Cory MacLauchlin

Let me start by saying I’m a big fan of Confederacy. This book was an interesting and insightful look into the life of the author and the novel. Unfortunately, since Thelma Toole controlled what was donated within the Toole Papers, we are getting an incomplete and controlled look into JKTs life, only what his mother wanted to share, especially with the destruction of the suicide note. It is kinda of crazy how little we know about people, especially since the novel was published posthumously, he wasn’t around to spread insight and knowledge…also, it was definitely a different generation than it is now. A lot is also gleaned from personal conversations and memories of the people who knew JKT best, but if we know anything about memory it is also incomplete and can be subconsciously biased. I believe that the author did the best he could with what he had, and that makes for a very good book. My observations aren’t a condemnation of the book, just the circumstances in general, and my desire to know the truth. Unfortunately, that seems lost to history.… (altro)

There rarely comes along a book which is a joy to read and which also claims a place as a classic work of American literature. "A Confederacy of Dunces" is such a book. Part of its mystique is that its author, John Kennedy Toole, did not live to see it published, did not live to see it win him the Pulitzer Prize and the critical praise and popularity he so richly deserved. Alas, the fame and national praise only came over a decade after Toole, suffering from depression and paranoia aggravated bu a crushing sense of failure at not having found a publisher for his novel, had killed himself on the outskirts of Biloxi in March 1969.

His mother, Thelma Toole, would find the manuscript of "A Confederacy of Dunces" atop an armoire in her son's bedroom in their home in New Orleans. She began a relentless campaign to find a publisher for it, finally convincing the novelist Walker Percy, then teaching at Loyola, to help her.

The mind that created Ignatius J. Reilly and the absurd world in which he lives was both unique in its genius and characteristic of the environment that shaped it. In his superb biography "Butterfly in the Typewriter", Cory MacLauchlin examines the tragic life of John Kennedy Toole and the remarkable story of "A Confederacy of Dunces" which came to life and flourished after the death of its author.

"Ken" Toole as he was known to most of his friends and associates, was a creature of New Orleans. The Crescent City is the most exotic city in the United States. Of French and Spanish colonial origin, it is the least typically "American" of our large cities. In its artistic and musical vibe it is partly Caribbean, partly Mediterranean and largely African. Toole was a keen observer of its many dialects and accents and of its cultural heritage and its tendency for decadence, if not depravity. "A Confederacy of Dunces" is a rival to Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire" as the quintessential New Orleansian literary work of art.

MacLauchlin comments on Toole's gift for mimicry and impressions. He was a great favorite at faculty parties at the many schoolds at which he taught: Hunter College in New York City (while he was attending Columbia), Louisiana State at Lafayette, and Dominican in New Orleans. In the early 1960s, he served in the U.S. Army, quickly rising to the rank of sergeant. He was stationed in Puerto Rico where he taught English to recruits. He was fluent in Spanish.

While in Puerto Rico in 1963, he began writing "A Confederacy of Dunces". Later that year, he was honorably discharged and returned to New Orleans to live with his aged parents. He continued working on his novel, although his writing was disrupted by the assassination of President Kennedy which greatly upset him. He was able to finish the novel in early 1964.

Then began his struggle to get his novel published. He mailed the manuscript to Simon and Schuster in New York, where it found its way to the desk of the chief editor, Robert Gottlieb. MacLauchlin is rather charitable in his treatment of Gottlieb, writing that he praised Toole and was generous in his time spent in dealing with the unknown writer. However, he kept telling Toole to revise the novel- and he lamented that it seemed to "lack meaning". When the novel was finally published, it was published, according to Thelma Toole, in its original, unedited draft form- and it won the Pulitzer Prize. This makes Gottlieb look like an idiot.

After being put off by Gottlieb, Toole gave up on trying to get his novel published. He continued to teach at Dominican, a Catholic college for women a few blocks from his home in New Orleans. In the fall of 1968, he seemed to have a nervous breakdown. On Jan. 20, 1969, he got in his car and took off on his final journey. He apparently first went west, to Hearst's castle at San Simeion in California. He then drove across the country to visit the home of the late Flannery O'Connor in Georgia. And then he turned homeward, driving along the Gulf coast. He got as far as the coast of Mississippi and there he ended his life- but not the story of his life or the work of a great literary imagination.… (altro)

I've already written a review for this marvelous biography of John Kennedy Toole. (If you're interested, it's here: http://deepsouthmag.com/2012/05/new-orleans-would-have-its-bard-yet/)

I would like to say that MacLauchlin does a fine job of analyzing the myth and legend of the enigmatic and troubled JK Toole. This biography was thorough and at the same time fun to read. Also, as someone who's written a novel, I was fascinated by the way the book [b:A Confederacy of Dunces|310612|A Confederacy of Dunces|John Kennedy Toole|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1406092525s/310612.jpg|968084] was discovered.

The irony to me is that John Kennedy Toole's mother basically tortured and smothered her brilliant son during his lifetime, and then later, she ended up being the reason his book was discovered- and lauded- ten years after his death (and still today).

[b:Butterfly in the Typewriter: The Short, Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of A Confederacy of Dunces|12618255|Butterfly in the Typewriter The Short, Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of A Confederacy of Dunces|Cory MacLauchlin|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1409521895s/12618255.jpg|17644737] is a fascinating biography, and I think it will appeal to all JK Toole fans, as well as anyone who enjoys literary biography, and books about the sometimes treacherous road to publication.… (altro)