The case that first sprang to my mind when this Finn/Mallory story broke was DBC Pierre, although it’s not exactly the same thing (his work didn’t “draw” particularly on his alleged life experiences):
You know it makes me angry because assholes appropriate other people’s sadness and get profit. I’ve had a sad life that ended up happy, but it would diverge too much from the white male narrative to make a story that would sell. These assholes just want to hear themselves talk, but they want to believe they are hearing more than that. So long as that remains the case, people are going to lie to fill that gap because people want it so much they pay extra for it. “Wash my fur but don’t make me wet” is a great opportunity for a bullshit artist.
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"Want to sell a book?" writes Jessa Crispin. "Start lying."
Oh, that’s been around for a long long time.
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In this case fabricating his own backstory was a marketing tool to sell his fiction. It’s a shortcut. People will pay more attention if you have some unique personal history instead of being just another average human from bland American suburbia. He could have spent years writing crappy fiction and nobody would’ve care, or maybe eventually profited from it from sheer volume.
I think Burroughs’ greatest gift to the literary world was his experimentalism, and how that influenced the Beat Writers. “Naked Lunch” is no weirder than Joyce’s “Ulysses” when you get down to it-- both are tough, confusing reads that can be rewarding if you give them the chance. But they’re not for everybody. Burrough’s personal life is more problematic, but his art stands by itself I think. Pollack may not have been a great painter either, but he discovered a way to break barriers like Burroughs, there’s value in that.
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“The trouble with writing a book about yourself is that you can’t fool around. If you write about someone else, you can stretch the truth from here to Finland. If you write about yourself, the slightest deviation makes you realize instantly that there may be honor among thieves, but you are just a dirty liar.”
–Groucho Marx, “Groucho and Me”
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I know that you have to be thorough when writing this sort of piece, but at 12,000 words the article seems to include a few literary world victory laps. Is the literary world that upset he faked his way into it?
Not to say I didn’t read the whole damned thing.
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Except in perhaps the greatest autobiography of all time, ‘my wicked wicked ways’ by Errol Flynn. I doubt a paragraph goes by without two lies, but I will continue to give out copies to everyone I know.
That was an amazing listen/read. Thank you for posting the link.
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