Irwin Corey

[Henry]

I asked about the time in 1974 when he had accepted the National Book Award
for Fiction that Thomas Pynchon received for his novel "Gravity's Rainbow"
when Pynchon, a well-known recluse, declined to attend.

"With Pynchon's permission, Thomas Guinzberg, head of Viking Books, asked me
to take his place at the Alice Tully Hall ceremony to accept the award,
figuring that my double-talk was right in line with his prose, which most
readers found very obtuse."

The professor's acceptance speech went off without a hitch despite a
streaker running across the stage during it. Almost no one knew what Pynchon
looked like, his only published photo being one from his high-school
yearbook.

Dinner with 'Professor' Irwin Corey
by David Weiss (edit at brooklyneagle.net), published online 07-25-2007
http://tinyurl.com/2gqzhb 

Henry M 
http://www.urdomain.us/scuffling.htm