J R

It bears mentioning, perhaps, now that the introducer is nearing the end of his allotted space, that he did also dine with Gaddis once, though the author was already somewhat slowed by illnesses that eventually shortened his term. Having a reverential attitude about the books in question, J R above all others, the introducer was awed to the point of not necessarily having enough to say to Gaddis. The dinner took place on Long Island, as it ought to have done, a place I do not often visit. The dinner was negotiated by an intermediary, a splendidly generous and mildly acerbic woman from Manhattan who seemed to know a lot about literature (also about money and society), and who referred to the author of J R as “Gaddis” both in the abstract and, as I recall it, to his face. She was chopping vegetables for some kind of pasta something-or-other (reconstructing!), throwing it together at the last minute though this in no way made the dinner less excellent, and it was early summer, and Gaddis’s common-law step-daughter was visiting the next day, and I knew her, so I was going to make a twenty-four hours of it, often in Gaddis’s company, and this included, I don’t remember why, seeing a portrait of Gaddis by a certain painter-turned-film-director, and sitting in the parlor of Gaddis’s modest little house, the house to which he had retired in his last years, the upper floor of which, if I remember correctly, he had never seen, despite living in it, and all of this was of great interest, though the introducer did not himself much register on Gaddis’s screen except as someone who, like him, also favored the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard. Still, the hostess determined, that first night, that the important thing was for Gaddis and this introducer to spend a few minutes together in close conversation, so a screened-in porch was proffered, and there Gaddis and I sat for a while, and Gaddis seemed both brilliant and lugubrious, slightly world-weary, disinclined to allow a younger man to observe him in anything less than tip-top condition, and, at the same time, much possessed of layers not entirely visible. This introducer does not think that Gaddis appreciated having acolytes or perhaps utterly distrusted such things, and the introducer would have foresworn the word had he been able to think of a way to do so without invoking it. The whole night seemed, as it ought to have seemed, stripped from the milieu of Gaddis, the pages of Carpenter’s Gothic, let’s say, or A Frolic of His Own, or from the pages of J R, where the action is all built upon the contradictions of Long Island, the rural idyll of the place, the stark vulgarity of its moneyed precincts, the nightmarish suburban encampments creeping across. I felt lucky to be at the dinner, and I remember it as one of the high points of my life, though I have not often had occasion to say so, but, still, that should not distract from the business of introducing, and so let it be said that this material, this dinner, and the slightly personal tone of this introduction, these are to make clear additionally that the big wondrous dream of J R, the unparalleled commedia of the whole, seems to this writer to emerge reliably from the life and experience of author William Gaddis, as fictive material almost always does, even in its most fanciful or imaginative or pyrotechnical circumstances. Gaddis, the man, seemed to know a great deal about a great many things. And this is a book that demonstrates how knowing a great deal about a great many things — about music, and finance, and Long Island, and American history — is one way to make an American novel comprehensive, vital, timeless, great. Gaddis would never be quite this unrestrained again, and while he would use dialogue in similar ways in Carpenter’s Gothic, he would never capture quite voices quite so numberless, nor would he shoehorn in so many economic and cultural landscapes at once. Perhaps because the environment was different in 1975. Maybe there were fences to be swung at then. Maybe readers could better tolerate an experiment. But who cares why, finally? These historical issues are for critics. The book itself is meanwhile here before you, and it is not difficult. It is like no other novel, a singularity, a hands-down astonishment, an inferno, a Big Bang, a masterpiece, etc. So be glad you have made this purchase, be glad you have spent a little of your hard-earned money—

Rick Moody, August 2011

J R

— Money…? in a voice that rustled.

— Paper, yes.

— And we’d never seen it. Paper money.

— We never saw paper money till we came east.

— It looked so strange the first time we saw it. Lifeless.

— You couldn’t believe it was worth a thing.

— Not after Father jingling his change.

— Those were silver dollars.

— And silver halves, yes and quarters, Julia. The ones from his pupils. I can hear him now…