Last year, a friend lent me a book called Squeegee Kid, by S.E. Tomas. It was the autobiography of a man describing his experience of homelessness as a young man. It was raw, gritty, powerful, and in a strange way, hopeful. This was not because there was a ‘good’ ending, but because what came out was the story of an exceptionally resilient and creative person, even if he was often his own worst enemy. The friend who lent me the book mentioned at the time said that Tomas wrote a number of other books, and sold them on a corner in downtown Toronto.
On Friday, I came to Toronto to visit my parents, and landed at the Island Airport. When I got off the shuttle in front of Union Station, I saw a man sitting at the corner, and a table in front of him with a bunch of books on it. It was S.E. Tomas! I got so excited, I introduced myself, and told him how powerful I thought Squeegee Kid was. We talked for a few minutes, and before I left, bought two more of his books, Carny Vol. 1 and Vol.2, about his experience working in the travelling carnival circuit (e.g. The Ex). As he told me, he now lives in an AirBNB with one room and an en-suite bathroom – he’s thrilled!
I read Volume 1 pretty quickly (I started it on the subway as soon as I left him), as the stories read smoothly and are very compelling. Unlike the first book, this is a collection of vignettes about his time as a “carny,” not a single narrative. While not as painful as reading about him living on the streets, he was only a small step from homelessness in these stories as well. Like the first, they were gritty and real.
Tomas has a staccato style that is well suited to the stories he’s trying to tell. It gives his narrative energy and creates a feeling of authenticity – not flowery language, nothing embellished. It’s a narrative that feels close to life. Tomas also a good sense of how to turn a life experience into a narrative that people will want to read about.
You can find all his books here, or just outside the Royal York Hotel.
Just Because I Liked It:
- I read a bunch of great articles in the Jewish Review of Books: About the poet Emmanuel Litvinoff and his challenge to T.S. Elliott; Michael Walzer’s excellent review of Adam Kirsch’s, book On Settler Colonialism; a fascinating reading of Ayn Rand as a Soviet-style writer; and a great legal piece by Michael Helfand on the students suing the UC university system for their anti-semitism.
- Separate from Adam Kirch’s excellent book, referenced above, is a great article in Sapir, about the upside-down world of critical theory.