Customer Reviews

Ken and Thelma: The Story of A Confederacy of Dunces

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Joel Fletcher met John Kennedy Toole at the University of Southwestern Louisiana (now UL-Lafayette), where Fletcher was a self-described "campus brat" and Toole (known throughout his life as Ken) was a member of the English faculty. Their friendship continued for five years via letters and visits, and Fletcher later became friends with Ken's legendary mother, Thelma. A memoir of both characters rather than a biography of either, KEN & THELMA is valuable for its affectionate but never idealized portraits of its subjects, its glimpses of Toole's fellow USL instructor Bobby Byrne (a prototype for CONFEDERACY protagonist Ignatius J. Reilly), and its appendix of letters from Toole to the author, in which his wry but always sweet-natured voice comes through at full strength. (On the letters about CONFEDERACY he'd been receiving from a New York editor: "Also, I am 'like one of those geniuses who turn up in Tanganyika or New Zealand.' Poor New Orleans. Suppose I had sent the thing in from Breaux Bridge ... or Parks.")

More than a decade after Toole's suicide, Fletcher stopped by Thelma Toole's house on Elysian Fields Avenue to congratulate her on the impending publication of A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES. Though she had only met Fletcher once, many years before, Mrs. Toole exclaimed, "Come in, Joel, honey, I was just thinking about you," and a friendship was born. Fletcher squired the "mother of the book" around to various parties, premieres, and even her 1981 star turn on the Tom Snyder show in New York, where she had a chance to show off her extensive training in elocution and theatrics: "[A] production assistant came in to give her a few tips. 'I don't know if you've ever had any experience in front of a camera ... but don't be afraid to make a few gestures with your hands while you are talking so you won't seem so stiff.' The poor girl had no idea to whom she was giving advice. Thelma's eyebrows went up and she flipped her wrist in a dramatic flourish that must have taken the girl's breath away. 'I guess you must have done this sort of thing before,' she said, and quickly disappeared." Though Fletcher makes clear that Mrs. Toole could be a difficult, high-maintenance friend, he appears to have cherished her unique character, and he remained devoted to her through her death in 1984.

Often mentioned by Toole enthusiasts -- and addressed in KEN & THELMA -- is the bad feeling between the authors of the 2001 Toole biography IGNATIUS RISING and friends of Ken and Thelma Toole still living in New Orleans. Fletcher was a source for Ignatius Rising, but as it turns out, an unwilling one. Upon reading the biography in galleys, Fletcher felt that it contained far too much speculation and innuendo as well as a deliberately unbalanced portrait of Mrs. Toole. He asked that the material he had contributed be removed, but it wasn't, and he spends KEN & THELMA's final chapter refuting IGNATIUS RISING.

The book's only real problem, at least for this reader, is Fletcher's willingness to minimize Simon & Schuster editor Robert Gottleib's sins against Toole and CONFEDERACY after Toole submitted the manuscript to him in 1964. Gottleib is not the leering Satan Mrs. Toole made him out to be in the wake of her son's death, but he did lead Toole on for a period of two years, making vague and unimplementable criticisms ("It isn't about anything"), often admitting that he wasn't even sure what he was trying to say. It's likely that some glimmer of the manuscript's genius did reach him and he was genuinely trying to help -- otherwise he wouldn't have spent so much time on it -- but one wonders whether an outright rejection wouldn't have been both more professional and kinder. It might have allowed Toole to move on and try other publishers, rather than continuing to believe (as he seems to have done) that Simon & Schuster would publish CONFEDERACY if he just made the right revisions. Or maybe not -- Toole does seem to have had an unfortunate tendency to give up on his work far too easily.

This is such a likable, welcome book, though, that such a small and subjective flaw is virtually irrelevant. If you have any interest in John Kennedy Toole, Thelma Toole, or A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES, KEN & THELMA is a must-read.

(This review was originally published in the New Orleans Times-Picayune.)

Ken & Thelma recounts an extraordinary story of the brilliant and disturbed author John Kennedy Toole (Ken) and his bigger-than-life Tennessee Williamsesque mother, Thelma.

Ken spent years writing and later unsuccessfully editing his masterpiece, A Confederacy of Dunces. When he killed himself in 1969, he had given up any hope of seeing it published. It was nearly a decade later that Thelma stepped in. Refusing to accept no for an answer, she undauntedly peddled her late son's manuscript from publisher to publisher ...ultimately bullying southern author Walker Percy to read it and take up her cause. The result of these years of struggle and rejection (it was refused by at least ten publishing houses!) was a posthumous Pulitzer prize and nearly two million copies sold.

To have any understanding of Ken, you would have to know something of Thelma; and there lies the specialness of this original and engrossing book. Author Fletcher knew them both well. A prolific keeper of diaries, he kept notes of everything, from his early encounters with Ken at the University of Southern Louisiana, through his important friendship with the mother after ken's suicide, including a stint as Thelma's « escort» in the months following the publication of Confederacy.

I had never read A Confederacy of Dunces, and this in no way diminished the interest that Fletcher's book held for me. A rather intimate biography, culled from memories of its author, Ken & Thelma is first-rate and fascinating from cover to cover. I highly recommend it.

This little book (and it is little in both page count and size, note the dimensions) is quite charming but in some ways disappointing. The author was a friend of John Kennedy Toole but theirs does not seem to have been a friendship close enough to share any real intimacy beyond casual letters and hanging out together at times. The real star of this book is not Toole but his mother, the defiantely eccentric yet amazingly heroic and strong Thelma Toole who became very much a Louisiana legend following the posthumous publication of her son's A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES in 1980 up to her death in 1983. Stopping by Ms. Toole's home to congratulate her on the book's success, the author quickly became something of a surrogate son to Thelma, chaperoning her to events and even to New York for an appearance on NBC's TOMORROW talk show. And as such the book is invaluable in giving of a glimpse on this willful woman who would not let her son's work sit unpublished despite almost a decade of rejection. Although Fletcher seems most concerned about that "other" book's presumptions about Toole's private life, to me it's most appalling point was it's vicious cartoonish take on Thelma who is made a fool on almost every page with no redeeming qualities. Fletcher saw her flaws (and bluntly says he is glad she was not HIS mother) but he also recognized the strength and humanity in her. And some of her crabbing most definately seems justified. One wishes Fletcher could tell us a little more about Toole but it appears JKT was exceptionally remote even among friends.

Although many have long lamented the long, to date unsuccessful, road to get a film made of CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES filmed (and with the recent tragedy of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, a film version seems almost impossible to be produced for untold number of years), I personally am most dissapointed in the seeming lack of interest in the author beyond Louisiana borders despite COD's best-selling status and critical acclaim. The two books on Toole to date where both published in Louisiana, the reviews to both overwhelmingly are also from within the state. Where are the academic volumes on Toole to say nothing of a major biography? If books can be written on authors from two centuries ago, certainly someone could do a major work on this writer despite his early death and bibliography limited to two posthumous works.

In all fairness Joel Flether states that Ken & Thelma is not a biography but rather a memoir. And that is exactly what it is. If you want to examine the life of John Kennedy Toole, this isn't the book for you. It primarily concerns the relationship that the author had with Thelma Toole and her quest, all be it purely self motivated, to have her son's masterpiece published. The undercurrent seems to be a character analyis of Thelma, her ingrained narcissim and her outrageous treatment of other people. In the end it is about Thelma which would probably please her to no end. The author accomplishes his stated goal, but left me wanting more.

If you're reading this, then you are probably familiar with John Kennedy Toole. From this book, you will learn a little bit more about this writer. There are other, more speculative books on this topic; Fletcher stays with the facts as he knew them, and as he was able to discover them. I think this is the best of the Toole bios. This is not a massive book; this reflects the short span of Toole's life.

After reading the abysmally amateurish Ignatius Rising, I didn't have much hope for this. However, as a New Orleanian and unabashed Confederacy fan, I was obligated to purchase it.

Boy, am I glad I did. While the book primarily concentrates on the author's relationship with Thelma, there's a plethora of correspondence and anecdotes that give the reader a much better insight into the life of Ken. You won't be sorry.

As friend and fellow Louisianan, Joel Fletcher was a natural choice to have written of the story of John Kennedy Toole and Confederacy of Dunces from a unique and personal perspective. The story of the great writer's masterpiece and his mother Thelma's role in the writer's life and death, is a must read for any Confederacy enthusiast. Fletcher, an objective and realistic observer who understands the limits of his relationship to the subject, proves an able story-teller in the great tradition of southern story-tellers where wit and timing are perfectly matched. I recommend this book to any reader of modern American literature.

A long-time admirer of "A Confederacy Of Dunces," I purchased "Ken And Thelma" after reading about it in the online blog of one of my favorite writers, Poppy Z. Brite. I was pleased to read this charming and enjoyable portrait of John Kennedy ("Ken") Toole, his mother Thelma, and the author, Joel, whose voice is engaging but never intrusive. (And whose author photo is distractingly handsome, if I may say so!) It is admittedly no objective portrait of its subjects, but it doesn't claim to be. If you want a charming memoir instead of speculative yellow journalism, give "Ken And Thelma" a read.

In this world of tightened means, its good to find a book you can read again and again and enjoy it every time. This is the karmic string theory of Confederacy of Dunces, every read a new perspective on the people of New Orleans that the guidebooks never mention. Spiraling out from the green hat of Mr Reilly to return to him in waves of incredulous giggling.
A wicked good read!

Very interesting book if you enjoyed Confederacy of Dunces. I especially enjoyed the connection to New Orleans and surrounding area, as in Toole's own book.