B007RT1UH4 EBOK (124 page)

Salinger material: author J. D. Salinger recently sued British author Ian Hamilton for unauthorized use of his letters in a forthcoming biography.

Sheldon v. Metro-Goldwyn [...] Murray v. National Broadcasting Co.: all cited on pp. 406–8 and 412–13 of
FHO
, where WG also quotes from Judge Hand’s
Nichols v. Universal Pictures Corporation
.

Bright Tunes Music Corp. v. Harrissongs Music: ex-Beatle George Harrison was sued in 1970 for unconsciously adapting the melody of “He’s So Fine” for his song “My Sweet Lord.” WG didn’t use this material.

Serra v. G.S.A.: sculptor Richard Serra unsuccessfully sued the General Services Administration to prevent removal of his
Tilted Arc
(1981) from its site in Lower Manhattan.

To Don DeLillo

[
Don DeLillo (1936– ), American novelist who in 1982 praised Gaddis in a
New York Times
profile “for extending the possibilities of the novel by taking huge risks and making great demands on readers” (October 10). DeLillo would later attend WG’s memorial service and contribute a brief tribute to the portfolio about WG that
Conjunctions
published in fall 2003.
]

Wainscott, New York 11975

19 July 1988

Dear Don DeLillo.

Why in the world have I waited till the day your
Libra
gets its nihil obstat from Christopher Lemondrop to send you a note. It showed up in galleys in New York 2 or 3 months ago when things were ghastly (health) about the time I saw you, I looked into it then & should certainly have written without waiting to read it through because my response was immediate, it is a terrific job. I don’t know all your work & also hesitate to say to any writer whatever comparing one of his works to another but in this case must tell you I find it far far beyond
White Noise
. Obviously if we take our work seriously we do not try to clone one novel to its predecessor so comparisons are indeed odious, & equally obviously the constantly shattered & reknit & fragmented again style of this new book appeals to me rather more than the linear narrative, when it’s always 9 o’clock in the morning at 9 am & 3pm at 3 in the afternoon if you see what I mean; but the hard cover arrived here a couple of weeks ago & I’ve just read it & confirmed all my earlier impression, its marriage of style & content—that essential I used to bray about to ‘students’ in those grim days—is marvelously illustrated here I think & especially as it comes together at the end as we know it must, speaking of the ‘nonfiction’ novel if we must but why must we, except that concept does embrace the American writer’s historic obsession getting the facts down clear (from “tells me more about whales than I really want to know” to Dreiser tapemeasuring Clyde’s cell at Sing Sing, or Jack London’s “Give me the fact, man, the irrefragable fact!”) & again one marvels at what you’ve marshaled in this impressive piece of work. We’ll be out of the country for August but may hope to see you in town in the fall, meanwhile high marks.

best regards,

WG

Christopher Lemondrop: Christopher Lehmann-Haupt’s approving review of DeLillo’s ninth novel appeared in the 18 July 1988 issue of the
New York Times.

“tells me more about whales [...]”: obviously a response to
Moby-Dick
(1851), but source unknown. WG notes Melville’s poor critical reception in
FHO
(39) and
AA
(55).

Dreiser tapemeasuring: near the completion of
An American Tragedy
(1925), Dreiser toured Sing Sing prison where Chester Gillette, a factory worker accused of murdering a young woman, and the model for his novel’s Clyde Griffiths, was interred.

Jack London’s [...] fact!: from
The Iron Heel
(1907). WG quotes the same line in
J R
(571).

To Donald Oresman

[
Accompanied by Judge Bone’s opinion, discussed in WG’s previous letter to Oresman, and eventually published on pp. 399–416 of
FHO
.
]

Wainscott, New York 11975

4 August 1988

Dear Donald.

While I enclose this item for your passing entertainment, I believe it is a good deal less amusing than the earlier
Szyrk
Opinion. Satire as in that case assumes a certain distance, whereas here this Opinion is more imitation than parody. That is because not simply does it play an important part in the novel, but because the Civil War ‘play’ referred to does actually exist (and fragments of it will appear in the book) and as I lifted material from Judge Learned Hand both in quoting and bodily lifting from his Opinions, I found myself filling with righteous indignation as evidence of this piracy mounted and felt at times like I had seen the infringing movie. I am still paranoid enough about it to refrain showing this about too widely for fear that someone will steal the whole thing literally (as a war picture) lock, stock and barrel: as a lawyer in the novel tells its protagonist, —You can’t copyright the Civil War, Oscar . . . [
FHO
17] At any rate this for the moment is simply a draft and I am back entangled with the novel’s text where Oscar is just getting together his Complaint.

I haven’t yet approached the book’s next legal confrontation, whether it will involve product liability (in Oscar’s being run over by his own car), or the reversal of his father Judge Crease’s opinion in
Szyrk
, or begin to face the Episcopal Church v. Pepsico(la) for all kinds of infringement (mainly I suppose the Lanham Act) exploiting the (subliminal) possibilities of the trade name’s anagram (Pepsicola/Episcopal) getting into quite deep waters, whether as Judge Pierre Leval suggests, the court’s consideration of the complaint constitutes in itself a forbidden ‘establishment’ of a religion, whether a religion can be guilty of laches &c; let alone digging up chores of the corporate origins of Pepsico (I wrote them once for a corporate history but got only some slick Annual Report material in return); let alone writing the whole thing and having Pepsico and the Episcopals sue
me
. . .

At any rate we are off for the Rockefeller’s 54 acre Study Center on Lake Como (Bellagio) to ponder these problems more deeply and hope to return in September with something to report.

with warmest regards,

Bill Gaddis

Lanham Act: 1946 law prohibiting trademark infringement, false advertising, etc.

laches: unreasonable delay seeking legal claims or damages.

To Gregory Comnes

[
Comnes, his wife Judith Chambers (1943– ), also a critic, Joseph Tabbi, and I met with Gaddis for a few hours on the afternoon of 6 October 1988 at his Manhattan apartment. The Comneses brought him a T-shirt with the last line of
J R
printed on the front (“Hey? You listening?”). At this time Comnes was revising his dissertation and afterward asked some questions about influences, which elicited this postcard, without salutation.
]

5 Nov. 88

To your queries:

I’d never come upon Walter Benjamin till this same query from 2 or 3 directions this past year or so, & at that point looked his work up.

Rilke no comment but I doubt of any greater concern than other liftings.

I have no notion of what GMHopkins ‘ideas’ are (the danger of ‘tracing down’ sources, ask Steven M.).

I enjoyed meeting you all & your wife’s charming letter, & for the shirt

Yours

W. Gaddis

To Joseph Tabbi

[
Tabbi (1960– ) was revising a chapter on
J R
from his dissertation for publication in a journal and wrote asking about WG’s background reading in mechanization and communication (aside from Wiener’s
Human Use of Human Beings
). He also asked if he could send him the published essay.
]

235 East 73rd str.

New York NY 10021

13 March 1989

Dear Joseph Tabbi.

To your queries of 28 February these unsatisfactory responses: Regarding Walter Benjamin, I have read nothing but his mechanization & the arts essay which was called to my attention only within the past 2 or 3 years & thus aeons after researches & readings on the subject for the player piano project (&
J R
); but found the parallels most striking.

Unfortunately I cannot go down the shelves of my library since it is almost entirely—or for those years quite entirely—locked away in a house I have rented out. Doubtless many of them would recall themselves to me on sight; they were very far ranging & having largely to do with organization (Hull House, crime, John D Rockefeller &c); Hollerith (sp?), early punched card innovations (from Jacquard(sp?)’s loom & Thos J Watson (pere) selling pianos off a truck; Plato’s warnings & exclusion of the artist; Babbage (sp?); v. Neumann(sp?)(which I found largely beyond my comprehension); & I cannot recall his wellknown name doing time/motion studies in the very early 1900s for industrial efficiency: all these flood back but there was far far more
however
all this was done
before
(though spilling a little over into) the composition of
J R
for the never to be completed
Agap
ē
Agape
whose premises—measurement & quantification as indexing thence dictating order & performance (cf. McNamara’s Vietnam body counts)—have long since caught up with us. Alas it will never be realized but in massive notes & marked margins in the hands of some beleaguered doctoral candidate, since I am now immersed in an equally mad enterprise.