his short poem shelling peas and musing about who to invite to a celebration or a memorial.

Jay Cowan should know what he's talking about in "Hunter Thompson, Shootist" — he was a caretaker of the gonzo journalist's Owl Farm off and on for 15 years. And like his subject, Cowan doesn't mince words, deciding to take on the same role Thompson took after Ernest Hemingway committed suicide with a shotgun.

Thompson was "accident prone," Cowan says, which is understandable considering all the time Thompson spent shooting guns while loaded. Thompson was also "a lousy shot," which is not understandable considering the fact that he was a "good athlete" who could hit from the top of the key.

He was also not a hunter, Cowan says, although Thompson admired "the famous meat-eating artist from Montana," Russell Chatham — enough to drive up the bid for a Chatham painting to $80,000 just to "get things rolling" at an auction. Thompson never intended to pay for the painting, but somehow he "got stuck with it."

There's a lot about the medical industry here — Schott's ambulance ride, Cahill's operation, Crittenden's lab results and Cowan's euthanasia. If that's not enough, there's a little bit more in the review's talk with retired NFL quarterback Drew Bledsoe.

In "The Art of Football," Bledsoe notes that he started skiing at age two, but he threw a spiral at one of his father's football practices when he was four or five and swore he would become a quarterback. The owner of the Patriots, however, was not amused, and Bledsoe ended up getting health insurance from Lloyds of London so he could do both.

"Skiing is more of a solo sport than football," notes Bledsoe, who owns a home in Iron Horse not far from the ski resort. He bragged that he was on the slopes at Big Mountain within 12 hours after the 2001 Super Bowl ended in Tampa Bay, Fla.

Bledsoe says he likes Whitefish — he bought a cabin on Whitefish Lake the first time he came to the area. He was 23 years old and the real estate agent didn't take him for real. But now that he's retired, he's got a vineyard in the Columbia Valley with more land near Walla Walla, Wash.

People would "probably be surprised how normal my life is for the most part," Bledsoe says. He's 34 now, with four kids that he wants to watch growing up. He hangs out with soccer moms now.