CNN

[Doug Millison]

One thing for sure, HHolt and the bookstores want to sell as many copies of
M&D as possible, an honorable desire. I doubt CNN dug up the story on their
own, as Pynchon offers few of the obvious celebrity news/gossip/tabloid
angles to attract mass media editors and producers -- aside from the
so-called "recluse" story, there seem to be only the lurid details Mr.
Siegel has aired and they haven't made it into mainstream media coverage
for many years; precious few book reviewers have treated M&D seriously and
in depth, after all, and it's clearly on their turf.

Scenario 1:  HHolt PR machine feeds the story to CNN, playing up the
celebrity recluse/cult following angle, knowing that's the only angle that
a mass media daily news organization is going to grab and run with. Tim's
point (below) is valid. How do we know the person who telephoned CNN was
really Pynchon? He didn't participate in any of the publication day public
events. "Professor" Irwin Corey all over again?

Scenario 2:  HHolt PR machine feeds the story to CNN; Pynchon really did
telephone the reporter and tried to influence the story, and ran smack into
the mass media mentality he's parodied so deftly and otherwise skewered in
his fiction. This scenario strikes me as unlikely.

Scenario 3:  CNN journalists find Pynchon in New York (with or without his
cooperation; I'm inclined to believe without) and tease with shots and no
identification.

Scenario 4:  CNN is part of the joke and presents video footage without
Pynchon; or maybe CNN is duped, too, and doesn't know what he looks like
either, or is following a ringer.

Pynchonesque remains the word, as far as I'm concerned, for the  CNN
coverage, no matter how it came about.

Personally, I don't care about knowing what he looks like. Whether he wants
to maintain his privacy, or out himself (aside:  I happened to catch a few
minutes of the Geraldo Rivera show on TV a couple of weeks ago when a
pathetic Henry Hill, the real-life gangster whose story became the
Goodfellas movie, came out of his Federal witness protection program
anonymity because he couldn't take it anymore, and he admitted to Geraldo
on the air that he was high on prescription drugs, a high point of tabloid
TV journalism), or play games with the media, I hope he keeps writing and
publishing what he writes.

Cordially,
Doug

At 8:30 PM 6/8/97, Tim Ware wrote:
>Regarding this Pynchon on CNN deal, when M&D was just coming out I got a
>call from someone in the HHolt PR dept asking if I knew anyone who was
>"famous" who read Pynchon. When I mentioned what I thought was the obvious
>choice--Larroquette--they were unaware that he was a P-reader. How
>interesting that he pops up on this CNN "report." To me, the whole thing
>smacks of a pre-arranged publicity stunt for the novel. I wouldn't be too
>surprised if none of those guys in the video is Pynchon.
>
>However, I haven't seen the video, and I sure would like to. If anyone out
>there would be kind enough to mail a tape to me, I'll check it out and
>mail it right back. Promise.
>
>Thanks in advance.
>
>Tim Ware (RB)

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