The victim who took the first bullet in the Umpqua Community College shooting was a UO grad who taught others writing while dreaming of publishing his own.
UCC professor Lawrence Levine, the instructor of the small “Introduction to Expository Writing” class that became the scene of the fifth deadliest school shooting in United States history on Oct. 1, studied creative writing at the University of Oregon just an hour north of Roseburg in the 1970s.
But it was the brain of a frustrated writer, his friends have told news outlets. Levine wrote many unpublished novels throughout his life, novels throughout his life, but none were published. That was a lifelong source of struggle for Levine, childhood friend Joey Weiss told The Oregonian.
Though Levine grew up in Beverly Hills, his friends said he found refuge in nature. That may be why he came to University of Oregon and later settled in Glide, 20 minutes east of Roseburg.
He loved fly fishing almost as much as writing, and worked part-time as a fly fishing guide. His Facebook bio says, under that job, that he was “in charge of answering dumb-ass questions.” His profile also shows that he liked Oregon Ducks baseball and the San Francisco Giants.
The only quote on Levine’s Facebook bio is from Samuel Beckett’s “How It is,” an unpunctuated monologue from a narrator crawling through endless mud, searching for form:
“all these calculations yes explanations yes the whole story from beginning to end yes completely false yes.”
Though he didn’t talk much, friends said, he had a dry sense of humor. He was a listener and a watcher, according to Lynda Winter, who dated him in 1976. He loved Tom Waits and the blues.
At least one of his novels was set in the Northwest. He once took a job bartending in Grants Pass because he was writing a novel about a bartender, friend Steve Schaffer told the Oregonian.
That writer’s mind was probably hard at work thinking how to best teach his craft as Levine started class on at 10 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 1. One of his students was not there at the start of class, and his name was Chris Harper-Mercer.
Harper-Mercer did show up half an hour later, however, and then there are two different accounts of what happened: A few sources say he fired through a window, hitting Levine from the parking lot.
One unverified account given to CNN by family of wounded student Anastasia Boylan says that he came into the classroom first and spoke to Levine.
“I’ve been waiting to do this for years,” Harper-Mercer said, according to Boylan’s family. Then he fired, killing Levine in one shot.
This story is developing as new information is released. If you have any information you’d like to share about Levine to be included in this obituary, please email [email protected].
The UCC professor killed first was a UO grad
Scott Greenstone
October 2, 2015
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