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November 18, 2015
 Library
Journal has announced their best books list of 2015
and Peter's book, "The
Rainman's Third Cure," is among the best
memoirs. Well done! For those of you who would like to
listen to Peter narrate his own book, you can purchase
this through
Amazon's Audible Studios.
November 8, 2015
 Jay
Silverman's "Girl on the Edge" has just received
the Audience Award at the Charleston Film Festival.
The low-budget independent feature was shot in 19 days
for under $1 million, Silverman said. It’s based on his
family’s real-life experience. It tells the story of a
troubled teenager who falls victim to an online
predator. Unable to cope with the trauma, Hannah (played
by Taylor Spreitler) becomes self-destructive and is
sent off to a farm managed by Hank Taylor (played by
Peter), who specializes in equine therapy. The filmmaker
has taken the movie to numerous festivals in recent
months where it has accumulated several awards and
secured international distribution.
October 30, 2015
As
previously reported, Peter joined the Melanthium Ensemble
in a concert at the Throckmorton Theatre
in Mill Valley on October 25th. Peter and Lewis
Richmond, decades-long colleagues in Zen Buddhism,
forged an artistic collaboration in a one-time
performance of poetry and music. Richmond’s contemporary
classical music group, The Melanthium Ensemble,
performed his original compositions, and together they
presented premieres of poems by Peter, for which
Richmond composed original music.
Peter has been
Richmond’s Buddhist
student for many years, and now they teach together. Of
their Zen relationship, Richmond says, "Peter and I are
a natural fit. I have always felt that the true role of
Buddhist practice is to develop the clarity and courage
to actually be truly of help to people wherever you
might find them. In all his various activities and
roles, as a political and social activist, performer and
teacher, Peter has always done that; he has a natural
gift for it which his Zen study has further enhanced."
"My work with Lew has been an inspiration,” notes Peter,
who is now an ordained Zen priest. "He has inspired me
to dedicate myself to ‘Suzuki-roshi’s way’ - the path
clarified for him by his teacher, the founder of San
Francisco Zen Center. The icing on the cake is humor,
mutual respect and a common dedication to helping
others. Plus, he swings musically."
Here's a photo of Peter four years
ago standing alongside his friend Lew (at Peter's right
wearing a blue robe).
October 11, 2015
During
a recent visit, a Q&A was put to Peter by Grinnell's
college newspaper, The Scarlet & Black.
What
is your favorite memory
from your time at
Grinnell?
PC:
There are many. My
closest friends, sitting
in the student union
every night, smoking
cigarettes and talking
about poetry from Donald
Allen’s book, "The New
American Poetry,
1945-1960." Also the
nurturing of a community
of people that were just
like me, meaning we read
the same books, we
thought the same things
were important, and we
had the good luck to
meet from all over the
country right here. They
are still my closest
friends to this day—that
is, the ones that are
still living.
Were
there any specific
events that pushed you
towards Buddhism? Had
you dabbled in other
religions beforehand?
PC:
Well, I had been raised
as a secular Jew in a
family with a lot of
socialists, communists
and capitalists. There
was a lot of high-level,
high IQ chatter. Then
there were events in the
60s where people I loved
very much died in a way
that I felt, had I been
smarter and more
observant, I could have
taken more
responsibility and maybe
prevented that. This was
communal living — … kids
looked up to me that I
wasn’t really aware of
and [I] didn’t monitor
my behaviour and didn’t
protect them from my own
charisma. Three kids in
particular never made it
to 23. That was
something that stayed
with me long after the
60s. I had been a drug
addict in the 60s and
when I was cleaning up
my life and putting it
together I had been
interested in Zen and
had been reading about
it. I actually was
dating a woman who was
living at a monastery. I
started to practice and
it became a part of my
process of healing from
addiction and guilt and
all sorts of stuff.
What
was your favorite film
or TV show to act or
narrate for?
PC:
It’s hard to pick a
favorite. You know,
sometimes you do a movie
like “Timerider,” which
is a silly little cult
science fiction western.
I got to play this dumb
cowboy and be funny. I
loved doing that; it was
not really that
important. A movie like
“A Man in Love” put me
on the cover of every
magazine in Europe … It
was a really complicated
movie about a
charismatic, selfish
American movie star and
I still get stopped by
people on the streets
who say, “You nailed
that guy.” Also, I love
working for Ken Burns: I
feel like I graduated
and went to heaven. I
love doing documentaries
because each one is
something that somebody
cared about passionately
and struggled for. It’s
like a crash course in a
single subject. I don’t
have a favorite. I like
the genre and the
process of actually
doing it.
If
you could tell your
college self just one
insight that you’ve
learned since graduation
what would it be?
PC:
Don’t shoot heroin. That
would be one. The other
is that life is longer
than you think. Take
care of yourself and
pace yourself.
Everything’s not gonna
happen all at once.
In
today’s fast-paced,
egocentric world, do you
think that it is ever
really possible to break
out of your ego?
PC: I
absolutely do think it’s
possible to not destroy
the ego, which we need
and helps keep us
healthy, but to put it
on a long leash and let
it go when it’s not
appropriate. It’s not
appropriate to be
thinking of yourself
when you’re making love,
when you’re in a fight
for your life or if
you’re trying to help
other people, then your
self gets in the way.
Ego is a tool, but we
elevate it to the
stature of a guardian
and all of the sudden
it’s mediating all of
our experiences. There
is a whole world out
there that has nothing
to do with us.
Hummingbirds and
leopards and spiral
nebulae and the Amazon.
It’s just like the
captain is in the
wheelhouse and has put
up all these photographs
of his personal history,
his friends, his
neighbors and his
qualities. He is living
in this tiny room and
around him is the
immensity of the ocean.
There are spiritual
practices that help you
get out of the
wheelhouse and the one I
practice is meditation
Buddhism. Every
religious tradition has
a wisdom tradition, and
yes, it is something
that you can do, it’s
something you can
accomplish, something
you can experience in
this life and then you
won’t have certain kinds
of questions plaguing
you anymore.
October 4, 2015
Last
Thursday Peter gave a lecture on the power of intention
at his alma mater, Grinnell College. According to
the school's newspaper, he drew on his own experiences
and his Buddhist faith to demonstrate the importance of
intention. He began by explaining some basic facets of
Buddhism and then moved into a discussion of how we are
all connected to the universe in some way.
He said, "We have never for one instant not been part of
all the universe and we are always part of it." He used
this idea to set up the crux of his talk: letting go of
your ego saying, "In a world in which everything is
changing and there are no fixed realities, the only
thing we can control is our intention." He argued that
this control of intention is what allows us to lead a
life that is personally fulfilling. At the same time,
the pursuit of personal fulfillment should be combined
with selflessness. In the Q&A that followed, Peter
addressed this issue more directly. He said, "The
question of how to be selfless is an impossible
question. There is great power to be had by taking an
unattainable vow because what it does is it binds you to
a moment-by-moment decision. If you keep that vow, it
will color the decision you make."
September 28, 2015
 A
1964 Grinnell College graduate, Peter will return to
his alma mater to give a free public lecture at 7 pm on
Thursday, October 1st. As a student at Grinnell,
he was one of the organizers of a group of students
known as the “Grinnell 14” who traveled to Washington,
D.C., during the Cuban Missile Crisis, fasting and
picketing for three days, protesting the resumption of
nuclear testing, and supporting President Kennedy’s
“peace race.” President Kennedy invited the group into
the White House (the first time protesters had ever been
so recognized) and they met with the U.S. National
Security Adviser McGeorge “Mac” Bundy. This meeting
received national media attention and the Grinnell group
photocopied the coverage and sent it to colleges across
the United States, contributing to, if not
precipitating, the first mass student demonstration of
25,000 in Washington in February of 1962.
Peter's lecture is called
"Intention: The Only Force on Earth We Can Control." A
dessert reception in the second-floor lobby of the Joe
Rosenfield Center will follow. His memoir, "The
Rainman's Third Cure",
will be available for purchase at the reception.
To
view the video clip of Peter's acceptance speech
at the 2015 Creative Arts Emmy Awards ceremony,
visit the official Emmys web site and begin the
video at around 1:59 minutes.
September 23, 2015
Peter
will be at Perry Memorial Library in Henderson,
NC on Sunday, September 27th for a book signing at 2 pm.
In his newest book, "The
Rainman's Third Cure", he discusses people in
his life who shaped him. One significant influence was
Henderson resident Sue Howard Nelson, who raised him
until about the age of 13. He thinks of her as his
second mother. He will be reading and signing his books
in the Farm Bureau Room. A limited number of copies will
be available for sale the day of the program.
Here
are a few more photos of our proud Coyote with his Emmy:
As
previously posted, on September 24 and 26 Peter will
narrate Greensboro Symphony Orchestra
performances of Aaron Copland's "Lincoln Portrait" and
music composed by Edvard Grieg for Henrik Ibsen's
dramatic poem, "Peer Gynt". Music Director Dmitry
Sitkovetsky, a longtime friend of Peter's, will conduct.
This marks Peter's second appearance with the orchestra.
In 2008, he narrated the premiere of a composition based
on the O. Henry short story, "The Gift of the Magi."
September 21, 2015
 On
October 25th at 2 pm, the Melanthium Ensemble will
perform a concert at the Throckmorton Theatre
in Mill Valley, CA. The concert will feature Peter
reading his poetry accompanied by the Ensemble, which
includes Craig Fry on violin, Fred Randolph on string
bass, Lew Richmond on piano and Jay Rizzetto on trumpet.
The Ensemble will also feature new works by Richmond. In
addition to poetry set to music, Peter will read other
new poems and talk about his many decades of devotion to
the poetic art. For more information and tickets,
visit the theatre web site.
September 12, 2015
Peter
has won an Emmy for narrator of the Ken Burns series,
"The Roosevelts: An Intimate History"! The 2015
Creative Arts Emmy Awards ceremony was held today at
Microsoft Theater in LA. He previously won an Emmy
in 1992 for his narration of "The Meiji Revolution", one
of ten episodes of the PBS series, "Pacific Century."
Congratulations! The show will be aired on FXX on
Saturday, September 19th at 8 pm and 10:30 pm.
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