Celebrity Prof: Wolfe Goes Back to College
by Calvin Reid, PW NewsLine -- Publishers Weekly, 2/18/2005
On Tuesday about 25 undergraduate writing students at New York's Fordham University, who just happened to be studying Tom Wolfe's I Am Charlotte Simmons, received a bit of a shock. After a rather theatrical knock-knock on the classroom door, Wolfe himself, trim and overdressed in his typical fashion, walked into the classroom of (mostly) surprised students.
Of course, the students just happened to be studying Wolfe's novel because of the efforts of his publisher, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, and the music channel MTV. Wolfe was the featured celebrity for a taping of Stand In, a program on MTV-U, the music channel's college network, that sets up celebrity artists as surprise professors-for-a-day.
Students--guys with baseball caps reversed; girls chatting and comparing cell phones--straggled into a sunlit classroom for an afternoon writing class. The teaching fellow, Kathy Knapp, called on a student in a New England Patriots cap who has a problem with Charlotte Simmons's personality. "She thinks she's better," he began. A blonde in a sweatshirt agreed with him" "She's just got no respect for anyone." Then came a knock on the classroom door--and in walked a grinning Tom Wolfe.
One student turned to give his buddy an "I told you I spotted him on campus" look, but most students seemed genuinely surprised, and a couple of oh-my-gods erupted around the room. Wolfe was gracious--"I'm impressed that you're reading my little effort," he said--and as humble and informal as one can be dressed like a Jazz Age dandy.
For the next hour or so, Wolfe talked about everything from his own books to the novels of Richard Price and Zola, and answered questions: What were the 1960s like? What about the white suits?
"What passes for genius is usually 65% content and the rest unique talent," Wolfe said, pressing his usual theme about the primacy of subject matter. "Every writer's got one great autobiography," he said, warning the students about "endlessly recannibalizing" their own experience, "but not necessarily two."
The students were quick to ask questions. How did a 70-year-old research a fraternity party? "You just have to seek people out. Reporting is not a skill, it's an attitude," he said, adding, "and I didn't wear the white suit--blue blazer and tie."
Why does he wear the white suit in the first place? "It annoyed people no end."
FSG publicity director Jeff Seroy said an editor at the house had been approached by an MTV exec about Wolfe: "She told me, 'MTV thinks Tom is cool.' " He said the book has done well on campus bestseller lists and deflected references to reports that overall sales are much below the official tally of 1.5 million copies in print.
Wolfe couldn't have seemed happier, beaming as he signed books afterwards for all the students. "My biggest thrill as a writer," he said, "was watching anonymously as people bought my first books. But this is much better. Students reading your book and asking questions? It's great for the ego and for the heart."
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