The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc. [Hardcover]

Jonathan Lethem (Author)

Book Description

Release date: November 8, 2011

What’s a novelist supposed to do with contemporary culture? And what’s contemporary culture sup­posed to do with novelists? In The Ecstasy of Influence, Jonathan Lethem, tangling with what he calls the “white elephant” role of the writer as public intellectual, arrives at an astonishing range of answers.

A constellation of previously published pieces and new essays as provocative and idiosyncratic as any he’s written, this volume sheds light on an array of topics from sex in cinema to drugs, graffiti, Bob Dylan, cyberculture, 9/11, book touring, and Marlon Brando, as well as on a shelf’s worth of his literary models and contemporaries: Norman Mailer, Paula Fox, Bret Easton Ellis, James Wood, and oth­ers. And, writing about Brooklyn, his father, and his sojourn through two decades of writing, Lethem sheds an equally strong light on himself.

Editorial Reviews

Review

National Book Critics Circle Award finalists
A New York Times Notable Book of 2011


"Hefty and remarkable .....These byways, all of which make room for eccentric flights as well as proper essays, augment the charm and impact of what Lethem prefers to call an 'autobiographical collage,' a phrase he lifts from Vonnegut. This influence seems only natural, for dominating all is Lethem's prime concern always: the novel....generous....exciting....openhearted, unconventional."
--The New York Times Book Review

"Did I say I love this book? Well, OK then, I love this book....bring[s] a novelist's sensibility to these essays, to find a through line, to approximate a narrative. It offers a way, in other words, to rethink the collection as a book in its own right — and not just that, but a book about a big idea."
--The Los Angeles Times

“He’s a novelist who has spent a lifetime creating his own subversive pantheon, a jumpy CBGB’s of the literary soul….Several of the essays here marinate in the fish sauce that is literary gossip…..feisty, freewheeling….funny”—The New York Times

"Emotionally engaging and intellectually nimble....curated selection of essays which thematically add up to more than the sum of its parts....Progressive....Eyebrow-raising...Impassioned....Disarming"--The Guardian 
 
“The Ecstasy of Influence is, more than anything, a record of Mr. Lethem’s life as a public novelist, a role for which he is obviously well suited…..Mr. Lethem has such a gift, and The Ecstasy of Influence is evidence of it.”—The New York Observer

"The writer I most wish was my best friend....impressively omnivorous new collection of mostly non-fiction....reveal a lively, even manic mind at play across a wide and wonderful series of subjects that are threaded together, mostly, as a kind of autobiography of a would-be writer becoming a struggling writer and then a successful writer while all the while remaining a voracious reader.....This book is its own kind of dense and dreamy zoo, and even if you don’t listen to Echo Echo in your basement apartment, you’ll still find much in here to enjoy and know you’re enjoying and know that Lethem knows you’re enjoying as much as he does." --The National Post

"Conceptual ambition, sense of purpose and a fan’s evangelical devotion distinguish this collection from the typical novelist’s gathering of nonfiction miscellany.....impressively rich....In addition to being a writer who blurs the distinction between genre fiction (sci-fi, detective, western) and postmodern literature (a term he questions), Lethem writes with a commitment to sharing his enthusiasm for whatever obsesses him....While the results illuminate his formative influences and artistic development, they also cast considerable light on the culture at large, which is both reflected in Lethem’s work and has profoundly shaped it.....Intensifying that intimacy, he shares his complicated relationships.... high ambitions and a strong sense of purpose."-
-Kirkus Reviews, starred review


"Peppery nonfiction....provocative tour de force....thoughtful and rambunctious....dynamically juxtaposed and connected....to create a jazzy, patchwork memoir....hilarious....fresh, erudite, zestful, funny frolic in the great fields of creativity."
--Booklist

About the Author

JONATHAN LETHEM is the New York Times bestselling author of eight novels, including Chronic City, The Fortress of Solitude, and Motherless Brooklyn.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; First Edition edition (November 8, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385534957
• ISBN-13: 978-0385534956
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.5 x 9.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #556,897 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Jonathan Lethem was born in New York and attended Bennington College.

He is the author of seven novels including Fortress of Solitude and Motherless Brooklyn, which was named Novel of the Year by Esquire and won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Salon Book Award, as well as the Macallan Crime Writers Association Gold Dagger.

He has also written two short story collections, a novella and a collection of essays, edited The Vintage Book of Amnesia, guest-edited The Year's Best Music Writing 2002, and was the founding fiction editor of Fence magazine.

His writings have appeared in the New Yorker, Rolling Stone, McSweeney's and many other periodicals.

He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars His essays are as fine as his fiction November 10, 2011

By A reader

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I was beguiled and a bit haunted by some of the pieces in "The Disappointment Artist," Lethem's first essay collection, so I looked forward to this new one. It's a catch-all compendium like authors used to be allowed once they'd written a bunch of novels and established their right to be heard in all their personal idiosyncrasy: fat, rich and bulging, a prose scrapbook with edges hanging out, addenda and random thoughts filling the cracks between solidly set, brilliantly prosed pieces. Mailer's "Advertisements" is modestly invoked (like Nawmin, Lethem scatters brief and costly comments on "the talent in the room," that is, other novelists of his generation), but I think as well of Vonnegut's "Wampeters," King's "Danse Macabre," and Woollcott's "While Rome Burns." I don't always share Lethem's enthusiasms (Dick, Cassavetes), but I'm willing to roll with his gentle voice and unbullying advocacy; and when we do match on people (Shirley Jackson, Manny Farber) he makes me feel them anew. Of course the title piece is a great literary monkeyshines, no less entertaining or thoughtful for being the sort of stunt any writer wishes he or she'd thought of pulling first.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A master at work November 10, 2011

By Mark

Format:Hardcover

Full disclosure: long-time fan of both Lethem's fiction and non-fiction. (Loved Motherless Brooklyn; loved Gun, With Occasional Music even more; his little book on They Live is a miniature masterpiece.) This is a superb collection of essays that reveal Lethem's influences and obsessions, including science fiction and gift economies. The title essay alone is an inventive tour de force worth reading again and again. He puts Franzen in the shade, is easily on par with the latest critical darling (mostly deserved) John Jeremiah Sullivan, and invites comparison with the best of DFW. Buy, and enjoy.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A well-constructed collection of writings November 10, 2011

By Ms. Bunburyist

Format:Hardcover

I often find "collected works" irritating, because they feel warmed over: they're full of things I've already read. In this case, no. While I'd read a good amount of what was collected here, the notes on each piece in combination with the pieces I hadn't read made it well worthwhile. The assemblage also made sense, with each piece shedding new light on the others. Worth the price of admission!