Bob Dylan and Close Encounters of the Pynchon kind.

[Joe Allonby]

I agree completely with Will on this one. Howard is a most gracious guy. The
anecdotes and discussion were his to share with me. I've given all of the
information that I will on this one. I just thought that all y'al would
appreciate it.

On 7/12/07, Will Layman <WillLayman at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> Howard is a good friend of mine.  He lives in Vermont in the summer
> but he lives in NW DC during the school year -- I taught his daughter
> all through grades 7 - 12.  I can back up Joe's story (Howard's
> friendship with Bob and Tom) all the way.
>
> That said, I hope that Joe will refrain from retelling the anecdotes
> as I have.  I know that's Howard's intention, and Howard is about the
> most gracious guy you could ever meet.
>
> His books, while utterly un-Pynchon-ish in most ways, have twice been
> finalists for the National Book Award. They are terrific and well-
> crafted as all get-out.
>
> -- Will Layman
>
> On Jul 12, 2007, at 3:57 PM, Joe Allonby wrote:
>
> > So I was in rural East Calais Vermont installing a piano in a
> > ramshackle old farmhouse at the end of a dirt road. The owner was a
> > nice enough guy in his early sixties named Howard.. While we were
> > discussing where he wqnted his new piano and where we were taking
> > his old one, the phone rang. He took a call from "Bob" who was in
> > Montpelior doing a "performance" and wanted to meet for dinner
> > before the show. Even from across the room I could recognize the
> > famous voice coming through the phone.
> >
> > "I couldn't help noticing, but were you just on the phone with Bob
> > Dylan?"
> >
> > "Well, I don't like to drop names but yeah."
> >
> > "Do you mind if I ask how you know Bob Dylan?"
> >
> > "We're old friends. We were introduced many years ago by my
> > literary agents husband. They're good friends."
> >
> > "OK, I'm going to take a wild guess that your literary agent is
> > Melanie Jackson."
> >
> > "Yes. How did you know that?"
> >
> > Howard Norman and I then sat down and had a great conversation
> > about his two good friends, Bob Dylan and Tom Pynchon. He had a
> > bunch of anecdotes about them both. He gave me several of his books
> > and ....... a pristine original paperback pamphlet of "Mortality
> > and Mercy in Vienna".
> >
> >
>
>
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