| Paul Fericano | |
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| Born | Paul Francis Fericano January 16, 1951 San Francisco, California, United States |
| Occupation | Writer, poet, satirist |
| Literary movement | Stoogism, New American Poets |
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San Francisco native Paul Fericano (born January 16, 1951) is a U.S. poet, writer, and satirist. For more than thirty years, his stand-up poetry and controversial satires have been brought to the public's attention mostly through the dedicated efforts of independent publishers and a loyal group of readers.
He also is the Executive Director of SafeNet, a non-profit organization helping victims of sexual abuse by priests of the Roman Catholic Church. Fericano attended St. Anthony's Seminary run by the Franciscan order of monks in Santa Barbara, California.
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From 1974 to 2005, Fericano was editor/publisher of Scarecrow Books and Poor Souls Press. In 1976. he launched the mock movement, "Stoogism," satirizing the pretensions of all literary schools. Ironically, "Stoogism" was later embraced by other poets and writers, including Allen Ginsberg, Elio Ligi, Joyce Odam, Peter Cherches, Charles Bukowski, A. D. Winans, Ronald Koertge, Richard Grayson, Ann Menebroker, Don Skiles and Gerald Locklin. In 1977 Fericano edited Stoogism Anthology, both a rare colflection of satiric work by 47 writers, and a unique poetry and film tribute to The Three Stooges comedy team.
In 1978, one of his poems, "The Three Stooges at a Hollywood Party", from his book, Loading the Revolver with Real Bullets, provoked outrage in some Republican members of the California State legislature who claimed the poem libeled actor John Wayne. Published by Second Coming Press, the poetry in the book was written by Fericano when he was funded by a grant from the California Arts Council. Due to the perceived state funding of the book, lawmakers used this as a reason for denying Jane Fonda's appointment at the time to the Arts Council by Jerry Brown.
Fericano also received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal arts funding organization that would run afoul of conservatives in the 1990s.
In response to former California governor Ronald Reagan's election to the Presidency in 1980 and the growing conservative movement, Fericano co-founded (with Elio Ligi) the first parody news and disinformation syndicate, Yossarian Universal News Service (YU), which the Los Angeles Times dubbed, "unbelievable news for unbelievable times." The service was named after the protagonist of Joseph Heller's satirical anti-war novel Catch-22.
As a media content provider with subscribers as diverse as Saturday Night Live, Punch (London), Mother Jones, La Prensa (Managua), and Paul Krassner's The Realist, YU News Service quickly became the ideal counterpoint to Reagan's "Great Communicator."
During George W. Bush's first year in office in 2001, Fericano chronicled the president's lies and blunders in weekly YU News Service dispatches emailed to thousands of subscribers all over the world. Three days after 9/11 he identified Bush's crusade against terrorism as his "re-election campaign war." In 2002-2003, at the height of the president's popularity, a collection of these stories, I, Terrorist: Dispatches from the Front, was rejected by more than 20 U.S. book agents and publishers.
Fericano continues to use YU News Service as a vehicle for his social and political satires, and since June 2004 he's been writing and performing for radio (The One Minute News Hour) with fellow satirist and broadcaster Mike Amatori.
In 1982, as a commentary on the absurd nature of all competitive awards, Fericano perpetrated a successful hoax on the literary community, specifically Poets & Writers, Inc. of New York, when he awarded his own poem, "Sinatra, Sinatra", the fictitious "Howitzer Prize." Nearly 500 writers and publishers requested applications from the bogus Howitzer Prize Committee for the 1983 prize before the author exposed the hoax.
The priest sexual abuse survivors’ group was created by Fericano, himself a victim of abuse, and the Law and Society program of the University of California, Santa Barbara. Fericano founded the organization to help promote a dialogue to promote healing and reconciliation among survivors of sexual abuse by priests. The first revelations of abuse happened in 1990.
Fericano believes that forgiveness promotes healing. “It’s a gift you give yourself,” he told the Santa Barbara Independent in 2008. “It has nothing to do with the other person accepting responsibility for his actions. It’s a great act of mercy and compassion you have for yourself.”