About – The Creative Works of David Fuks

A few words of welcome

There is another David Fuks that I keep hearing about. He is a physician who publishes frequently. He is clearly a talented and dedicated scientist. I frequently receive emails with his articles attached. They all begin, “Is this you?” I politely respond, “No.” What I want to say is, “This person is the David Fuks my parents wanted me to be. The one they would have enjoyed bragging to their friends about.”

Instead, my mother and father got the impulsive kid with an attitude…the comedian…the storyteller…the advocate…the Schmendrick. To be sure, I was not an easy child. But I like to think my parents (now of blessed memory), would have been a little bit proud of how I turned out.

Despite our challenges, they taught me how to love and shaped my worldview and sense of purpose: I want to bring comfort to those who are in need of it and I want to make people who are, perhaps a little too secure, just a little uncomfortable. So, thanks for coming to this website. Thanks for being curious. I’ll try to keep you interested.

About My Name

“Fuks” is derived from the German name for “Fox” and in Germany is spelled “Fuchs”. My parents were Polish Jews and Holocaust survivors. The spelling is Eastern European. I like to tell people that we were a poor family and couldn’t afford the additional consonant.

When my parents became U.S. citizens, they anglicized the family name to “Fox” when I was five years old. I was enrolled in public school as David Fox (although among the refugee community I was always known as Fuks’ boy). When I was able to get a driver’s license, I discovered that “Fuks” was still my legal name. I was elated. There was a period of my life when I insisted on using the popular mispronunciation of the name. I ran for judge on Student Government Day and plastered the school with signs that read, “Everyone wants Fuks!” It was a glorious campaign which was sadly interrupted by a long visit with the Assistant Principal in my high school.

As a young adult, I visited Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial in Israel. While exploring a directory of Jews in the Lodz Ghetto where my family lived before most of them were murdered, I discovered that there were 25 David Fukses. It was then that I decided that honoring the name was important.

Biography

When I was a kid in Detroit, Michigan, I was intrigued by a character in Al Capp’s “Li’l Abner” comic strip who was cursed to travel with an active rain cloud over his head. The impact of the Holocaust on my parents and family of origin was much like this for me. Still, I loved my parents and, despite my childhood struggles to find a path to fit into American culture, the early relationships of our family have inspired much of my work as a writer.

As a pre-adolescent, I was the weird kid. Going to public school during the day and Yeshiva Bet Yehuda (Hebrew school) until 6pm weekdays (and on Sundays) left no room for learning the skills with which to participate in sports. My father’s volatility and my mother’s expertise in guilt inducement provided the platform upon which scapegoating was possible. My younger sister, Myra, was a source of solace. My older sister, Libbie, was a capable critic.

A creative writing class saved me. I found my voice. I could make my peers laugh. I could share outrageous ideas. I could re-invent myself. Being weird was suddenly acceptable. My experience as an outsider gave me a perspective that informed my writing. I found a niche among creative kids and developed an antic outrageous disposition that carried me through high school and my undergraduate college years.

My heroes were Sir Edmund Spenser and Pablo Neruda. Both were remarkable poets and also active participants in statecraft. At my father’s insistence that I find work that served the community, I found a home in human services. I worked in this arena for four decades. Upon retirement, my wish to write and to perform led me back into acting classes, stand-up comedy, sketch comedy, improv…and, finally, into playwriting. I remain actively engaged as a political advocate and as an aspiring writer and performer. My father’s advice regarding my desire to act was, “Learn to act normal.” I’m still working on this.

What is most normal in my life is the family that I was able to start. My wife DeAnn, my sons Ben and Ian, my daughter-in-law Celeste and my grandchildren Ivory Rose and Violet Jade are blessings I seek to deserve. You will not find them in my fiction. They reside in my heart.

David Fuks Artistic Resume David Fuks Resume

Bird Photos

Small birds roosting and big raptors hunting have always amazed me. I take cameras with me wherever I walk to capture the delightful wildlife around me. This website is peppered with a number of photos I’ve taken. I hope you enjoy them!