
Tom Wolfe, the Art of Fiction No. 123 (1991) - pepys
https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2226/tom-wolfe-the-art-of-fiction-no-123-tom-wolfe
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padobson
_It doesn’t matter if your audience doesn’t know what a gadrooned platter is.
Often people are flattered to have an unusual word thrust upon them. They say,
Well, that author thinks I know what he’s talking about!_

This is one of those rare sentences that changes the way my mind works. When I
read a weird word in a magazine piece, I usually think the author is being
pretentious or needlessly flowery - perhaps even a secret handshake inside a
literary class where I don't belong. It never occurred to me to think this was
showing respect to the reader.

~~~
dionidium
The irony of condescending to your readers is that it's only the people you
actually _want to impress_ who will notice.

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B1FF_PSUVM
I've read my share of Tom Wolfe, always with pleasure - he worked hard at
making sure of that.

I'd say that "Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers" is probably the single most
enlightening thing he wrote about how society works after 1960.

P.S. Just the note on gadrooned platters makes the interview worth reading
(not even auto-correct knows what _that_ is ...)

P.P.S. _" If people want stories serially they’ll go to television."_ ... ah
well ... that's really 1991 for you.

~~~
richmarr
Can you clarify what you found enlightening about it?

~~~
B1FF_PSUVM
There was a change in the way social conflict is handled. The late-XIX century
way was making a city like Paris have wide, straight avenues and "pour la
canaille la mitraille" \- a straight military approach to class warfare.

The late-XX century is on the side of psych-warfare and pouring oil on
troubled waters, i.e. buying peace on a piecemeal basis. It's right out on
Wolfe's first paragraph: _" They knew you were the right studs to give the
poverty grants and community organizing jobs to."_

(I was going to quote that originally, but forty years brought that line too
close to today's reality bone ...)

~~~
richmarr
There seems to be a common belief that the 'modern' era is somehow different
to the past. I'm open to the idea, but in the most part it seems based on so
little data that it can be discounted.

Maybe Wolfe has got some evidence, but I tend to be skeptical of those kinds
of arguments. My default assumption is that people are exhibiting a historical
or narrative bias.

The late 20th century didn't produce Sun Tzu or Machiavelli, for example, so
it seems like counter-examples are available. Would love to see data.

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komali2
>What about Thomas Wolfe? Did he float into your consciousness at all?

You are all witnessing the moment I discovered these are different people.

When the news came out that Tom Wolfe died I said "damn wasn't he super old
though?" to my partner, and completely misinterpreted the weird look she gave
me.

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nyc111
Previous discussion
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17074489](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17074489)

This same Paris Review article was locked; I'm glad they unlocked it now. But
other Paris Review articles are all locked and require subscription.

