Sunday, November 07, 2004
New Wolfe Novel - Theme is Really Good - Hopefully the Book Too
From AP
I hope this novel addresses how diseased and violent liberal culture and sexuality is. It´s what we need in terms of education, that universities (and many public schools) are profoundly failing their students.
Wolfe said the idea of a college novel interested him because it's never been explored from the student's point of view, and because college has replaced the church as a moral touchstone.
These ideas came out muddled, as though he wasn't quite sure why he wrote the book. He spoke of college as being a breeding ground for political-correctness, but it can sometimes be a thin veil for the hedonism that goes on at schools.
Wolfe is no stranger to campus life. The Richmond, Va., native is the grandson of a Confederate rifleman - his family's Virginia ties, on the paternal side, date back to 1710. He attended Washington and Lee University before earning a doctorate in American studies at Yale. He was even in a fraternity.
"The drinking is neither more nor less now. There is the addition of cocaine, a little bit of ecstasy, but I wouldn't say these things really play any major part on campuses," he says.
The heroine of the new, 675-page novel is 18-year-old Charlotte Simmons, the pertinacious prodigy of a tiny mountain town in North Carolina who gets a full ride to the venerable Dupont. Charlotte is unbelievably naive, and the novel chronicles her education to the world of college. Once rigid and "moral" in a traditional sense, she matriculates to the world of sex, drinking and materialism as she deals with a frat guy, a jock and a caustic, emaciated roommate.
"Tom's work creates discussion in the literary world, but more important in the world of readers," said Jeff Seroy, senior vice president of marketing at the publishing house.
Fellow writer Gay Talese, whom Wolfe credits for starting New Journalism, said his work is important to both fiction and nonfiction because he is not afraid to take risks.
"I can tell you he is a very contrarian observer and a courageous writer and that is why he is read," Talese said. "He wasn't political in terms of offending people; whether he wrote about the Black Panthers, or the editor of the New Yorker. If there was a subject that today would be politically incorrect to write about, Wolfe would write about them."
Talese hasn't read "Charlotte Simmons" yet. So far, critics have not been kind and the book has debuted to mostly negative reviews. A Los Angeles Times review said, "His characters are burdened, often to the point of capsizing, by his stereotypes." The New York Times echoed a similar theme, and said, "He gives us some tiresomely generic if hyperbolic glimpses of student life."
[..]
"I don't think anyone is immune to that. It doesn't mean you're maniacal about moving up, like I am," he quips. "Preserving the status that you have is really important."
It's easy to be lulled by Wolfe and his smooth, slight Southern drawl. Friends say his dress and persona are the real thing. But don't be fooled: It is a red herring. This author is a Cheshire cat. He is ruthless and has an opinionated, caustic tongue, known for trashing contemporaries John Updike and Norman Mailer for being too self-indulgent. He wrote scathing articles about The New Yorker years ago and editors and the magazine would not comment on him for this story.
"Fiction is dying," Wolfe says. "There's just not the kind of work being done that should. I can enjoy Herman Hesse and (Franz) Kafka, they are writers of fables. But I don't consider that to be the optimal form of writing."
I hope this novel addresses how diseased and violent liberal culture and sexuality is. It´s what we need in terms of education, that universities (and many public schools) are profoundly failing their students.
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