unsubstantiated rumor that Melanie Jackson denied Playboy Japan "interview"

[pynchonoid]

Convenient, that anonymous source of yours.  And you
got it, what, second-hand (somebody you know got this
statement from Melanie Jackson?) or third-hand
(somebody you know knows somebody who got this
statement from Melanie Jackson?), or do you even know
how many people have passed this rumor around before
it got to you?

Apparently you haven't verified this with Melanie
Jackson.  I assume you would have let us know that.

If Pynchon had made such a statement, through his
agent, certainly it would have been publicized -- his
every move, or rumors about his every move, are
communicated through the media these days, cf. his
appearance on the The Simpsons, the recent New Yorker
cartoon of Pynchon and his next book.

This so-called "denial" - thoroughly unsubstantiated -
is not enough to counter the physical fact of the
interview's publication in Playboy Japan, the
magazine's assurance that the interview is authentic.

 If you want to discredit this interview, or the
conditions under which it took place, why don't you
contact Melanie Jackson or Pynchon and find out
yourself, instead of trying to disseminate an
unsubstantiated rumor? 

A respectable editor would never publish this sort of
claim, except perhaps in a gossip column. 

A similar rumor has been passed around before (and was
mentioned in some of the p-list correspondence awhile
back, I believe - you might want to go through the
archives before you make the claim that it wasn't) ,
although when I heard it, the phone call was made to
"Jackson's office" and the person who made the call
did not claim to talk with Melanie Jackson, but only
to somebody who answered the phone and did not give a
name; I forget if the person who answered the phone
was said to be a man or a woman. I also heard that a
follow-up call to the Melanie Jackson agency produced
a non-committal response, that the person who answered
didn't know anything about it.

If you want to undermine the interview in an
authoritative way, you're going to have to do some
research of your own, jbor.  A third- or fourth- or
fifth-hand rumor won't cut it, because of the evidence
of the published interview itself, the magazine's
defense, and the fact that Pynchon's has apparently
not challenged it legally or otherwise.

Here's the advice I'd give a rookie reporter if I were
the assigning editor on this story:  Start with a call
to Melanie Jackson and see if you can corroborate this
rumor you've suddenly "discovered".  If that doesn't
work, try faxing a letter to her, or put it in the
mail. 

At the same time, contact Pynchon's publisher with the
same questions.  And, query Playboy Japan as well. 
And, Pynchon Notes, which took some steps to
investigate this (I'm not sure to what extent, but I
believe PN has more information about this matter than
has been mentioned on the p-list or elsewhere
publicly). 

Then - and this is the important part, for an ethical
reporter concerned with the integrity of the story,
that is - wait until you get a definitive response
from one or more of them before trying to pass off the
rumor as fact.

Please let us know what you've found out.  It would
make a good article, if properly researched and vetted
- for PN, or perhaps for a newspaper or magazine with
an interest in serious literature. 

Good luck.


--- jbor <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:

> on 9/11/04 9:31 AM, jbor wrote:
> I've since had it on good authority that a "denial
> that P gave the Playboy
> Japan interview" was provided over the phone to one
> of the New York
> p-listers by Melanie Jackson, Pynchon's agent and
> wife.
>

=====
http://pynchonoid.org
"everything connects"


		
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