re Re: Pynchon & journalists

[jbor]

on 12/1/02 4:24 PM, Doug Millison at millison at online-journalist.com wrote:

> Inerview sources, subjects -- it's the same thing really

For someone who has been so lexically-fastidious up to this point this is
quite an astonishing cop-out.

The _PW_ quote:

> Hajdu conducted hundreds of interviews for each of his books, but
> his favorite source is someone he's never met. The reclusive Thomas
> Pynchon, who was a close friend of Fariña's, replied (by fax) to an
> extensive list of questions and permitted Hajdu to quote from his
> correspondence.

An interview comprises an interviewer and an interviewee, or subject.
Research or investigation generally entails a "source" and, despite your
attempts at obfuscation, the excerpt above, which you cited, clearly denotes
Pynchon's input as "his correspondence".

It was never the real issue, of course, but thanks for the last word on
that. (By the way, as I happen to edit a quarterly journal I lied a little
about being a total media novice. Unlike you, I prefer to give my
interviewees the option of a taped face-to-face interview or an exchange by
email, and I provide them with an opportunity to proofread and suggest
alterations to the interview transcript before it goes to press. I can
assure you that the results from each interview mode are vastly different.)

> so we agree!

Well, it does appear that what we've manage to establish are the following
key points:

1. Pynchon contacted CNN in early-1997, and in the course of the
conversation which he initiated with the people there he firmly denied that
he was the author of the Wanda Tinasky letters and hoax.

2. David Hajdu enjoyed his correspondence by fax with Pynchon, and used some
of the information he received as source material for his book.

3. The Japan _Playboy_ piece, if legitimate, will be Pynchon's first
official press interview, breaking a forty-year silence.

4. Comments attributed to Pynchon in both the _Playboy_ article and Bruce
Eisner's MDMA book have yet to be verified.

That's pretty much where we began 30 or so posts ago, give or take, but from
my point of view the ordeal has been worth it just to get these details
straight, and I'm very glad to hear that you've got something out of the
exchange yourself. (My apologies to anyone else still reading though.)

best