Ritual on a Saturday afternoon (best thing I ever wrote!) When Jesus, tied to a tree in Old Town Plaza, was being mercilessly scourged by a centurion, the announcer cautioned us not to believe in …
October 16, 2022
Jonathan Saville wrote theater, classical music, and art reviews for the Reader from 1972 to 2003.
Saville was a professor in the literature and then the theater department at UCSD.
Articles by Jonathan Saville
Baja men re-enact Christ's passion at Old Town
San Diego – city of shame, University Avenue, roommates from hell, writers write about moms
Roommates from Hell I walked outside to the storage door. I pushed on the door and opened it. I saw the rope around John’s neck and John’s face looking at me. I screamed and ran …
December 5, 2021
Mira Mesa man captured first giant panda in 1936
I Need Time to Recuperate A snowstorm trapped the porter on the other side of a pass, and he couldn’t get back for three days. Quentin had matches and lit a fire. He had a …
August 2, 2021
Herbert Marcuse ends up in lotus land, Ishmael Reed visits Quincy Troupe at UCSD
Angel of the Apocalypse During that long, violent spring of 1968, leftist student leaders around the world began to quote Marcuse and claim his ideas as inspiration to their movements. By June worldwide media had …
July 26, 2021
20th Century music in San Diego, annoying audience members, passion play in Old Town
Neglected, rejected, and misunderstood When — I don’t speak only of San Diego — do we ever get a chance to hear live performances of Ernst Toch, Vittorio Rieti, Vaclav Nelhybel, Peter Mennin, Roger Sessions, …
January 16, 2021
La Jolla – a shoreline and a mountain
What Windansea surfers said about Tom Wolfe Eight summers have drifted by since Tom Wolfe (author of The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test) traveled to California to write a series on “The New Life Out There” …
July 20, 2020
Mayor O'Connor goes slumming in Balboa Park, Mayor Faulconer reads Dr. Seuss racist book
Caught between a hug and a hard place If you move to somewhere on the East Coast, such as Boston, NYC, or Philadelphia, fewer people will try to hug you, mostly because they’re all too …
April 25, 2020
Jonathan Saville and the Reader
How Saville came to work at the Reader: In 1972, I was an associate professor in the Literature Department at UCSD. I had an office on the Muir Campus, with my door usually left open …
February 23, 2019
Neighborhood: small towns of San Diego
I see Asian gang cars some nights, in a long caravan down the Mira Mesa Boulevard. They meet at In-N-Out Burger before heading off for illegal street races on Kearny Villa Road or in Sorrento Valley.
December 24, 2003