“Stan Kenton & His Daughter Leslie’s ‘Love Affair’”
Ruminant With A View
By Elizabeth Boleman-Herring
“I don’t know if I ever went to sleep or not. The next thing I knew his massive body was on top of mine. In a rough voice he started to repeat my name: ‘Leslie. Leslie. Oh, Leslie.’ His hands stroked my body in ways that frightened me. It felt like he was trying to take me into a strange universe—a place where I didn’t know the rules. What was he doing? What did he want? What did he expect of me? I reassured myself that it must be OK. After all, he was my father. He was my pal . . . . Then came the pain. . . . Out of here. I’m out of here. From the ceiling I look down at the bed, at the bodies of the two people beneath me, twisted on each other.”—from Love Affair: The Memoir of a Forbidden Father-Daughter Relationship, by Leslie Kenton, 2010, Vermilion, an imprint of Ebury Publishing, A Random House Group Company
TEANECK, NJ—(Weekly Hubris)—4/26/10—Leslie Kenton, daughter of the famous and supremely talented and tortured big band leader and jazz composer, Stanley Kenton, was 11 in 1952, when her systematic sexual abuse at the hands of her father began.
The rapes and, eventually, consensual sex between father and pre-pubescent daughter would last for three years. The damage, searing and as toxic as the plume that descended from Chernobyl, has lasted Leslie’s lifetime, and will seep out into the lives of her children and their children beyond her.
Incest inflicts damage for the ages.
I have one admission to make before beginning this review of Leslie Kenton’s memoir: As an almost-13-year-old eighth-grader, I was as well the victim of cruel, demeaning, and damaging sexual abuse at the hands of a trusted family friend; the adoptive father of one of my closest friends at our posh Chicago prep school; a physician married to a physician, into whose care I had been entrusted by my parents.
The abuse took place over the course of an entire, meant-to-be-idyllic-for-me summer, when I was invited to spend time horseback-riding and swimming with my school friend at her family’s Idaho ranch. My parents were absent. I was isolated on the family compound hundreds of miles from the nearest settlement. The man had unlimited access to me, and I was too terrified to tell my friend, her older brother, or her mother, all of whom I now believe knew what was going on under their noses and, thus, conspired in my victimization.
I was the summer’s designated sacrificial lamb, too young to understand what was being done to me; too young, and well-brought-up to fight back against an authority figure: if a doctor does it, if a man-of-the-cloth does it, if a policeman does it, can it be wrong? Children make such docile, delicious victims. They are all but unconscious, unless brought up, hard, on the street. And the street was as unknown to me as abuse of any sort.
I now believe both my childhood friend and her brother were also victims of The Monster, as I came to call him, a man now long dead. I surmise this only from the rage that boiled up in me that summer; a rage mirrored in the eyes of the other children at the ranch.
Perhaps, oddly, I had no idea why I was always angry there. The rage had a life of its own, and surged up and over for no apparent reason. I raged at the doctor, but had no idea why. And then, once my parents had come to collect me, and I, stutteringly, tried to tell my mother that “something” had occurred between me and Dr. B . . . I simply “went unconscious,” like Sleeping Beauty, for decades and decades, till the memories welled up, at last, in adulthood, devastating in their detail. Leslie Kenton’s story mirrors my own in every detail. . . .
The fans of Stan Kenton and his music, those who worship at the shrine of “Artistry in Rhythm,” will not want his image tarnished by his first-born daughter’s heartbreaking and nakedly honest memoir.
They will, I know—as it has already begun, on Kenton sites on the internet—blame the victim.
But, before they begin casting stones at this candid and guileless woman, now 70, an accomplished writer who devoted her life to her children, and to writing about health, spirituality and beauty, they should read her memoir. She waited a long, long time to make the details of her life with her father public; and she has done an immense amount of research to “place” the abuse in context; to explain, and document, as well, her paternal grandmother’s abuse of Stanley, himself; the abuse that led, she believes, to her own, at her father’s hands. Like mother; like son.
What the “Kentonians” should take away from this book, this revelation, first and foremost, is the fact that Leslie loved her father; loves him still. She has faced off with the demons that were unleashed upon and then possessed him; the demons in him that then deflowered the innocent entrusted to his care.
It is apt that the account of Leslie’s early life is written without ornament or stylistics, as though penned by a precocious child. Only in the “Appendix” does Leslie Kenton’s voice “mature,” and the reader come face to face with the mature woman, researcher, and scholar, who emerged from the ashes of the Kenton household. Incest—any severe sexual abuse—can bring about dissociation, derealization, a longing for annihilation, Leslie writes (and I, myself, learned, firsthand). First comes the shock and betrayal; then, the denial; then, the remembrance.
She quotes long passages from the writing of Leonard Shengold, M.D., an expert in the field of incest, and the author, most recently, of Soul Murder Revisited, and then concludes:
“To thrive, each one of us needs adequate gratification and a sense that we are wanted and valued. When a parent looks upon his child as an extension of himself—a thing that exists only to satisfy his needs—a terrible abuse of power is taking place. Because a child cannot escape from this situation, whatever identity she had before the abuse gets lost. This is what happened to me and why I spent so many years in my teens and twenties attempting to manufacture an artificial personality, as well as years after that trying to discover who I really was.
“Whenever a parent denies what has happened, he is trying to erase history. To have any sense of identity, we need to know what is real and not real. We have to be able to trust our memories so we can separate them from fantasy. As a result of parental denial, the child learns not to trust herself. And the impotence of the child in the face of her father’s omnipotence creates a situation where the father becomes God. . . . Stanley had usurped my soul.”
When I returned from Idaho that fall, and began high school, something had gone out of me. I had tried to tell my parents what had befallen me: they swept my attempts at explanation under a family carpet of unknowing, and I was repeatedly sent, for sleepovers, to the doctors’ town residence in Chicago.
I clung to my friend and her mother on these dangerous visits, and was never again alone with Dr. B. But, my mind had, in effect, split off the section of memory dating from the summer before: I would deal with it later, much later. . . .
. . . which is precisely what Leslie has done. It has taken her decades and decades to peel away, layer by layer, what obscured the horrors of her childhood. But, diligent researcher that she has become—no accident; something in her psyche sensed she would need these skills—she has the dates, locations and precise venues now “in memory”; the truth no longer obscured or clouded by her need to protect her vulnerable soul and shattered self.
I found her book a true “profile in courage,” a myth-breaking portrait of a man much more complex and tortured than many knew. Oh, but so, so many suspected what lay beneath the surface. . . .
Don’t blame the messenger, Kentonians. In a way, Leslie is, along with his music, all that remains of Stan. In reality, she is the true, most honest keeper of the Kenton flame, and deserving of respect and encouragement for the act of truth-telling that is this memoir. She was a child mightily sinned against who has yet found it in her heart to love the man who tortured her. It should be a “bag of shells” for those who admire Kenton’s musical legacy to embrace his daughter with open arms. It’s what Stan would have wanted from his fans—that, and the forgiveness and mercy he could never grant himself.
Myself? My own rage against the late Dr. B, against his daughter, his wife, his son—and my own beloved parents, for turning a blind eye—abides. At the very moment in my life when I most needed protection and shelter, I fell into the hands of a monster. Like the altar boys abused by their trusted priests, I was betrayed. And, unlike Leslie Kenton, I have not got beyond it.
Elizabeth Boleman-Herring
Elizabeth Boleman-Herring, Publishing-Editor of “Hubris,” considers herself an Outsider Artist (of Ink). The most recent of her 15-odd books is The Visitors’ Book (or Silva Rerum): An Erotic Fable, now available in a third edition on Kindle. Her memoir, Greek Unorthodox: Bande à Part & A Farewell To Ikaros, is available through www.GreeceInPrint.com.). Thirty years an academic, she has also worked steadily as a founding-editor of journals, magazines, and newspapers in her two homelands, Greece, and America. Three other hats Boleman-Herring has at times worn are those of a Traditional Usui Reiki Master, an Iyengar-Style Yoga teacher, a HuffPost columnist and, as “Bebe Herring,” a jazz lyricist for the likes of Thelonious Monk, Kenny Dorham, and Bill Evans. Boleman-Herring makes her home with the Rev. Robin White; jazz trumpeter Dean Pratt (leader of the eponymous Dean Pratt Big Band); and Scout . . . in her beloved Up-Country South Carolina, the state James Louis Petigru opined was “too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum.” (Author Photos by Robin White. Author Head Shot Augment: René Laanen.)
10 Comments
Nini
HI Elizabeth
That was / is such a sad sad story , which I’m sure is not uncommon today either with people not willing to hear the young ones. Be well, Namaste, Nini
eboleman-herring
Thanks for writing in, Nini. Like you, my career, early on, placed me at the head of classrooms full of small people. Their trust is so complete, it seems almost impossible to me to accept the reality that there are those who, regularly, betray it. But this is my year to explore sociopathy in writing, willy-nilly, and I’m endeavoring to better understand the monsters in our midst. Thank heaven I had but one such creature cross my path early on. And none was a parent or a relative. Stan, first, and then, Leslie, was betrayed by a parent. . . Namaste, My Dear, e
John Maddock-Lyon
Dear Elizabeth
Thank you for the book review of Leslie Kenton’s moemoir. She was on UK Breakfast TV very recently and came across very well.
In the 50’s I was a fan of Stan Kenton and collected 78’s of his music and I remain a fan. Any artist, composer and writer has a life outside their talent with which I might have problems – drugs, alcohol, prostitution etc, but not in my appreciation of their talent otherwise our museums, art galleries and concert halls would be almost empty and silent.
Leslie has clearly come through her experience better than the Step-daughter in Pirandello’s (I can’t condone his Fascism) “6 characters in search of an author”.
As a victim of an abusive schoolmaster at summer camp in 1953 approx, I can to some extent understand Leslie’s feelings and the problem of convincing one’s parents about what happened and the need to sweep it under the table. Her experience was far worse than my own, as it involved a parent.
John Maddock-Lyon
eboleman-herring
Dear John, thank you so much for writing in. Leslie has proven to be a sort of miracle of healing. Her life has been so productive (just google her list of publications). In the wake of the Catholic Church’s abuse scandal breaking wide open here in the US, several of us here at WH have written about the abuse of children, from different angles (see Michael House and Jerry Zimmerman’s columns). I know my own column may have been difficult for some to read. But I feel strongly that if we don’t talk about it, write about it, deal with it, the horror of the sexual abuse will remain, like racism, a shared-silently fact of every human society. And that will not do. . . I remain an ardent fan of Kenton’s music, but a greater fan of his daughter. Gratias ago, John, e
Katherine
I remember listening to Kenton’s music growing up, it’s such a shame that someone with his talent would do such horrible things to his own child! I too, hope that the world won’t blame the victim. I don’t know why people find it so hard to believe that someone talented and famous can have a dark side? Shame on them, and kudos to the survivors who’ve managed to not only survive their abuse, but flourish afterwards.
eboleman-herring
You know, Katherine, in college I studied under poet James Dickey, also author of the novel, “Deliverance,” and, to me, he was a monstrous predator. Somehow, still, I am able to separate the poet from the monster. I can read his work–and listen to Kenton’s music–and still wonder at the talent. Leslie, in her book, manages to do that as well, miraculously. It’s a testament to her spirit. I think, though, the generations of girls and women who have come after Leslie’s and mine, at least in the West, have been encouraged to fight back against predators with everything they have. THAT lesson has been a turning point. No matter if the predator is authority figure or parent, he, or she, has no right to molest you.
Symona
Keep these aticrels coming as they’ve opened many new doors for me.
eboleman-herring
Thank you, Symona. Bless you. Namaste, Elizabeth
Karen Hope Carter
Thank you Elizabeth;
One thing I over looked mentioning in my post to you on Facebook was that part of my therapy is responding as I did. I am learning to embrace the Motto; ” Silent No Longer.” Currently I am in a wonderful program here in Delaware called S.O.A.R. Survivors of Abuse Recovery. I am also the client of the Director of this program and he has been a terrific support for me. Delaware recently allowed a two year window for children and adults of sexual abuse to take their abusers to court. That window is closed now which is a shame as it should never be closed. Sadly I wasn’t able to take advantage of the ability to take my sexual abusers to court because of another loop hole being that my abuses happened in other states. As stated in our conversation on Facebook Elizabeth my story began at age 5 when my mother abandoned me and three other siblings. I ended up in foster care already with feelings of abandonment, rejection and neglect. There in the foster home I was raped repeatedly by the youngest son of my foster parents. I was 5 and he was 16. This went on until I was 13 where upon the very mother that had abandoned me re married and the state granted her motherhood again. She moved my sister and I to another state where she had been working in the exotic dancing area. The man she married proceeded to physically abuse and molest me. One line I will forever hear in my head is; ” Go ahead and tell your mother, she won’t believe you.” I will forever hear his cynical laugh too. I went from one hell right into another. As I said in our post together Elizabeth my entire childhood was spent in childhood rape. I never knew that I even had the right to say NO until much older as an adult. I thought I had no rights. What ever was done to me was to be accepted in fear and powerless surrender. I felt time after time like I was a small helpless animal trapped in a corner by a larger animal of prey. I was stripped of all say in what happened to me. Ironically even at age 5 I had the ability to know that what was happening to me was NOT my fault. I knew what the son of the foster parents and my step father were doing was wrong and the blame was theirs. That guilt I never took on and I suppose I was lucky in that sense. Also, not every child blocks out the events. I remember every incident as if it happened yesterday. Every place, every smell, every sound and every feeling is crystal clear. I asked my therapist why that was so and it was explained that sometimes traumas fall so fast and often on a child that there isn’t time to process or develop mental, physical or emotional safeguards that many children do. I think the hardest thing for me today is that every time another child becomes a victim of rape my wounds open up all over again. The memories flood back in and I find no peace or relief from the pain combined with the pain I share with those newer victims.
Sincerely;
Karen Hope Carter
eboleman-herring
Dearest Karen, thank you for reading, subscribing, and for writing in. I wrote a long and thoughtful piece about pedophilia, following our exchange on Facebook, for The Huffington Post. They declined to publish it, so it will appear here on Weekly Hubris on July 2 (2012), and reach a much smaller audience. It is STILL all but impossible to be heard, regarding the systematic rape of innocents in this country, and the wealthy media do nothing to remedy the situation. I wish I knew why we are still being silenced in 2012 . . . but it is what it is. At least you can be certain I hear you, and that your story has been told, at least here. It’s a start. Love you, eb-h