Frederick Exley quotes. A Fan's Note's fan's notes. Notable performance ... A quarterback in today's New York Giants. Photograph: Henry Ray Abrams/AFP After I was contracted to begin work on a book detailing the crazy life and off-field exploits of NFL football player Jason Peter, I knew that I would need to begin researching the world of American football. Not being a lover of sports, I began a crash course in all things NFL. As part of my research, I trawled through sports-themed books: the good, the bad and the ugly. There are too many bad sports books to mention (although I did feel that Daryl Strawberry's memoir represented some kind of nadir), but the good ones were surprisingly enjoyable. Friday Night Lights was a million times better than the lacklustre movie, and Buzz Bissinger infused his sporting scenes with enough testosterone and excitement to draw even this most unsporting of reader into his world. Exley called his book a "fictional memoir", and asked that he be considered a "writer of fantasy".
Sad Sack Superman - By Walter Kirn. Like Hermann Hesse's Steppenwolf and anything by Antonin Artaud, Frederick Exley's A Fan's Notes is one of those books that gets pushed on you by crazy people. I was in Munich in the early 1980s, widening my horizons on a Eurailpass, when it was pushed on me. An aging beatnik with a ragged knapsack plunked down next to me in the Haufbrauhaus and started raving about the "book of books. " He brought out a tattered paperback and thrust it at me, insisting that the volume was too important not to be passed on. When I asked the man what A Fan's Notes was about, I expected an answer profound and mystical; instead, he fixed his bright eyes on me and said, "Frank Gifford. It's all about this guy who loves Frank Gifford. " I'm in pain, you're in pain.
Where have all the anti-heroes gone? E xley is so over-rich in his descriptions of all things wholesome and American that his disgust is infectious. Exley's self-loathing is really self-love. American Legends Interviews..... Fred Exley - Mel Zerman remembe. On campus, Fred regarded himself as "a leper. " (Self-pity was an Exley hallmark.) Ignored by the golden haired sorority girls, he spent his time in local saloons in the company of a vaguely literary crowd.
At USC, the future author first became aware of Frank Gifford. The star of the school's football team, Gifford was everything Exley was not: popular, a gifted athlete. Fred was never sure if he loved or hated him, but over time Gifford was to became an imaginary alter ego, a rival he never could catch. In the fall of 1953, Fred Exley headed for Manhattan, his B.A. degree in hand.
A transfer to Chicago, a cutback at the railroad, a few too many nights in bars, and Fred was back in Watertown. It was Sundays Fred lived for. After a few weeks on his mother's davenport, another pattern emerged--one that was to be repeated two or three times. The gents in the white coats arrived to take Exley to the "hospital"-- his euphemism for the state mental asylum at Wingdale.
A Fan's Notes by Frederick Exley. Michael Schaub hundred books A Fan's Notes by Frederick Exley Looks like we found a way to sneak some nonfiction onto the Bookslut 100 after all. Frederick Exley's first novel is basically a memoir with a wink -- a sort of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance for self-loathing depressive alcoholics. "No one who has read it can ever forget it," wrote James Dickey.
Turns out that's an understatement. I don't think I've ever read an author this appalling and engaging, this creepily charismatic. It's up for debate how much Fred Exley, the author, actually resembled Fred Exley, the narrator of this book. That's not to say it didn't resonate with me. It's impossible to know what to say in response to this book. Frederick Exley | biblioteke. Frederick Exley. Frederick Exley. Exley, Frederick. Title: FREDERICK EXLEY PAPERSDate range: 1924-1998Location: D.247Size: 36 boxes, 5 packages, 4 oversize pieces Born and raised in Watertown, NY, writer and novelist Frederick Exley (1929-1992) is best known for his "fictional memoir" A Fan's Notes, published in 1968.
While the rest of Exley's writing career was not as successful or lucrative as most of his contemporaries, critics and fans alike consider A Fan's Notes to be a masterpiece of modern American fiction, earning Exley somewhat of a cult following. The substantially autobiographical work was the first and most acclaimed in a trilogy of novels including Pages from a Cold Island(1975) and Last Notes from Home(1988).
Exley also contributed articles to a number of magazines throughout his career, including Esquire and Rolling Stone, the latter of which serialized four installments of Last Notes from Home prior to its publication as a novel by Random House. Abbreviations used: The Frederick Exley Papers were donated by Robert C. ALET Edizioni. A Fan's Notes by Fred Exley Book Review | Dusty Wright's Culture. A Fan's Notes by Frederick Exley (Vintage) Ken Krimstein recommended this book for my holiday reading and I don't know whether to buy him a beer or punch him in the face.
I can't remember the last time I read a book that caused such emotional discomfort, yet it both moved me and disgusted me. This fictional memoir from the pen of Frederick Exley (March 29, 1929 - June 17, 1992) was heralded an American classic by the likes of Kurt Vonnegut and James Dickey. The narrator is an anti-hero both loathed and pitied, yet hardly feared, equal parts Bukowski debauched drunkard, Donleavy's Ginger Man mooching scoundrel, and post-college Holden Caufield delusional intellectual (mirroring Exley's lifelong struggle with alcohol and own mental health issues) with the mind of a giant and a soul of damaged goods.
That he possesses any redeemable characteristics would be difficult to quantify. Moreover, like his debut novel, in real life Mr. Released in the fall of 1968, around the time Mr. Mr. Chautauqua» Blog Archive » Frederick Exley: The Illuminating Dar. For those who don’t know his work, Frederick Exley’s passing seventeen years ago (June 17, 1992) will be as the great preponderance of the world’s myriad events – unknown, unseen, unremarked. For those of us who know and love his work, his passing marked the loss of trusted eyes; of a keen and long-suffering intellect; of a voice as plaintive and hopeful as our own; of a painfully courageous honesty that even transience, alcohol, and loneliness could not extinguish; of an excruciating insight that would not have let him live or die any other way. Now that he no longer watches the world for me, I take comfort in knowing his books still hold his vision.
Aside from the occasional article and periodic piece, the body of Exley’s work comprises a novelistic trilogy. Billed by the author as “autobiographical fiction”, A Fan’s Notes, Pages From A Cold Island, and Last Notes From Home traverse the fuzzy line between reality and fantasy, observation and imagination, history and lies. A Case of the American Jitters - The New York Review of Books.
Great God Pan: Exley's Notes from Jefferson Boulevard. It should surprise no one to learn that Exley's lifelong delusions germinated not in the somber countryside and grey cities of the East, but at Exley's place of undergraduate learning? The University of Southern California in the downtown heart of the city that manufactures fantasy.
-from Great God Pan #12, 1998 "Other men might inherit from their fathers a head for figures, a gold pocket watch all encrusted with the oxidized green of age, or an eternally astonished expression; from mine I acquired this need to have my name whispered in reverential tones. " From this need sprang, for Frederick Exley, a life full of fantasy and delusion lowlighted by a long stay in the Avalon Valley State Hospital for the mentally insane and a booze-induced seizure that landed him flat on back in his hometown emergency room, begging the nurse to tell his mother he loved her. "There was nothing grossly unusual in the fantasy," he writes in A Fan's Notes. The girl in Exley's fantasy is well-drawn. Five Books to Booze With.
The study of literature is supposed to be a serious and sober-minded pursuit, but that seems unfair, as so many of our great writers, from Parker and Faulkner to Chandler and Cheever, were notorious lushes. You, reader, should feel no shame mixing the two either, soaking your mind in both liquor and literature, cocktails and classics. And if you’re reading a book filled with boozy adventures, it’s really the right thing to do. With that in mind, here are five great books that make you want to booze, and recommendations for what to drink while reading them.
Ray Barry Hannah Rumor has it that Barry Hannah was as mad and drunk as his narrator, Dr. Companion drink: Bourbon & lemonade *Tower, Wells. A Fan’s Notes Frederick Exley What would happen if the bastard son of J.D. Companion drink: A good American ale. Paradise Donald Barthelme Paradise does not contain as much boozing as the other books listed, although several bottles of wine and scotch are consumed.
Companion drink: Gin and tonic. Books: Rereading “A Fan’s Notes” — AnneMoore.net. When I first read E. M. Forster’s “Where Angels Fear to Tread” I thought it a twisted comedy. (It is.) I read it again years later and found it sad — still a comedy, but threaded with tragedy. Loss, loss and more loss, complicated by squashed emotions and cultural misunderstanding. Why do we reread? I get frustrated by the poverty of newer books. I just reread Frederick Exley’s “A Fan’s Notes.” “A Fan’s Notes” is an autobiographical novel.
No friendship or relation is worth more than a drink. It’s a train-wreck of a life. He’s most often found on his mother’s davenport. This read I was amazed by his junkie-like behavior in search of alcohol. It’s worth reading “A Fan’s Notes” again, and again. Tagged as: A Fan's Notes, fiction, Frederick Exley, rereading. A FAN'S NOTES BY FREDERICK EXLEY | rgdinmalaysia on Xanga. Riding the train with Fred Exley. On Monday, my daughter, Liz, and I rode Amtrak's Adirondack from Penn Station, New York City, to Plattsburgh, New York, en route to a visit with my in-laws in Massena. Packing for the trip, I took from the shelf where it has sat unread since I bought it some years ago my copy of Frederick Exley's Pages from a Cold Island. One evening about fifteen years ago, I was where my bride had learned to expect me to be more often than she wished, which was at the bar of the Lion's Head, in Greenwich Village.
After a few beers, I felt the inevitable (my maternal grandmother used to say, "Know why beer goes through you so fast? It doesn't have to stop to change color. ") need to visit the room a few steps from where I was seated. Having spent thirty seconds or so reading the superurinary graffiti ("God made Shakespeare, then broke the mold. God broke the mold, then made Jacqueline Susann. I didn't rush out, buy and read A Fan's Notes then; I had a third year paper to complete and finals to take.
Gaddis Annotations - Gaddis Remembered - George Hunka. The Literature of Failure was scheduled for late Wednesday afternoon – two hours, once a week (Gaddis, I learned later, would take a midday train up from his home, teach the seminar, sleep over in a guest bedroom -- it could have been La Farge’s, if I remember correctly -- then finish up with his prose workshop the next day). There were about twelve students in the class, and few of us were familiar with Gaddis and so didn’t know what to expect. He showed up for the first class in what would be his usual outfit -- a corduroy jacket (usually tan), a necktie, very much what a middle-aged college literature professor might be expected to wear in 1979.
Gaddis was not a very tall man, perhaps 5'8" or 5'9" at the outside, with sandy blonde hair slowly turning to white and a craggy, lined face. His voice, a reedy, raspy drawl fed by years of cigarettes, brought to mind a more cosmopolitan W.C. Fields. (The cigarettes were a constant presence. We always called him “Mr.