April 2011
The obsessively private author Thomas Pynchon and I have been friends for over 30 years. He is not only my friend, but owns a very important collection of Indian blankets I’ve helped him acquire over the years. I have been to his home numerous times and he’s often visited mine. He is a gregarious and charming man….the complete opposite of his public image. To the world at large he’s a ghost, a cypher, a shadowy phantom that might not even exist.
In all the years we’ve known each other and for at least the decade before he’s allowed no photographs to be published of him and likely never will. He has become perhaps more famous for this unyielding anonymity than for his brilliant sprawling novels. I can’t say a great deal about the gentleman here without compromising our friendship, but I can tell you that while publicly he may shun photographers, that is not always the case privately. I possess more than a few pictures of him shot during our many times together over the years. While on most occasions a glimpse of a camera sends him into a rage, on others he begrudgingly allows a quick photograph…sometimes even eking out an emotionally torn version of a smile.
We talk a couple times a week…offering up our opinions on topics important and absurd and such was the case this Wednesday evening. As always he asked how I was doing financially and I replied not so bad but would be doing a great deal better if he would ever allow me to sell a picture or two of him.
“What do you think a photo of me would fetch?,” he mused.
“Six figures certainly. Maybe 7.The sky’s the limit,” I answered.
“But how would they know it’s me?,” he asked. “It could be a picture of Joseph Blow. They’re not going to take your word for it and I never give interviews.”
“You could have your literary agent verify it’s you and I would be rich. It could be a picture from 1980. It doesn’t have to be anything recent.”
“But why would I let you sell my picture for a fortune when I could sell it myself?””Because if you wanted to do that you would have done it years ago.”
“Excellent point,” he laughed. “How much do you think you could get for a picture of one of my Indian blankets?”
“What? You have got to be kidding.”
“Not at all. Publish a picture of any one you want. See what happens. Maybe you’ll get rich, Barry. Maybe you won’t. Roll the dice. big boy. And just publish one side of the blanket…maybe somebody will pay dearly to see the other side. It could happen. People are strange…I know…I used to be one.
“So here’s a picture of one side of Thom Pynchon’s c. 1910 Racine blanket. If you want to see the other side it’ll cost you.
