What I Say
My brother, Philippe Tapon, wrote his first novel
and Dutton (a division of Penguin)
published it! The title is A
Parisian
From Kansas.
Instead of reviewing it in a traditional way, I will give you my unique perspective into my brother's novel and
tell you stories you wouldn't otherwise hear about the making of the
novel.
Background
My brother sent three chapters of the book to a
famous semi-retired editor, William Abrahams. After reading the 3
chapters, Mr. Abrahams asked for the rest of the book. Although he had
vowed to never edit someone's first attempt at a book (and kept that vow
for over 40 years), he decided to break it for Philippe's novel.
Moreover, he decided to come out of his semi-retired state to edit it.
Obviously, this book must have been extremely compelling to make such a
famous editor take such a significant action.
Mr. Abrahams did it, "Because I've never read anything like this." In
fact, that's what most people say after reading it, and I can almost
guarantee that you will too. I cannot promise that you'll love it
(though nearly everyone has), but I can promise you that you'll agree
that it is extremely original and thought provoking.
Secrets from the Author
Allusions to great works
Throughout the work the author makes allusions to great works such as
T.S. Eliot's Waste Land, Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby, and
Irving's The World According To Garp. It is a self-referential
novel so it makes reading it exciting. Even though the work is
considered fiction, about 80% of the novel events actually occurred; so
one can certainly say that it is based on a true story.
Look for "Ghosts" in the novel
I'll share with you a secret you would probably never pick up unless
you knew the author. If you pay close attention you will notice that in
a few places Philippe mentions some fairly non-descript characters in
the novel.
For example, near the end of Chapter 2 Philippe and Darren say
goodbye to the tarot card reader. Then he writes:
There was a tall English-looking gentleman wearing pin-stripes
and glasses behind the door, resting on a furled umbrella, waiting.
"Bonjour, madame," he said, with an
execrable accent.
She acknowledged him with a smile.
Darren said good-bye; so did I. She stepped back; the gentleman
looked at me with a backward half-look, and then she closed the door on
them both.
After reading the above passage most readers, will either think,
"Huh?" or just ignore it and move on. After all, it's strange that
Philippe takes time to describe this seemingly unimportant gentleman
"character" in the novel.
Here's the secret: The preceeding passage describes the tarot
card reader drawing all sorts of cards and predicting the future. If
you're familiar with T.S. Eliot's
Waste
Land, you'll see the allusion to the third stanza of the epic
poem:
Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
Had a bad cold, nevertheless
Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
With a wicked pack of cards....
Thank you....
So who is that English-looking gentleman? T.S. Eliot himself! Indeed,
Philippe sneaks Eliot into the novel in deference to Elliot's great work
which Philippe alludes to. The idea is that T.S. Eliot is a "ghost" in
the novel who is overlooking the allusion Philippe makes to the Waste
Land.
There are a few other "ghosts" in the novel if you keep your eye out
for them. The idea of putting "ghosts" in the novel comes from Alfred
Hitchcock's movies, where, if your eye wanders to the "wrong part of the
screen" you might catch a glimpse of Hitchcock himself.
In short, what makes the book so fascinating is that it is simple
enough to be read casually and enjoy on a superficial level, and yet it
is complex enough to be analyzed in a graduate school level English
literature class.
Architecture of Novel
The novel has a distinct "architecture" that borrows from the
immortal
Odyssey of Homer. For example, in Homer's masterpiece, Ulysses
describes his voyage to "hell" in Book 9. By Book 11 he recounts the
deepest depths of the underworld. By Book 13, Ulysses snaps out of his
flashback.
Similarly, Philippe writes what he calls the Fragment Chapters
(numbers 9-12) in his novel. Starting in Chapter 9 the writing style
changes dramatically, as Darren, the protagonist, begins to
narrate. Philippe transcribes the thoughts that Darren has recorded on a
tape. Chapters 9 through 12 delve into Darren's life from his
perspective. Because of the different style, these chapters truly feel
like a "departure" from the book.
And just as Ulysses graphically describes the horrors of Hades and
the underworld in Book 11 of the
Odyssey,
Darren graphically depicts the homosexual acts he committed during his
brash youth in the gay underworld in Chapter 11. The revolting
description reaches a crescendo by the end of Chapter 11 and one breaths
a sigh of relief as the author eventually reverts to the novel's
original style and story.
If you are sensitive to such writings, I suggest you skip the Fragment
Chapters (9-12), especially Chapter 11. However, although the
descriptions are graphic, they are not gratuitous - they stem from the
deep architectural design of the novel.
Another interesting detail to look for is to notice how the novel
turns on itself in Chapter 13. It's as if the novel ends in that chapter
and begins anew. If you look closely you will see parallel between
Chapter 13 and Chapter 1. And it continues: Chapter 14 parallels Chapter
2, Chapter 15 follows 3, and so on (although the parallelism soon drops
off).
I caught this parallel structure on my own (somewhat by accident),
and I asked my brother if he had done it on purpose. He had. He was
happy that I caught it.
Little Nuggets
Sometimes the author will just throw in a micro-allusions that, if
you're in the know or you're paying attention, you'll appreciate and
smile.
For example, if you piece together the "ending" of James Joyce's
Finnegans Wake wth its "beginning," you would get:
A long a last a loved along the
riverrun past Eve and Adam from swerve of shore to bend of bay...
So what, you say? Well, if you're aware of the above you'll smile
when you casually read this passage on page 11 of A
Parisian
From Kansas:
The next night, the three of us took a corner table at Finnegans
Wake, a pub not far from where the river ran, and....
Get it? "Finnegans Wake" and "river ran." Subtle. I call it a
micro-allusion. The novel is littered with such micro-allusions. It's no
big deal if you miss them, but when you catch them you may smile.
Here's one more on page 3:
[Jean-Baptiste had] found a wicker bookcase and had laden with
all his unread books; among them I spotted Sur la route
and Le Soleil se leve aussi.
If you know French (or ask someone who does) you would know that
those two books are (translated) On the Road (Jack Kerouac) and
The Sun Also Rises (Ernest Hemingway). Again, it's just a
micro-allusion to credit the works that inspired Philippe to write.
Conclusion
Don't worry that this novel is a bunch of intellectual mumbo-jumbo.
While the novel is intense, it is not heavy. The writing style flows
smoothly and is frequently light and colloquial.
In short, A
Parisian From
Kansas
is truly an amazing work. To think that the author wrote it in just 9
months while working in Paris part-time is flabbergasting.
Buy it for cheap on Amazon!
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What Reviewers Say
"...Tapon is a
real writer of great talent..."
- Clarence Brown in The
American Reporter Review of A
Parisian
From Kansas
"But it not just
an AIDS novel. A Parisian From
Kansas
positively teems with literary references questioning, exploring,
confronting, philosophical, literary, and metaphysical ideas, with
humor, intelligence and grace. That's what I think about Tapon's
remarkably original debut novel.... Tapon's audacious and wholly
successful book.... The year is early (this is April 6, as I write),
but I'll venture to say this will be original, sad, surreal - it's and smart." -
Richard Labonte Reviewer for A Different Light Bookstore
Publishers
Weekly has selected Philippe Tapon as one of 15 most noteworthy
first-time novelists in the United States, describing it as
"an adventurous investigation of the creative process, a
multilayered exploration of gay identity and an unnerving analysis of
society's response to the AIDS crisis."
"A clever and
almost consistently amusing debut, part Nabokov and part John Irving..."
-
Kirkus
"...Tapon's
prose is almost faultlessly clear and witty, with plenty of sharp
dialogue, loving, acute descriptions of Paris, and an unflagging sense
of movement. It's not surprising to find the text littered with
references to F. Scott Fitzgerald and John Irving, two of the better
melodists in American writing." -
Review by Paul Reidinger,
an author
"[A
Parisian
From Kansas
is] screamingly funny at times and at others just screaming." -
American Reporter
"Despite
the ease with which the term tour de force can be tossed around,
in tossing it in the direction of this remarkable first novel, it
sticks!!.... Alternately funny, flip, and deadly serious, this novel
boasts fully human, foible-laden characters,
and it is brilliant with technical virtuosity." - Brad Hooper, Reviewer
for the Booklist
"Not for the
first time, I felt that the novel had pulled me into her orbit." -
American Reporter Review
The Booklist and
Kirkus, two other respected reviewers, gave the novel a prestigious star
(reserved for the best books). Furthermore, the novel is in the list of
Fiction Stars of 1997.
"Unconventional,
uncompromising, and unblinkingly truthful, A
Parisian
from Kansas
is an emotion-packed exploration of the limits of compassion and the
ills of a generation. A first-rate, page-turning narrative, a
dramatization of the creative process and the inherent challenges of
novel writing, this story is provocative in the very best way." -
Penguin
"This is one of
the most original works of gay fiction in years." - Amazon.com
Baker & Taylor put the novel in
its Upcoming Books to Buy list. Moreover, Amazon.com put it on its
Recommended list.
"Tapon is a
writer whose verbal gift doesn't desert him even when he is lost." -
The Guardian
"Tapon is
relentlessly literary..."
says Clarence Brown, a book reviewer.
The author's editor, William
Abrahams (who recently died), told Philippe after reading the book:
"Philippe, you are a better writer than John Irving, and you have
nothing to envy from Fitzgerald." Heavy compliments indeed coming from
such a renowned editor was 77 years old when he said this.
"An assured and
entertaining debut that will make readers curious to see what its
talented author will turn his hand to next." - Kirkus
Official
synopsis
Remarkably
assured, accomplished, and spellbinding, this engaging
story-within-a-story tells of the friendship between two Americans in
Paris: the disaffected, world-weary HIV-positive Darren; and Philippe,
the sensitive, poetic young man who agrees to write Darren's novel.
From the
book jacket
In a debut by one of the
most original writers in recent fiction, Philippe Tapon creates a
provocative Mobius strip novel. A
Parisian
from Kansas
is a quixotic, erotic, and thoroughly spellbinding work about expatriate
life in Paris, about a writer creating a novel, and about a raw-boned,
HIV-positive American named Darren Swenson who wants to be made immortal
in the book he asks Philippe Tapon to write.
Shockingly graphic, yet delicately
structured, A
Parisian from
Kansas
folds back in upon itself as Darren visits his farmer parents in
Kansas,
meets lovers, and dies several times as the action accelerates toward a
tragic but life-affirming finale. With Paris as a backdrop and an
all-pervasive presence, Philippe Tapon, both character and author,
writes about heiresses, intellectuals, the devil himself, and
jeunesse doree, as he follows the witty, iconoclastic Darren's last
days of life. A Boswell to this Johnson from
Kansas, he
is scribbling madly all the while. The result is alternatively
phantasmagoric, hallucinatory, and journalistic--an eyewitness account
of a man's dying and a novel's being born.
Autobiography as fiction...an homage to
The World According to Garp and The Waste Land recast in
the shadow of AIDS...a story within a story--Philippe Tapon's work is
all this and more. What it is above all is emotionally powerful
literature by a distinctly American voice.
Philippe Tapon is a 30-something native Californian
who has lived in Paris, Madrid, and London.
Excerpt
"That was the night I had really
started imaging Darren: not only imagining his nice shoes and wry smile
and cafe-chic clothing, but imagining also just how his lifelong
collections of photographs, journals, tape recordings, cafe-chic
clothing and his vast accumulations of stories could have all been yoked
to his immense ambition--to turn the raw material of his life into a
novel.
"We had sensed that ambition in each
other, and that ambition lashed us together. He had the material, I had
the style--and together, we had a novel."
The Mistress
Philippe's second and final novel is
The Mistress.
It follows a family of losers and difficult characters through WWII.
It's loosely based on our real French family.
Personally, I liked A Parisan more than
The Mistress. But if A
Parisian
sounds too crazy for you, you may prefer The Mistress
because it is more conventional.
The New York Times gave it a great review.
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