William Gaddis Books

A National Book Award-winning satire about the unchecked power of American capitalism, written more than three decades before the 2008 financial crisis. At the center of J R is J R Vansant, a very average sixth grader from Long Island with torn sneakers, a runny nose, and a juvenile fascination with junk-mail get-rich-quick offers. Responding to one, he sees a small return; soon, he is running a paper empire out of a phone booth in the school hallway. Everyone from the school staff to the municipal government to the squabbling heirs of a player-piano company to the titans of Wall Street and the politicians in Washington will be caught up in the endlessly ballooning bubble of the J R Family of Companies. First published in 1975 and winner of the National Book Award in 1976, J R is an appallingly funny and all-too-prophetic depiction of America’s romance with finance. It is also a book about suburban development and urban decay, divorce proceedings and disputed wills, the crumbling facade of Western civilization and the impossible demands of love and art, with characters ranging from the earnest young composer Edward Bast to the berserk publicist Davidoff. Told almost entirely through dialogue, William Gaddis’s novel is both a literary tour de force and an unsurpassed reckoning with the way we live now.

A revelatory collection of correspondence by the lauded author of titanic American classics such as The Recognitions and J R, shedding light on his staunchly private life. UPDATED WITH OVER TWO DOZEN NEW LETTERS AND PHOTOGRAPHS Now recognized as one of the giants of postwar American fiction, William Gaddis shunned the spotlight during his life, which makes this collection of his letters a revelation. Beginning in 1930 when Gaddis was at boarding school and ending in September 1998, a few months before his death, these letters function as a kind of autobiography, and also reveal the extent to which he drew upon events in his life for his fiction. Here we see him forging his first novel, The Recognitions (1955), while living in Mexico, fighting in a revolution in Costa Rica, and working in Spain, France, and North Africa. Over the next twenty years he struggles to find time to write the National Book Award–winning J R (1975) amid the complications of work and family; deals with divorce and disillusionment before reviving his career with Carpenter’s Gothic (1985); then teaches himself enough about the law to produce A Frolic of His Own (1994). Resuming his lifelong obsession with mechanization and the arts, he finishes a last novel, Agapē Agape (published in 2002), as he lies dying. This newly revised edition includes clarifying notes by Gaddis scholar Steven Moore, as well as an afterword by the author’s daughter, Sarah Gaddis.

Gaddis' kafkaesque novel begins with the notion that justice exists only in the afterlife, while on Earth, there is merely law. The story follows unsuccessful playwright Oscar J. Crease as he engages in a bizarre lawsuit against a Hollywood producer, driven solely by the pursuit of money.

Agapc Agape reflects on the destructive elements of corporate culture on the arts, featuring an unnamed narrator who lies dying, mirroring Gaddis's own fate, while contemplating humanity's lost capacity for sacred passion.

Wyatt Gwyon forges art not from larceny but from love. He produces uncannily accurate "originals", faithful to the spirit and the letter of the Flemish masters. In an age when the real and the fake have become indistinguishable, Gwyon's forgeries reflect a truth that others cannot even recognize.

A satirically jaundiced view of modern law and justice chronicles the fortunes of Oscar Crease, a middle-aged college instructor and playwright, as he sues a Hollywood producer for pirating a play

This story of raging comedy and despair centers on the tempestuous marriage of an heiress and a Vietnam veteran. From their "carpenter gothic" rented house, Paul sets himself up as a media consultant for Reverend Ude, an evangelist mounting a grand crusade that conveniently suits a mining combine bidding to take over an ore strike on the site of Ude's African mission. At the still center of the breakneck action--revealed in Gaddis's inimitable virtuoso dialoge—is Paul's wife, Liz, and over it all looms the shadowy figure of McCandless, a geologist from whom Paul and Liz rent their house. As Paul mishandles the situation, his wife takes the geologist to her bed and a fire and aborted assassination occur; Ude issues a call to arms as harrowing as any Jeremiad--and Armageddon comes rapidly closer. Displaying Gaddis's inimitable virtuoso dialogue, and his startling treatments of violence and sexuality, Carpenter's Gothic "shows again that Gaddis is among the first rank of contemporary American writers" (Malcolm Bradbury, The Washington Post Book World).

William Gaddis, celebrated for his four novels, also produced significant critical writings. This collection features original essays, including his first publication on player pianos and reflections on missed opportunities in America. Gaddis explores the writer's relationship with religion, showcasing his literary insight in a conservative era.

William Gaddis' fünftes und letztes Buch "Das mechanische Klavier" ist sein literarisches Vermächtnis und thematisiert die Mechanisierung der Kunst. In einem dramatischen Monolog reflektiert ein sterbender Schriftsteller über den Einfluss des mechanischen Klaviers auf die Künste und führt einen Dialog mit vergangenen Dichtern und Denkern.