Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr. (March 2, 1930 – May 14, 2018)
[Some sources say 1931; ''The New York Times'' and Reuters both initially reported 1931 in their obituaries before changing to 1930. See and ] was an American author and journalist widely known for his association with
New Journalism
New Journalism is a style of news writing and journalism, developed in the 1960s and 1970s, that uses literary techniques unconventional at the time. It is characterized by a subjective perspective, a literary style reminiscent of long-form non- ...
, a style of news writing and journalism developed in the 1960s and 1970s that incorporated literary techniques.
Wolfe began his career as a regional newspaper reporter in the 1950s, achieving national prominence in the 1960s following the publication of such best-selling books as ''
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
''The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test'' is a 1968 nonfiction book by Tom Wolfe. The book is a popular example of the New Journalism literary style. Wolfe presents a firsthand account of the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, ...
'' (a highly experimental account of
Ken Kesey
Ken Elton Kesey (September 17, 1935 – November 10, 2001) was an American novelist, essayist and countercultural figure. He considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s.
Kesey was born in ...
and the
Merry Pranksters
The Merry Pranksters were comrades and followers of American author Ken Kesey in 1964.
Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters lived communally at Kesey's homes in California and Oregon, and are noted for the sociological significance of a lengthy roa ...
) and two collections of articles and essays, ''
Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers'' and ''
The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby
''The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby'' is the title of Tom Wolfe's first collected book of essays, published in 1965. The book is named for one of the stories in the collection that was originally published in ''Esquire magazine'' i ...
''. In 1979, he published the influential book ''
The Right Stuff'' about the
Mercury Seven
The Mercury Seven were the group of seven astronauts selected to fly spacecraft for Project Mercury. They are also referred to as the Original Seven and Astronaut Group 1. Their names were publicly announced by NASA on April 9, 1959; these seve ...
astronauts, which was made into a 1983
film of the same name directed by
Philip Kaufman
Philip Kaufman (born October 23, 1936) is an American film director and screenwriter who has directed fifteen films over a career spanning more than six decades. He has been described as a "maverick" and an "iconoclast," notable for his versati ...
.
His first novel, ''
The Bonfire of the Vanities
''The Bonfire of the Vanities'' is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City, and centers on three main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, Jewish as ...
'', published in 1987, was met with critical acclaim and also became a commercial success. Its adaptation as a
motion picture
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
of the same name, directed by
Brian De Palma
Brian Russell De Palma (born September 11, 1940) is an American film director and screenwriter. With a career spanning over 50 years, he is best known for his work in the suspense, crime and psychological thriller genres. De Palma was a leading ...
, was a critical and commercial failure.
Early life and education
Wolfe was born on March 2, 1930, in
Richmond, Virginia
(Thus do we reach the stars)
, image_map =
, mapsize = 250 px
, map_caption = Location within Virginia
, pushpin_map = Virginia#USA
, pushpin_label = Richmond
, pushpin_m ...
, the son of Helen Perkins Hughes Wolfe, a garden designer, and Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Sr. (1893 - 1972), an
agronomist
An agriculturist, agriculturalist, agrologist, or agronomist (abbreviated as agr.), is a professional in the science, practice, and management of agriculture and agribusiness. It is a regulated profession in Canada, India, the Philippines, the ...
and editor of ''The Southern Planter''.
He grew up on Gloucester Road in the Richmond North Side neighborhood of
Sherwood Park. He recounted childhood memories in a foreword to a book about the nearby historic Ginter Park neighborhood. He was student council president, editor of the school newspaper, and a star baseball player at
St. Christopher's School, an
Episcopal all-boys school in Richmond. Another brief but touching memoir was written in a letter to a man who purchased the Wolfe home place in 1991.
Upon graduation in 1947, he turned down admission to
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
to attend
Washington and Lee University
, mottoeng = "Not Unmindful of the Future"
, established =
, type = Private liberal arts university
, academic_affiliations =
, endowment = $2.092 billion (2021)
, president = William C. Dudley
, provost = Lena Hill
, city = Lexingto ...
. At Washington and Lee, Wolfe was a member of the
Phi Kappa Sigma
Phi Kappa Sigma () is an international all-male college secret society and social fraternities and sororities, fraternity. While nicknames differ from institution to institution, the most common nicknames for the fraternity are Skulls, Skullhous ...
fraternity. He majored in English, was sports editor of the college newspaper, and helped found a literary magazine, ''Shenandoah,'' giving him opportunities to practice his writing both inside and outside the classroom. Of particular influence was his professor
Marshall Fishwick
Marshall William Fishwick (July 5, 1923 – May 22, 2006) was an American multidisciplinary scholar, professor, writer, and editor who started the academic movement known as popular culture studies and established the journal ''Internationa ...
, a teacher of American studies educated at UVA and Yale. More in the tradition of anthropology than literary scholarship, Fishwick taught his students to look at the whole of a culture, including those elements considered profane. Wolfe's undergraduate thesis, entitled "A Zoo Full of Zebras: Anti-Intellectualism in America," evinced his fondness for words and aspirations toward cultural criticism. Wolfe graduated ''
cum laude
Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sou ...
'' in 1951.
While still in college, Wolfe continued playing baseball as a pitcher and began to play semi-professionally. In 1952, he earned a tryout with the
New York Giants
The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Giants compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East division. ...
, but was cut after three days, which he blamed on his inability to throw good fastballs. Wolfe abandoned baseball and instead followed his professor Fishwick's example, enrolling in
Yale University
Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
's
American studies
American studies or American civilization is an interdisciplinary field of scholarship that examines American literature, history, society, and culture. It traditionally incorporates literary criticism, historiography and critical theory.
Sch ...
doctoral program. His Ph.D. thesis was titled ''The League of American Writers: Communist Organizational Activity Among American Writers, 1929-1942.''
In the course of his research, Wolfe interviewed many writers, including
Malcolm Cowley
Malcolm Cowley (August 24, 1898 – March 27, 1989) was an American writer, editor, historian, poet, and literary critic. His best known works include his first book of poetry, ''Blue Juniata'' (1929), his lyrical memoir, ''Exile's Return ...
,
Archibald MacLeish, and
James T. Farrell
James Thomas Farrell (February 27, 1904 – August 22, 1979) was an American novelist, short-story writer and poet.
He is most remembered for the ''Studs Lonigan'' trilogy, which was made into a film in 1960 and a television series in 1979.
B ...
. A biographer remarked on the thesis: "Reading it, one sees what has been the most baleful influence of graduate education on many who have suffered through it: It deadens all sense of style." Originally rejected, his thesis was finally accepted after he rewrote it in an objective rather than a subjective style. Upon leaving Yale, he wrote a friend, explaining through expletives his personal opinions about his thesis.
Journalism and New Journalism
Though Wolfe was offered teaching jobs in academia, he opted to work as a reporter. In 1956, while still preparing his thesis, Wolfe became a reporter for the ''
Springfield Union'' in
Springfield, Massachusetts
Springfield is a city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, and the seat of Hampden County. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers: the western Westfield River, the ...
. Wolfe finished his thesis in 1957.
In 1959, he was hired by ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
''. Wolfe has said that part of the reason he was hired by the ''Post'' was his lack of interest in politics. The Post's city editor was "amazed that Wolfe preferred cityside to
Capitol Hill
Capitol Hill, in addition to being a metonym for the United States Congress, is the largest historic residential neighborhood in Washington, D.C., stretching easterly in front of the United States Capitol along wide avenues. It is one of the ...
, the beat every reporter wanted." He won an award from
The Newspaper Guild
The NewsGuild-CWA is a labor union founded by newspaper journalists in 1933. In addition to improving wages and working conditions, its constitution says its purpose is to fight for honesty in journalism and the news industry's business practices ...
for foreign reporting in
Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...
in 1961 and also won the Guild's award for humor. While there, Wolfe experimented with fiction-writing techniques in feature stories.
In 1962, Wolfe left Washington D.C. for New York City, taking a position with the ''
New York Herald Tribune
The ''New York Herald Tribune'' was a newspaper published between 1924 and 1966. It was created in 1924 when Ogden Mills Reid of the ''New-York Tribune'' acquired the ''New York Herald''. It was regarded as a "writer's newspaper" and competed ...
'' as a general assignment reporter and feature writer. The editors of the ''Herald Tribune'', including
Clay Felker
Clay Schuette Felker (October 2, 1925 – July 1, 2008) was an American magazine editor and journalist who co-founded ''New York'' magazine in 1968. He was known for bringing numerous journalists into the profession. ''The New York Times'' wrote ...
of the Sunday section supplement ''
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
'' magazine, encouraged their writers to break the conventions of newspaper writing.
Wolfe attracted attention in 1963 when, three months before the
JFK assassination
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...
, he published an article on
George Ohsawa
George Ohsawa (born ; October 18, 1893 – April 23, 1966) was a Japanese educator who was the founder of the macrobiotic diet. When living in Europe he went by the pen names of Musagendo Sakurazawa, Nyoiti Sakurazawa, and Yukikazu Sakurazawa. He ...
and the
sanpaku
or is a Japanese term meaning "three whites". It was introduced into English by George Ohsawa in the mid-1960s. It is generally referred to in English as "sanpaku eyes" and refers to eyes in which either the white space above or below the iris ...
condition foretelling death.
During the
1962–63 New York City newspaper strike, Wolfe approached ''
Esquire
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...
'' magazine about an article on the
hot rod
Hot rods are typically American cars that might be old, classic, or modern and that have been rebuilt or modified with large engines optimised for speed and acceleration. One definition is: "a car that's been stripped down, souped up and made ...
and
custom car
A custom car is a passenger vehicle that has been either substantially altered to improve its performance, often by altering or replacing the engine and transmission; made into a personal "styling" statement, using paint work and aftermarket ...
culture of
southern California
Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most po ...
. He struggled with the article until his editor,
Byron Dobell
Byron Dobell (May 30, 1927 – January 21, 2017) was an American editor and artist. He is considered "one of the most respected and accomplished editors in New York magazine publishing history," the editor of several popular American magazines, in ...
, suggested that Wolfe send him his notes so they could piece the story together. Wolfe procrastinated. The evening before the deadline, he typed a letter to Dobell explaining what he wanted to say on the subject, ignoring all journalistic conventions. Dobell's response was to remove the salutation "Dear Byron" from the top of the letter and publish it intact as reportage. The result, published in 1963, was "There Goes (Varoom! Varoom!) That Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby." The article was widely discussed—loved by some, hated by others. Its notoriety helped Wolfe gain publication of his first book, ''
The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby
''The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby'' is the title of Tom Wolfe's first collected book of essays, published in 1965. The book is named for one of the stories in the collection that was originally published in ''Esquire magazine'' i ...
'', a collection of his writings from the ''Herald-Tribune'', ''Esquire'', and other publications.
This was what Wolfe called
New Journalism
New Journalism is a style of news writing and journalism, developed in the 1960s and 1970s, that uses literary techniques unconventional at the time. It is characterized by a subjective perspective, a literary style reminiscent of long-form non- ...
, in which some journalists and essayists experimented with a variety of
literary techniques, mixing them with the traditional ideal of dispassionate, even-handed reporting. Wolfe experimented with four literary devices not normally associated with feature writing: scene-by-scene construction, extensive dialogue, multiple points of view, and detailed description of individuals' status-life symbols (the material choices people make) in writing this stylized form of journalism. He later referred to this style as literary journalism. Of the use of status symbols, Wolfe has said, "I think every living moment of a human being's life, unless the person is starving or in immediate danger of death in some other way, is controlled by a concern for status."
Wolfe also championed what he called "saturation reporting," a reportorial approach in which the journalist "shadows" and observes the subject over an extended period of time. "To pull it off," says Wolfe, "you casually have to stay with the people you are writing about for long stretches ... long enough so that you are actually there when revealing scenes take place in their lives." Saturation reporting differs from "in-depth" and "investigative" reporting, which involve the direct interviewing of numerous sources and/or the extensive analyzing of external documents relating to the story. Saturation reporting, according to communication professor Richard Kallan, "entails a more complex set of relationships wherein the journalist becomes an involved, more fully reactive witness, no longer distanced and detached from the people and events reported."
Wolfe's ''
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
''The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test'' is a 1968 nonfiction book by Tom Wolfe. The book is a popular example of the New Journalism literary style. Wolfe presents a firsthand account of the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, ...
'' is considered a striking example of New Journalism. This account of the
Merry Pranksters
The Merry Pranksters were comrades and followers of American author Ken Kesey in 1964.
Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters lived communally at Kesey's homes in California and Oregon, and are noted for the sociological significance of a lengthy roa ...
, a famous sixties counter-culture group, was highly experimental in Wolfe's use of
onomatopoeia
Onomatopoeia is the process of creating a word that phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Such a word itself is also called an onomatopoeia. Common onomatopoeias include animal noises such as ''oink'', ''m ...
,
free association, and eccentric punctuation—such as multiple exclamation marks and italics—to convey the manic ideas and personalities of
Ken Kesey
Ken Elton Kesey (September 17, 1935 – November 10, 2001) was an American novelist, essayist and countercultural figure. He considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s.
Kesey was born in ...
and his followers.
In addition to his own work, Wolfe edited a collection of New Journalism with E. W. Johnson, published in 1973 and titled ''
The New Journalism''. This book published pieces by
Truman Capote
Truman Garcia Capote ( ; born Truman Streckfus Persons; September 30, 1924 – August 25, 1984) was an American novelist, screenwriter, playwright and actor. Several of his short stories, novels, and plays have been praised as literary classics, ...
,
Hunter S. Thompson
Hunter Stockton Thompson (July 18, 1937 – February 20, 2005) was an American journalist and author who founded the gonzo journalism movement. He rose to prominence with the publication of '' Hell's Angels'' (1967), a book for which he s ...
,
Norman Mailer
Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer ...
,
Gay Talese
Gaetano "Gay" Talese (; born February 7, 1932) is an American writer. As a journalist for ''The New York Times'' and ''Esquire'' magazine during the 1960s, Talese helped to define contemporary literary journalism and is considered, along with ...
,
Joan Didion
Joan Didion (; December 5, 1934 – December 23, 2021) was an American writer. Along with Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson and Gay Talese, she is considered one of the pioneers of New Journalism. Didion's career began in the 1950s after she won an ...
, and several other well-known writers, with the common theme of journalism that incorporated literary techniques and which could be considered literature.
Non-fiction books
In 1965, Wolfe published a collection of his articles in this style, ''
The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby
''The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby'' is the title of Tom Wolfe's first collected book of essays, published in 1965. The book is named for one of the stories in the collection that was originally published in ''Esquire magazine'' i ...
'', adding to his notability. He published a second collection of articles, ''
The Pump House Gang
''The Pump House Gang'' is a 1968 collection of essays and journalism by Tom Wolfe. The stories in the book explored various aspects of the counterculture of the 1960s. The most famous story in the collection, from which the book takes its nam ...
'', in 1968. Wolfe wrote on popular culture, architecture, politics, and other topics that underscored, among other things, how American life in the 1960s had been transformed by post-WWII economic prosperity. His defining work from this era is ''
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
''The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test'' is a 1968 nonfiction book by Tom Wolfe. The book is a popular example of the New Journalism literary style. Wolfe presents a firsthand account of the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, ...
'' (published the same day as ''The Pump House Gang'' in 1968), which for many epitomized the 1960s. Although a conservative in many ways (in 2008, he claimed never to have used
LSD
Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), also known colloquially as acid, is a potent psychedelic drug. Effects typically include intensified thoughts, emotions, and sensory perception. At sufficiently high dosages LSD manifests primarily mental, vi ...
and to have tried
marijuana
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...
only once). Wolfe became one of the notable figures of the decade.
In 1970, he published two essays in book form as ''
Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers''. "Radical Chic" was a biting account of a party given by composer and conductor
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Considered to be one of the most important conductors of his time, he was the first America ...
to raise money for the
Black Panther Party
The Black Panther Party (BPP), originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, was a Marxist-Leninist and black power political organization founded by college students Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton in October 1966 in Oakland, Califo ...
. "Mau-Mauing The Flak Catchers" was about the practice by some African Americans of using racial intimidation ("mau-mauing") to extract funds from government welfare bureaucrats ("flak catchers"). Wolfe's phrase, "
radical chic
Radical chic is the fashionable practice of upper-class people associating with politically radical people and causes. Coined in the 1970 article "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's" by journalist Tom Wolfe, the term has become widely used in l ...
", soon became a popular derogatory term for critics to apply to upper-class
leftism
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
. His ''
Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine
''Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine'' is a 1976 book by Tom Wolfe, consisting of eleven essays and one short story that Wolfe wrote between 1967 and 1976. It includes the essay in which he coined the term "the 'Me' Decade" to refer to the 1970s ...
'' (1977) included Wolfe's noted essay, ''
The "Me" Decade and the Third Great Awakening''.
![Original 7 Astronauts in Spacesuits - GPN-2000-001293](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/Original_7_Astronauts_in_Spacesuits_-_GPN-2000-001293.jpg)
In 1979, Wolfe published ''
The Right Stuff'', an account of the pilots who became America's first
astronaut
An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally r ...
s. Following their training and unofficial, even foolhardy, exploits, he likened these heroes to "
single combat
Single combat is a duel between two single warriors which takes place in the context of a battle between two armies.
Instances of single combat are known from Classical Antiquity and the Middle Ages. The champions were often combatants who repres ...
warriors" of a bygone era, going forth to battle in the
Space Race
The Space Race was a 20th-century competition between two Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between the tw ...
on behalf of their country. In 1983, the book was adapted as a
feature film
A feature film or feature-length film is a narrative film (motion picture or "movie") with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation in a commercial entertainment program. The term ''feature film'' originall ...
.
In 2016 Wolfe published ''
The Kingdom of Speech'', a critique of the work of
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
and
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is ...
. Wolfe synthesized what he construed as the views of
Alfred Russel Wallace
Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was a British naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He is best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution through natural se ...
and Chomsky on the language organ as not being a product of natural selection to suggest that speech is an invention that is responsible for establishing our humanity. Some critics claimed that Wolfe's view on how humans developed speech were not supported by research and were opinionated.
Critiques of art and architecture
Wolfe also wrote two critiques of and social histories of
modern art
Modern art includes artistic work produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the styles and philosophies of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the tradi ...
and
modern architecture
Modern architecture, or modernist architecture, was an architectural movement or architectural style based upon new and innovative technologies of construction, particularly the use of glass, steel, and reinforced concrete; the idea that form ...
, ''
The Painted Word
''The Painted Word'' is a 1975 book of art criticism by Tom Wolfe.
Background
By the 1970s Wolfe was, according to Douglas Davis of ''Newsweek'' magazine "more of a celebrity than the celebrities he describes." In . The success of Wolfe's pre ...
'' and ''
From Bauhaus to Our House'', published in 1975 and 1981, respectively. ''The Painted Word'' mocked the excessive insularity of the art world and its dependence on what he saw as faddish critical theory. In ''From Bauhaus to Our House'' he explored what he said were the negative effects of the
Bauhaus
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 200 ...
style on the evolution of modern architecture.
Made for TV movie
In 1977,
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...
produced ''Tom Wolfe's Los Angeles'', a fictional, satirical TV movie set in Los Angeles. Wolfe appears in the movie as himself.
Novels
Throughout his early career, Wolfe had planned to write a novel to capture the wide reach of American society. Among his models was
William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray (; 18 July 1811 – 24 December 1863) was a British novelist, author and illustrator. He is known for his satirical works, particularly his 1848 novel '' Vanity Fair'', a panoramic portrait of British society, and t ...
's ''
Vanity Fair'', which described the society of 19th-century England. In 1981, he ceased his other work to concentrate on the novel.
Wolfe began researching the novel by observing cases at the Manhattan Criminal Court and shadowing members of the homicide squad in
The Bronx
The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...
. While the research came easily, he encountered difficulty in writing. To overcome his writer's block, Wolfe wrote to
Jann Wenner
Jann Simon Wenner ( ; born January 7, 1946) is an American magazine magnate who is a co-founder of the popular culture magazine ''Rolling Stone'', and former owner of '' Men's Journal'' magazine. He participated in the Free Speech Movement while ...
, editor of ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'', to propose an idea drawn from
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
and Thackeray: to serialize his novel. Wenner offered Wolfe around $200,000 to serialize his work. The frequent deadline pressure gave him the motivation he had sought, and from July 1984 to August 1985, he published a new installment in each biweekly issue of ''Rolling Stone''.
Later Wolfe was unhappy with his "very public first draft" and thoroughly revised his work, even changing his protagonist, Sherman McCoy. Wolfe had originally made him a writer, but recast him as a bond salesman. Wolfe researched and revised for two years, and his ''
The Bonfire of the Vanities
''The Bonfire of the Vanities'' is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City, and centers on three main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, Jewish as ...
'' was published in 1987. The book was a commercial and critical success, spending weeks on bestseller lists and earning praise from the very literary establishment on which Wolfe had long heaped scorn.
Because of the success of Wolfe's first novel, there was widespread interest in his second. This novel took him more than 11 years to complete; ''
A Man in Full
''A Man in Full'' is the second novel by Tom Wolfe, published on November 12, 1998, by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. It is set primarily in Atlanta, with a significant portion of the story also transpiring in the East Bay region of the San Francisco B ...
'' was published in 1998. The book's reception was not universally favorable, though it received glowing reviews in ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'', ''
Newsweek
''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis (businessman), Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print m ...
'', ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'', and elsewhere. An initial printing of 1.2 million copies was announced and the book stayed at number one on ''The New York Times'' bestseller list for ten weeks. Noted author
John Updike
John Hoyer Updike (March 18, 1932 – January 27, 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short-story writer, art critic, and literary critic. One of only four writers to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once (the others being Booth ...
wrote a critical review for ''The New Yorker'', complaining that the novel "amounts to entertainment, not literature, even literature in a modest aspirant form." His comments sparked an intense war of words in the print and broadcast media among Wolfe and Updike, and authors
John Irving
John Winslow Irving (born John Wallace Blunt Jr.; March 2, 1942) is an American-Canadian novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter.
Irving achieved critical and popular acclaim after the international success of ''The World According to G ...
and
Norman Mailer
Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer ...
, who also entered the fray. The novel was selected to be adapted into a television series by
Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...
in 2021.
In 2001, Wolfe published an essay referring to these three authors as "My Three Stooges." That year he also published ''
Hooking Up
''Hooking Up'' is a collection of essays and a novella by American author Tom Wolfe, a number of which were earlier published in popular magazines.
The essays cover diverse topics dating from as early as 1965, including both non-fiction and ficti ...
'' (a collection of short pieces, including the 1997 novella ''Ambush at Fort Bragg'').
He published his third novel, ''
I Am Charlotte Simmons
''I Am Charlotte Simmons'' is a 2004 novel by Tom Wolfe, concerning sexual and status relationships at the fictional Dupont University. Wolfe researched the novel by talking to students at North Carolina, Florida, Penn, Duke, Stanford, and Mic ...
'' (2004), chronicling the decline of a poor, bright scholarship student from Alleghany County, North Carolina, after attending an elite university. He conveys an institution filled with snobbery, materialism, anti-intellectualism, and sexual promiscuity. The novel met with a mostly tepid response by critics. Many social conservatives praised it in the belief that its portrayal revealed widespread moral decline. The novel won a
Bad Sex in Fiction Award
''Literary Review'' is a British literary magazine founded in 1979 by Anne Smith, then head of the Department of English at the University of Edinburgh. Its offices are on Lexington Street in Soho. The magazine was edited for fourteen years by v ...
from the London-based ''
Literary Review
''Literary Review'' is a British literary magazine founded in 1979 by Anne Smith, then head of the Department of English at the University of Edinburgh. Its offices are on Lexington Street in Soho. The magazine was edited for fourteen years by v ...
'', a prize established "to draw attention to the crude, tasteless, often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel". Wolfe later explained that such sexual references were deliberately clinical.
Wolfe wrote that his goal in writing fiction was to document contemporary society in the tradition of
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
,
Émile Zola
Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, also , ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, and an important contributor to the development of ...
, and
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck Jr. (; February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968) was an American writer and the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature winner "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social ...
.
Wolfe announced in early 2008 that he was leaving his longtime publisher,
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer ...
. His fourth novel, ''
Back to Blood'', was published in October 2012 by
Little, Brown and Company
Little, Brown and Company is an American publishing company founded in 1837 by Charles Coffin Little and James Brown in Boston. For close to two centuries it has published fiction and nonfiction by American authors. Early lists featured Emily ...
. According to ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', Wolfe was paid close to US$7 million for the book.
[Rich, Motoko.]
Tom Wolfe Leaves Longtime Publisher, Taking His New Book
, ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', January 3, 2008. Retrieved January 3, 2008. According to the publisher, ''Back to Blood'' is about "class, family, wealth, race, crime, sex, corruption and ambition in Miami, the city where America's future has arrived first."
[Trachtenberg, Jeffrey A.]
Tom Wolfe Changes Scenery; Iconic Author Seeks Lift With New Publisher, Miami-Centered Drama
, ''The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'', January 3, 2008. Retrieved January 3, 2008. The book was released to mixed reviews. ''Back to Blood'' was an even bigger commercial failure than ''I Am Charlotte Simmons''.
Critical reception
Kurt Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American writer known for his satirical and darkly humorous novels. In a career spanning over 50 years, he published fourteen novels, three short-story collections, five plays, and ...
said Wolfe is "the most exciting—or, at least, the most jangling—journalist to appear in some time," and "a genius who will do anything to get attention."
Paul Fussell
Paul Fussell Jr. (22 March 1924 – 23 May 2012) was an American cultural and literary historian, author and university professor. His writings cover a variety of topics, from scholarly works on eighteenth-century English literature to commentar ...
called Wolfe a splendid writer and stated "Reading him is exhilarating not because he makes us hopeful of the human future but because he makes us share the enthusiasm with which he perceives the actual." Critic
Dwight Garner
Dwight Garner (born January 8, 1965) is an American journalist and longtime writer and editor for ''The New York Times''. In 2008, he was named a book critic for the newspaper. He is the author of ''Garner's Quotations: A Modern Miscellany'' and ...
praised Wolfe as "a brilliantly gifted social observer and satirist" who "made a fetish of close and often comically slashing detail" and was "unafraid of kicking up at the pretensions of the literary establishment."
Harold Bloom
Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was described as "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking wor ...
described Wolfe as "a fierce storyteller, and a vastly adequate social satirist".
Critic
James Wood disparaged Wolfe's "big subjects, big people, and yards of flapping exaggeration. No one of average size emerges from his shop; in fact, no real human variety can be found in his fiction, because everyone has the same enormous excitability."
In 2000, Wolfe was criticised by
Norman Mailer
Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer ...
,
John Updike
John Hoyer Updike (March 18, 1932 – January 27, 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short-story writer, art critic, and literary critic. One of only four writers to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once (the others being Booth ...
and
John Irving
John Winslow Irving (born John Wallace Blunt Jr.; March 2, 1942) is an American-Canadian novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter.
Irving achieved critical and popular acclaim after the international success of ''The World According to G ...
, after they were asked if they believed that his books were deserving of their critical acclaim. Mailer compared reading a Wolfe novel to having sex with a 300 lb woman, saying, "Once she gets to the top it's all over. Fall in love or be asphyxiated." Updike was more literary in his reservedness: He claimed that ''A Man in Full'' "amounts to entertainment, not literature, even literature in a modest aspirant form." Irving was perhaps the most dismissive, saying "It's like reading a bad newspaper or a bad piece in a magazine... read sentences and watch yourself gag." Wolfe responded, saying, "It's a tantrum. It's a wonderful tantrum. ''
A Man in Full
''A Man in Full'' is the second novel by Tom Wolfe, published on November 12, 1998, by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. It is set primarily in Atlanta, with a significant portion of the story also transpiring in the East Bay region of the San Francisco B ...
'' panicked Irving the same way it panicked Updike and Norman. Frightened them. Panicked them." He later called Updike and Mailer "two old piles of bones" and said again that Irving was frightened by the quality of his work. Later that year he published an essay titled ''My Three Stooges'' about the critics.
Recurring themes
Wolfe's writing throughout his career showed an interest in
social status
Social status is the level of social value a person is considered to possess. More specifically, it refers to the relative level of respect, honour, assumed competence, and deference accorded to people, groups, and organizations in a society. Stat ...
competition.
Much of Wolfe's later work addresses
neuroscience
Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, development ...
. He notes his fascination in "Sorry, Your Soul Just Died", one of the essays in ''Hooking Up''. This topic is also featured in ''I Am Charlotte Simmons'', as the title character is a student of neuroscience. Wolfe describes the characters' thought and emotional processes, such as fear, humiliation and lust, in the clinical terminology of brain chemistry. Wolfe also frequently gives detailed descriptions of various aspects of his characters' anatomies.
White suit
Wolfe adopted wearing a white suit as a trademark in 1962. He bought his first white suit, planning to wear it in the summer, in the style of
Southern gentlemen. He found that the suit he'd bought was too heavy for summer use, so he wore it in winter, which created a sensation. At the time, white suits were supposed to be reserved for summer wear. Wolfe maintained this as a trademark. He sometimes accompanied it with a white tie, white
homburg hat
A homburg is a semi-formal hat of fur felt, characterized by a single dent running down the centre of the crown (called a "gutter crown"), a wide silk grosgrain hatband ribbon, a flat brim shaped in a "pencil curl", and a ribbon-bound trim abo ...
, and two-tone
spectator shoes
The spectator shoe, also known as co-respondent shoe, is a style of low-heeled, Oxford shoe, oxford, Brogue shoe#Semi-brogues (or Half brogues), semi-brogue or Brogue shoe#Full brogues (or Wingtips), full brogue constructed from two contrasting col ...
. Wolfe said that the outfit disarmed the people he observed, making him, in their eyes, "a man from Mars, the man who didn't know anything and was eager to know."
Views
![Wolfe at White House](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Wolfe_at_White_House.jpg)
In 1989, Wolfe wrote an essay for ''
Harper's Magazine
''Harper's Magazine'' is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance, and the arts. Launched in New York City in June 1850, it is the oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the U.S. (''Scientific American'' is older, b ...
'', titled "
Stalking the Billion-Footed Beast". It criticized modern American novelists for failing to engage fully with their subjects, and suggested that modern literature could be saved by a greater reliance on journalistic technique.
Wolfe supported
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
as a political candidate and said he voted for him for president in
2004
2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO).
Events January
* January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 6 ...
because of what he called Bush's "great decisiveness and willingness to fight".
Bush reciprocated the admiration, and is said to have read all of Wolfe's books, according to friends in 2005.
[ Bumiller, Elisabeth (February 7, 2005)]
"Bush's Official Reading List, and a Racy Omission"
''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''. Retrieved May 15, 2010
Wolfe's views and choice of subject material, such as mocking left-wing intellectuals in ''Radical Chic'', glorifying astronauts in ''The Right Stuff'', and critiquing
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is ...
in ''
The Kingdom of Speech'' sometimes resulted in his being labeled conservative.
[Vulliamy, Ed (November 1, 2004)]
The liberal elite hasn't got a clue
''The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' Due to his depiction of the Black Panther Party in ''Radical Chic'', a member of the party called him a racist. Wolfe rejected such labels. In a 2004 interview in ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'', he said that his "idol" in writing about society and culture is
Émile Zola
Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, also , ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, and an important contributor to the development of ...
. Wolfe described him as "a man of the left", one who "went out, and found a lot of ambitious, drunk, slothful and mean people out there. Zola simply could not—and was not interested in—telling a lie."
Asked to comment by ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' on blogs in 2007 to mark the tenth anniversary of their advent, Wolfe wrote that "the universe of blogs is a universe of rumors" and that "blogs are an advance guard to the rear."
He also took the opportunity to criticize Wikipedia, saying that "only a primitive would believe a word of" it. He noted a story about him in his Wikipedia bio article at the time which he said had never happened.
[Varadarajan, Tunku (July 14, 2007)]
"Happy Blogiversary"
''The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
''
Wolfe was an
atheist
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
but said that "I hate people who go around saying they're atheists". Of his religious upbringing, Wolfe observed that he "was raised as a
Presbyterian
Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
". Wolfe sometimes referred to himself as a "lapsed Presbyterian."
Personal life
Wolfe lived in New York City with his wife Sheila, who designs covers for ''
Harper's Magazine
''Harper's Magazine'' is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance, and the arts. Launched in New York City in June 1850, it is the oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the U.S. (''Scientific American'' is older, b ...
''. They had two children: a daughter, Alexandra; and a son, Thomas Kennerly III.
Death and legacy
Wolfe died from an infection in
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
on May 14, 2018, at the age of 88.
The historian Meredith Hindley credits Wolfe with introducing the terms "statusphere", "the right stuff", "
radical chic
Radical chic is the fashionable practice of upper-class people associating with politically radical people and causes. Coined in the 1970 article "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's" by journalist Tom Wolfe, the term has become widely used in l ...
", "
the Me Decade" and "good ol' boy" into the
English lexicon
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...
.
Wolfe was at times incorrectly credited with coining the term "
trophy wife
A trophy wife is a wife who is regarded as a status symbol for the husband. The term is often used in a derogatory or disparaging way, implying that the wife in question has little personal merit besides her physical attractiveness, requires sub ...
". His term for extremely thin women in his novel ''The Bonfire of the Vanities'' was "social X-rays".
According to journalism professor
Ben Yagoda
Ben Yagoda (born 22 February 1954) is an American writer and educator. He is a professor of journalism and English at the University of Delaware.
Early life
Born in New York City to Louis Yagoda (1909-1990), a labor mediator and arbitrator with ...
, Wolfe is also responsible for the use of the
present tense
The present tense (abbreviated or ) is a grammatical tense whose principal function is to locate a situation or event in the present time. The present tense is used for actions which are happening now. In order to explain and understand present ...
in magazine profile pieces; before he began doing so in the early 1960s, profile articles had always been written in the
past tense
The past tense is a grammatical tense whose function is to place an action or situation in the past. Examples of verbs in the past tense include the English verbs ''sang'', ''went'' and ''washed''. Most languages have a past tense, with some hav ...
.
List of awards and nominations
Television and film appearances
*Wolfe's legs appeared in
John Lennon
John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer, songwriter, musician and peace activist who achieved worldwide fame as founder, co-songwriter, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of ...
and
Yoko Ono
Yoko Ono ( ; ja, 小野 洋子, Ono Yōko, usually spelled in katakana ; born February 18, 1933) is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, and peace activist. Her work also encompasses performance art and filmmaking.
Ono grew up i ...
's 1971 film ''
Up Your Legs Forever
''Up Your Legs Forever'' is a 1971 film by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. The film was made on 14 December 1970 on West 61st Street in Manhattan, New York City, though the couple did not have permits to work in the United States at that time.
The fi ...
''
* Wolfe was featured as an interview subject in the 1987
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...
documentary series ''Space Flight''.
* In July 1975, Wolfe was interviewed on ''
Firing Line'' by
William F. Buckley Jr.
William Frank Buckley Jr. (born William Francis Buckley; November 24, 1925 – February 27, 2008) was an American public intellectual, conservative author and political commentator. In 1955, he founded ''National Review'', the magazine that stim ...
, discussing ''
The Painted Word
''The Painted Word'' is a 1975 book of art criticism by Tom Wolfe.
Background
By the 1970s Wolfe was, according to Douglas Davis of ''Newsweek'' magazine "more of a celebrity than the celebrities he describes." In . The success of Wolfe's pre ...
''.
* Wolfe was featured on the February 2006 episode "The White Stuff" of
Speed Channel
Speed was an American sports-oriented cable and satellite television network that was owned by the Fox Sports Media Group division of 21st Century Fox. The network was dedicated to motorsports programming, including auto racing, as well as aut ...
's ''
Unique Whips ''Unique Whips'' is an American reality television show that aired on the now-defunct Speed network from 2005 to 2008. It premiered on February 8, 2005, The show follows the work of Unique Autosports, based in Long Island, New York, as they customi ...
'', where his
Cadillac
The Cadillac Motor Car Division () is a division of the American automobile manufacturer General Motors (GM) that designs and builds luxury vehicles. Its major markets are the United States, Canada, and China. Cadillac models are distributed i ...
's interior was customized to match his trademark white suit.
* Wolfe guest-starred alongside
Jonathan Franzen
Jonathan Earl Franzen (born August 17, 1959) is an American novelist and essayist. His 2001 novel ''The Corrections'', a sprawling, satirical family drama, drew widespread critical acclaim, earned Franzen a National Book Award, was a Pulitzer Pr ...
,
Gore Vidal
Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and ...
and
Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon ( ;
born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, gr ...
in ''
The Simpsons
''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, ...
'' episode "
", which aired November 19, 2006. He was originally slated to be killed by a giant boulder, but that ending was edited out. Wolfe was also used as a sight gag on ''The Simpsons'' episode "
Insane Clown Poppy
"Insane Clown Poppy" is the third episode of the twelfth season of the American television series ''The Simpsons''. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 12, 2000. In the episode, during an outdoor book fair, Kru ...
", which aired on November 12, 2000. Homer spills chocolate on Wolfe's trademark white suit, and Wolfe rips it off in one swift motion, revealing an identical suit underneath. The episode "
Flanders' Ladder
"Flanders' Ladder" is the twenty-first and final episode of the twenty-ninth season of the American animated television series ''The Simpsons'', and the 639th episode of the series overall. It aired in the United States on Fox on May 20, 2018.
Th ...
" was dedicated to the memory of Wolfe as seen at the end of the episode's credits.
Bibliography
Non-fiction
* ''
The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby
''The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby'' is the title of Tom Wolfe's first collected book of essays, published in 1965. The book is named for one of the stories in the collection that was originally published in ''Esquire magazine'' i ...
'' (1963)
* ''
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
''The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test'' is a 1968 nonfiction book by Tom Wolfe. The book is a popular example of the New Journalism literary style. Wolfe presents a firsthand account of the experiences of Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters, ...
'' (1968)
* ''
The Pump House Gang
''The Pump House Gang'' is a 1968 collection of essays and journalism by Tom Wolfe. The stories in the book explored various aspects of the counterculture of the 1960s. The most famous story in the collection, from which the book takes its nam ...
'' (1968)
* ''
Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers'' (1970)
* ''
The New Journalism'' (1973) (Ed. with EW Johnson)
* ''
The Painted Word
''The Painted Word'' is a 1975 book of art criticism by Tom Wolfe.
Background
By the 1970s Wolfe was, according to Douglas Davis of ''Newsweek'' magazine "more of a celebrity than the celebrities he describes." In . The success of Wolfe's pre ...
'' (1975)
* ''
Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine
''Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine'' is a 1976 book by Tom Wolfe, consisting of eleven essays and one short story that Wolfe wrote between 1967 and 1976. It includes the essay in which he coined the term "the 'Me' Decade" to refer to the 1970s ...
'' (1976)
* ''
The Right Stuff'' (1979)
* ''In Our Time'' (1980)
:: a collection of essays and drawings, of the 1970s
* ''
From Bauhaus to Our House'' (1981)
* ''
The Purple Decades'' (1982)
* ''
Hooking Up
''Hooking Up'' is a collection of essays and a novella by American author Tom Wolfe, a number of which were earlier published in popular magazines.
The essays cover diverse topics dating from as early as 1965, including both non-fiction and ficti ...
'' (2000)
* ''
The Kingdom of Speech'' (2016)
Novels
* ''
The Bonfire of the Vanities
''The Bonfire of the Vanities'' is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City, and centers on three main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, Jewish as ...
'' (1987)
* ''
Ambush at Fort Bragg'' (1996/7) Novella
* ''
A Man in Full
''A Man in Full'' is the second novel by Tom Wolfe, published on November 12, 1998, by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. It is set primarily in Atlanta, with a significant portion of the story also transpiring in the East Bay region of the San Francisco B ...
'' (1998)
* ''
I Am Charlotte Simmons
''I Am Charlotte Simmons'' is a 2004 novel by Tom Wolfe, concerning sexual and status relationships at the fictional Dupont University. Wolfe researched the novel by talking to students at North Carolina, Florida, Penn, Duke, Stanford, and Mic ...
'' (2004)
* ''
Back to Blood'' (2012)
Featured in
* ''
The Sixties
File:1960s montage.png, Clockwise from top left: U.S. soldiers during the Vietnam War; the Beatles led the British Invasion of the U.S. music market; a half-a-million people participate in the Woodstock, 1969 Woodstock Festival; Neil Armstrong ...
'', episode 7 (2014)
* ''
Smiling Through the Apocalypse'' (2013)
* ''
Salinger'' (2013)
* ''
Felix Dennis: Millionaire Poet'' (2012)
* ''
Tom Wolfe Gets Back to Blood'' (2012)
* ''
A Light in the Dark: The Art & Life of Frank Mason'' (2011)
* ''
Bill Cunningham New York
''Bill Cunningham New York'' is a 2010 American documentary film directed by Richard Press and produced by Philip Gefter. ''Bill Cunningham New York'' is distributed by Zeitgeist Films and was released in theaters on March 16, 2011.
Synopsis
"We ...
'' (2010)
* ''
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson'' (2008)
* ''
Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride: Hunter S. Thompson on Film'' (2006)
* ''
Annie Leibovitz: Life Through a Lens'' (2006)
* ''
Breakfast with Hunter'' (2003)
* ''
The Last Editor'' (2002)
* ''
Dick Schaap: Flashing Before my Eyes'' (2001)
* ''
Where It's At: The Rolling Stone State of the Union'' (1998)
* ''
Peter York's Eighties: Post'' (1996)
* ''
Bauhaus in America'' (1995)
* ''
Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media'' (1992)
* ''
Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol'' (1990)
* ''
Spaceflight
Spaceflight (or space flight) is an application of astronautics to fly spacecraft into or through outer space, either with or without humans on board. Most spaceflight is uncrewed and conducted mainly with spacecraft such as satellites in or ...
'' (1985)
* ''
Up Your Legs Forever
''Up Your Legs Forever'' is a 1971 film by John Lennon and Yoko Ono. The film was made on 14 December 1970 on West 61st Street in Manhattan, New York City, though the couple did not have permits to work in the United States at that time.
The fi ...
'' (1971)
Notable articles
* "The Last American Hero Is Junior Johnson. Yes!" ''
Esquire
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...
'', March 1965.
* "Tiny Mummies! The True Story of the Ruler of 43rd Street's Land of the Walking Dead!" ''New York Herald-Tribune'' supplement (April 11, 1965).
* "Lost in the Whichy Thicket," ''New York Herald-Tribune'' supplement (April 18, 1965).
* "The Birth of the New Journalism: Eyewitness Report by Tom Wolfe." ''
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
'', February 14, 1972.
* "The New Journalism: A la Recherche des Whichy Thickets." ''
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
'', February 21, 1972.
* "Why They Aren't Writing the Great American Novel Anymore." ''
Esquire
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...
'', December 1972.
* "
The Me Decade and the Third Great Awakening" ''
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
'', August 23, 1976.
* "
Stalking the Billion-Footed Beast", ''
Harper's''. November 1989.
"Sorry, but Your Soul Just Died."''
Forbes
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...
'' 1996.
* "Pell Mell." ''
The Atlantic Monthly
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
'' (November 2007).
* "The Rich Have Feelings, Too." ''
Vanity Fair'' (September 2009).
Writing about Tom Wolfe
* "How Tom Wolfe became ... Tom Wolfe" by
Michael Lewis
Michael Monroe Lewis (born October 15, 1960) Gale Biography In Context. is an American author and financial journalist. He has also been a contributing editor to '' Vanity Fair'' since 2009, writing mostly on business, finance, and economics. H ...
in ''
Vanity Fair'' (November 2015).
* Tom Wolfe's America: Heroes, Pranksters, and Fools by Kevin T. McEneaney. Praeger, 2010.
See also
*
Creative nonfiction
Creative nonfiction (also known as literary nonfiction or narrative nonfiction or literary journalism or verfabula) is a genre of writing that uses literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives. Creative nonfiction contra ...
*
Hysterical realism
Hysterical realism is a term coined in 2000 by English critic James Wood (critic), James Wood to describe what he sees as a literary genre typified by a strong contrast between elaborately absurd prose, plotting, or characterization, on the one han ...
* Wolfe's concept of
fiction-absolute
Notes
References
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Official websiteTom Wolfe papers, 1930-2013 held by the Manuscripts and Archives Division,
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress ...
.
Tom Wolfe Biography and Interviewwith
American Academy of Achievement
The American Academy of Achievement, colloquially known as the Academy of Achievement, is a non-profit educational organization that recognizes some of the highest achieving individuals in diverse fields and gives them the opportunity to meet o ...
*
Article about Wolfe's recent public appearance at the Chicago Public Library from fNews (a publication of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago)* "The Word According to Tom Wolfe"
Episode 1Episode 2Episode 3Episode 4 an
Episode 5from
National Review
''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief i ...
''The Future of the American Idea: Pell-Mell'' in ''The Atlantic Monthly'' (November 2007)June 2006 interview from ''frieze''by
TheGuardian.com
TheGuardian.com, formerly known as Guardian.co.uk and ''Guardian Unlimited'', is a British news and media website owned by the Guardian Media Group. It contains nearly all of the content of the newspapers ''The Guardian'' and ''The Observer'', ...
National Review 100 Best Non Fiction Books 20th century
''Sorry, but Your Soul Just Died''*
Tom Wolfe's Steamy Portrait of College Life— an interview about "I Am Charlotte Simmons" in BookPage (December 2004)
*
*
''In Depth'' interview with Wolfe, December 5, 2004"Should Tom Wolfe Still Hate ''The New Yorker?''" in ''Construction Magazine'' (January 9, 2012).
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