NP - new editions of Gaddis' JR, The Recognitions

[Erik T. Burns]

I would just like to point out that these new Gaddis editions are
published by the Dalkey Archive.

That's reason enough to buy new editions, and pay full price. It's all good.


On Wed, Jan 25, 2012 at 3:30 PM, Charles Albert <cfalbert at gmail.com> wrote:
> Unless you already have a copy, there's, like, 60 reasons to do so.....I had
> a hard time finding a used copy of Recognitions for less than $75 bucks....
>
> love,
> cfa
>
>
> On Wed, Jan 25, 2012 at 9:44 AM, rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I've been through a few copies myself. no reason not to buy new ones
>>
>> the awesome Steven Moore is editing a collection of selected letters of
>> William Gaddis (which I'm sure you know all about)
>>
>> Gaddis' interview published in the Paris Review is also wonderful reading:
>>
>>
>> http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2577/the-art-of-fiction-no-101-william-gaddis
>>
>> "Even though I should have known from The Recognitions that the world was
>> not waiting breathlessly for my message, that it already knew, and was quite
>> happy to live with all these false values, I’d always been intrigued by the
>> charade of the so-called free market, so-called free enterprise system, the
>> stock market conceived of as what was called a “people’s capitalism” where
>> you “owned a part of the company” and so forth. All of which is true; you
>> own shares in a company, so you literally do own part of the assets. But if
>> you own a hundred shares out of six or sixty or six hundred million, you’re
>> not going to influence things very much. Also, the fact that people buy
>> securities—the very word in this context is comic—not because they are
>> excited by the product—often you don’t know what the company makes—but
>> simply for profit: The stock looks good and you buy it. The moment it looks
>> bad you sell it. What had actually happened in the company is not your
>> concern. In many ways I thought . . . the childishness of all this. Because
>> JR himself, which is why he is eleven years old, is motivated only by
>> good-natured greed. JR was, in other words, to be a commentary on this free
>> enterprise system running out of control. Looking around us now with a
>> two-trillion-dollar federal deficit and billions of private debt and the
>> banks, the farms, basic industry all in serious trouble, it seems to have
>> been rather prophetic."
>>
>> he said this in 1986. how ever so true it is even today.
>>
>> and more on fire the bastards:
>> http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2012/01/24/mistaken-identity/
>>
>> rich
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 25, 2012 at 8:10 AM, <rbollinger at austin.rr.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Got an e-mail on this the other day - per Amazon it releases February 7:
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.amazon.com/J-R-William-Gaddis/dp/1564784339/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_2
>>>
>>> J R
>>>
>>> A great masterpiece by William Gaddis, with a new introduction by Rick
>>> Moody.
>>>
>>> "Winner of the 1976 National Book Award, J R is a biting satire about the
>>> many ways in which capitalism twists the American spirit into something
>>> dangerous, yet pervasive and unassailable. At the center of the novel is a
>>> hilarious eleven year old—J R—who with boyish enthusiasm turns a few basic
>>> lessons in capitalist principles, coupled with a young boy’s lack of
>>> conscience, into a massive and exploitative paper empire. The result is one
>>> of the funniest and most disturbing stories ever told about the corruption
>>> of the American Dream"
>>>
>>> Also saw a new edition of The Recognitions in my local indie store last
>>> Saturday night, although Amazon says it doesn't release until February 20
>>> ....
>>>
>>>
>>> Rob Bollinger
>>> "I don't live in Texas - I live in Austin" - Molly Ivins
>>
>>
>