More on the blurb brouhaha

[jd]

I just think you're looking too far into it.  I think it would likely
have caused the same stir had the blurb / title come out at the same
time... the fact that he wrote one, not that it came out early, is the
thing most people seem to be interested in, and that early release was
just an incidental mishap.  And he didn't disavow knowledge of the
authorship, that was just that Slate guy misquoting the publisher.

On 7/25/06, jbor at bigpond.com <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> Another blogger:
> "[...] The Amazon synopsis not only bore all the hallmarks of Pynchon's
> style, but carried his byline as well. Real, or a hoax? Patterson
> initially wrote that the publicity chief of the book's publisher
> Penguin "disavow[ed]" all knowledge of the writeup's authorship, and
> added that Amazon.com hadn't sorted out what its response would be and
> that, unsurprisingly, Pynchon wasn't returning Patterson's phone call.
> The next day, however, Patterson posted a clarification. The blurb was
> Pynchon's handiwork after all, according to Penguin, which, Patterson
> corrected, did not disclaim the post. What a great bit of PR! [...]"
>
> http://jstheater.blogspot.com/
>
> On 26/07/2006:
>
> >> And that Associated Press story is literally everywhere:
> >>
> >> http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=49568
>
> And that's just the most obscure rag to have picked it up. All the
> major US dailies, the Guardian, CNN. By my last count, there were over
> two dozen on-line versions of that AP report out there.
>
> And now some of them are starting to print it together with what's
> becoming the iconic image of TRP: sending himself up as a cartoon
> author with a paper bag over his head on the Simpsons.
>
> Marketing 101. Product branding. In TRP's case, it's the "reclusive
> author" tag. Along with the staged controversy of the "now you see it,
> now you don't" blurb (and the stereotyped notoriety of Pynchon's
> on-line fans as cult-worshipping nerdlingers) it has won this new book
> maximum exposure, created a "buzz". Had the book been announced
> "normally", even with the Pynchon blurb attached, it would have been
> reported in Publisher's Weekly and probably rated a couple of lines
> here and there in y'r more highbrow Arts News columns. With the Slate
> TV critic on board at the get-go, this story's getting mileage in the
> celebrity gossip columns.
>
> It's great.
>
> And that second Simpsons appearance, where all he does is make puns on
> the titles from his back catalogue, begins to make a lot more sense.
>
> best
>
>
>