Thanks for the thorough review, Raymond. I feel like I was there,
without having had to go to the bother of actually showing up.
To me, the most interesting part is:
"And that basically he lives in LA
of over 40 years ago in his head writing his books."
Joy
On 10/15/2010 12:17 PM, TAIT RAYMOND wrote:
> I attended a reading by James Ellroy last week on 5 October at the Cambridge
> Union here in Cambridge, England. The reading took place in the main
> chamber which you can see pictures of here:
>
>
>
> http://www.cus.org/
>
>
>
> When I went in to take a seat people were sitting on both sides of the
> chamber with a lectern placed in the middle just in front of the ‘big red
> chair’ so that he would have been facing down the middle of two rows of
> seats opposite each other. A little while before the scheduled start time a
> young woman came in and asked everyone on one side to move to the other so
> that they could move the lectern and he could face one side of the chamber.
> An audience of 100 or so gathered. Just after 7.30 she came back and gave a
> brief introduction before asking us to welcome James Ellroy who entered and
> took up his position. He is a very striking man! He also dresses well and
> that night was wearing a more casual outfit than I might have expected:
> Sleeveless dark grey pullover, long sleeved reddish shirt with a nice
> pattern, white trousers and what appeared to be trainers. It all looked
> good anyway.
>
>
>
> He began with a very theatrical introduction where he spoke about being in
> Cambridge, quoted a chunk of TS Eliot and then something else that I didn’t
> recognize before addressing the audience more informally. He explained that
> he was going to read five short pieces from The Hilliker Curse and then we
> would be able to ask questions. At some point during all this he went off
> on a bizarre riff about how if we all bought 1,000 copies of the book or
> something like it we would be able to have unlimited sex with anyone we
> wanted forever. It was a bit more complicated than that with separate
> stages but didn’t quite come off in my view. He also gave us a variation on
> this which every audience gets: ‘Good evening peepers, prowlers, pederasts,
> panty-sniffers, punks and pimps. I'm James Ellroy, the demon dog, the foul
> owl with the death growl, the white knight of the far right, and the slick
> trick with the donkey dick. I'm the author of 16 books, masterpieces all;
> they precede all my future masterpieces.’ He told the story about his
> mother asking him on his tenth birthday who he wanted to live with, her or
> his dad, and how she hit him when she said his dad. And how he invoked the
> Hilliker curse as a consequence.
>
>
>
> Then the reading. He reads in quite a unique way, more like a poet than a
> novelist - phrases hurled out in a very declamatory way with pauses in
> between. I wasn’t entirely sure this worked until he came to the fourth or
> fifth passage which is written in a ‘he said, she said’ form where I thought
> it came off really well.
>
>
>
> And then the questions and answers section which was of course the highlight
> of the evening. They covered the following territory
>
>
>
> Who is the Blood the Rover dedicated to? I can’t remember exactly what was
> said but I think it was the woman who was the ‘she’ in the passage he read
> from The Hilliker Curse. This was the first question from a woman who is a
> big fan and had read all his books. It developed into a fairly lengthy
> dialogue between them. Who knows, maybe they spent the night together?
>
>
>
> Something about Closure. There is no such thing as closure says JE. He
> spoke about the influence of the death of his mother and then told a sort of
> joke. He would like to meet the person who invented sex and ask what
> project they are working on now. And he would like to meet the person who
> invented the concept of closure and shove a plate up their ass.
>
>
>
> Does he have any influence over film versions of his novels? No. He went on
> to talk about how films are like hamburgers and he doesn’t watch them. He
> explained that he doesn’t read newspapers, doesn’t watch TV and doesn’t go
> to the cinema. Has no books in his home apart from his own and one other
> the identity of which I have forgotten. And that basically he lives in LA
> of over 40 years ago in his head writing his books.
>
>
>
> He mentioned Beethoven and someone asked what was so great about him. He
> explained that Beethoven had revolutionized music in a way that no other
> artist has done with any other artform and spoke about the greatness of
> Beethoven’s late music and the importance of his deafness.
>
>
>
> I asked him about the extent to which he believes the events in American
> Tabloid for example are the sorts of things which actually occurred and the
> extent to which they are a conscious exaggeration. He replied that he
> didn’t want to seem glib but that he makes all that shit up.
>
>
>
> Someone else asked if he had ever had any legal comeback from anyone. He
> said there had been one legal action where a researcher had identified the
> death of someone in one of his books but it turned out this was another
> person with the same name. He said he wasn’t able to talk about the
> specifics.
>
>
>
> Someone asked about Noir. He said he wasn’t noir at all.
>
>
>
> Someone asked about Raymond Chandler. The most overrated writer in the
> history of American literature. Terrible plots etc. Now Dashiell Hammett…
>
>
>
> Does he believe in God? Yes
>
>
>
> Will he go to heaven? Yes
>
>
>
> After the questions he signed books for us with his characteristic scribble.
>
>
>
> I found him charismatic and intimidating, unique and impressive. I haven’t
> read enough of his books to be able to assess his real worth but having just
> read American Tabloid for the first time which I think is a huge novel in
> every sense I mean to read more.
>
>
>
> Raymond
>
>
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