"[Lipsky says] Tell me about the bandanna stuff we were talking about yesterday.
[Wallace replies] I started wearing bandannas in Tuscan because it was a hundred degrees all the time. When it's really hot, I would perspire so much that it would drip on the page. Actually, I started wearing it that year and then it became a big help in Yaddo in '87, because I would drip into the typewriter and I was worried that I was gonna get a shock.
And then I discovered that I felt better with them on...
I mean, I don't wear it all the time. I wear it--I know it's a security blanket for me--whenever I'm nervous. Or whenever I feel like I have to be prepared, or keep myself together, I tend to wear it... [I]t made me feel kind of creepy that people view it as an affection or a trademark or something. It's more just a foible, it's the recognition of weakness, which is that I'm just kind of worried that my head's going to explode." (295-6)
I also saw Jonathan Franzen on the cover of Time. Interesting man, dull as dishwater, though. Seriously man, don't get all hung up about the whole gray scale/bland-colors, tortured-writer-working-in-a-wasteland BS that teenagers dream about (2) and just try to get some enjoyment out of it. I hate that Time had to abridge the piece for their online edition. Why? The whole subtext (or subplot or detour or whatever you prefer) about his friendship with Wallace was one of the best parts, humanizing the seemingly un-human writer. As such, the Internet version of the article just seems to enforce the idea of Franzen as a detached, frigid, genius.
JPC
Footnotes:
(1) This is not an original observation; several others have preceded me (including Wallace Himself).
(2) Every writer goes through this phase. I did too. The good ones out-grow it. The great ones make fun of it, play with it; make it their own. Franzen has yet to develop beyond that stage. He is a great writer; he just needs to become a better individual.
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