Amazon.com Review
Despite having written more than 25 books, Richard Elman never became a household name. Like the vast majority of writers, he was relegated to the literary B list, teaching in college creative writing programs and publishing his work to mostly respectful reviews but less than stratospheric sales. Elman died in 1997 at the age of 63; it only seems appropriate that his last book should be a literary memoir. Though Elman never made it to the big leagues himself, he certainly rubbed elbows with those who did;
Namedropping is a collection of essays that chronicles his encounters with a number of celebrity artists, musicians, and writers, as well as lesser-known (and some completely unknown) literary figures. Elman's recollections of his friends and acquaintances are often fascinating, frequently funny--and sometimes more than you really wanted to know (Little Richard's proclivity for masturbating while being interviewed comes instantly to mind). But there's also an underlying melancholy--the regret of a man "past middle age, with so many books written ... and only a few still in print"--that permeates these pieces.
Namedropping dishes some tasty gossip about the likes of Isaac Bashevis Singer, Faye Dunaway, and Richard Elman's more famous namesake, the biographer Richard Ellmann, but in the end, like all good memoirs, it's more revealing of the author than his purported subjects.
From Publishers Weekly
What sets this work apart from other recent memoirs is that Elman (Tar Beach) is finally less revealing of himself than of his cultural milieu. Through brief essays, Elman records his encounters with a range of important and interesting public figuresAmostly other writers but also musicians, actors and politicians. As a poetry student of Yvor Winters, Elman was housemates with Alexander Kerensky and classmates with Tillie Olson and the British poet Thom Gunn, while in New York as a freelancer Elman cultivated a relationship with his hero Isaac Bashevis Singer and crossed paths with the likes of Walker Evans, Robert Lowell and Faye Dunaway. If Elman is often candidly critical of his subjectsAhe writes that Hunter Thompson had little to say about Las Vegas that a kindergartner didn't already knowAhe is equally critical of himself and quotes Singer's assertion that "it's hard to be a writer without gifts," while musing that perhaps he, Elman, should study for a profession. One thing Elman provides, if apparently inadvertently, is a fascinating history of the "listener-sponsored" Pacifica Radio Foundation, for which Elman produced pieces on James Agee and Hart Crane. Elman is both poignant, as when he recalls finally meeting the other, better known Richard EllmannAa gathering that included Hannah Arendt, Dwight MacDonald and Daniel BellAand bawdy, as when he describes how Little Richard masturbated twice during an interview. Not all of the anecdotes in this collection are substantive enough to stand alone, but read together they are engaging and enlightening.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
