O'Hara Biographer on Video

Wolff Interviewed on O'Hara Biography Interview, about 28 minutes long, was broadcast 7 February 2008 on UC Televison, Los Angeles, with Connie Martinson on 'Connie Martinson Talks Books.' YouTube is an excellent source for O'Haraiana. I was hoping for full-length videos of the Hollywood pictures. No such luck. However, clips from BUtterfield 8, From the Terrace, and others are available. --Richard Carreño
henrychannoiv has shared a video with you on YouTube! Connie Martinson: Geoffrey Wolff Geoffrey Wolff, from UC Irvine, discusses his book "The Art of Burning Bridges: A Life of John O'Hara." Series: "Connie Martinson Talks Books" [8/2004] [Humanities] [Show ID: 8786]
© 2008 YouTube, Inc.

Web Site Launched

New O'Hara Fan Site
Erica Ramus, in Pottsville, has launched a new O'Hara website. It's called John O'Hara Fans. The site is still under construction. But check out the O'Hara-oriented links! Good stuff. Erica's site, incidentally, is not associated the John O'Hara Society.

O'Hara Night in Pottsville Scheduled

Theatre Shows Set for July 17, 18

The Actors Guild of Schuylkill County will present dramatic presentations of four short works by John O'Hara in a theatre-dinner production Thursday, July 17, and Friday, July 18, at Sweet Arrow Lake Park, Pine Grove (Pottsville).

Doors open at 6 p.m., with performances set to begin at 6:30 p.m. Per person admission is $35, with cheques payable to SALCA, sent to Mike Stefanick, 86 Shoreline Drive, Pine Grove, Pennsylvania 17963. For futher details contact Mike at 570.345.4963, or via mikastefanick@comcast.net.

The O'Hara Society is not sponsoring the event. But, clearly, we are supportive. Richard and others plan to be there Friday night. Contact Richard re details for hotel/motel accomodations. Hope to see you there!

'Gibbsville Summers in Richterville' will present The Hardware Man, Afternoon Waltz, The House on the Corner, and The Victim.

Fitzgerald's Digs

New Pix From Our Hollywood-based Correspondent: These show the penthouse, where Fitzgerald lived and sat many many evenings with Sheila Graham. He did not die here, but one block east on Hayworth, in her apartment, which is coincidentally owned by the same people who own 1403 N.Laurel.

Bruccoli Condolences

Contact Details For those you need addresses where to convey thoughts, memories, and condolences, I have two: Department of English, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208 Bruccoli Clark, Inc., 2006 Sumter Street, Columbia, SC 29201 :: 803:771:4642 If anyone has a home address, please post. Richard

Question of the Day

'Best' Cities?

Montreal:--
Got a call today from a 'researcher' at the National Geographic, trying to confirm O'Hara quote that 'the best cities to write about are New York, New Orleans, and San Francisco.' I told the researcher that I hadn't heard/read that statement, and that I couldn't remember any O'Hara works taking place in NO or SF. I guess that was good enough. The phone went dead.

Of course, I could be wrong. (There are so many better O'Hara boffins amongst membership than me!) So, there it is. If I'm wrong, quote chapter and vice.

Richard

Matt Bruccoli: RIP

From Robert Saliba, Morristown, New Jersey: I was looking forward to some day meeting Dr. Matthhew Bruccoli. A year or two ago I e-mailed him and tell him how much I appreciated his contribution. He wrote what I consider to be an authoritative biography of John O'Hara. Permit me to quote the last paragraph of the book: "For forty years he wrote truthfully and exactly about life and people, scorning fashion, to produce a body of work unsurpassed in American literature in scope and fidelity to American life. He was one of our best novelists, our best novella-ist, and our greatest writer of short stories." Dr. Bruccoli also assembled novellas and short stories of John O'Hara into a book called Gibbsville, PA. I enjoy reading these the best (as well as the novels) because they are about his "anthracite country," and I think the writing really excels because that is where O'Hara's heart was. I'm looking forward to visiting Pottsville this summer and the dinner theatre performance in July.

Matt Bruccoli: O'Hara Scholar Dies

Matthew J. Bruccoli, 76, O'Hara's Biographer By William Grimes Published: June 6, 2008 Matthew J. Bruccoli, whose biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald and outpouring of scholarly essays and critical editions made him the dean of Fitzgerald studies in the United States, died at his home in Columbia, S.C., on Wednesday. He was 76. The cause was a glioma, a tumor of the brainstem, said his wife, Arlyn. Mr. Bruccoli (pronounced BROOK-uhly), who taught at the University of South Carolina for nearly 40 years, wrote more than 50 books on Fitzgerald or Hemingway, notably "Some Sort of Epic Grandeur: The Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald," published in 1981. He and his wife donated 3,000 books and periodical publications by and about Fitzgerald to the university. Matthew Joseph Bruccoli was born in the Bronx, where his father ran a drugstore and where he attended the Bronx High School of Science. He earned his bachelor's degree at Yale University in 1953 and briefly attended graduate school at Cornell University before transferring to the University of Virginia, where he received a master's degree and a doctorate. "It took me seven years because I kept taking time off to write books," he told The New York Post in 1978. After teaching at Ohio State University for eight years, he joined the English department at the University of South Carolina in 1969. He retired in 2005 as the Emily Brown Jefferies Distinguished Professor of English but continued to cut a dash on campus, instantly recognizable by his vintage red Mercedes convertible, Brooks Brothers suits, Groucho mustache and bristling crew cut that dated to his Yale days. His untamed Bronx accent also set him apart. In the publish-or-perish world of academia, Mr. Bruccoli set a daunting example. In addition to his voluminous work on Fitzgerald and Hemingway, he wrote biographies of John O'Hara, James Gould Cozzens and Ross Macdonald, compiled descriptive bibliographies of several authors and edited the letters and notebooks of many others, including Vladimir Nabokov, whose literature courses he took at Cornell. "He endeared himself to Nabokov by saying that his reason for taking the course was, 'I like stories,' " his wife said. "Nabokov thought that was the perfect answer." With Dmitri Nabokov, the novelist's son, Mr. Bruccoli edited "Vladimir Nabokov: Selected Letters, 1940-1977," published in 1989. In his spare time he helped run Bruccoli Clark Layman, a company that produced reference works of literary and social history, notably the Dictionary of Literary Biography. He also edited the Fitzgerald Newsletter from 1958 to 1968 and the Fitzgerald/Hemingway Annual from 1969 to 1979. In addition to his wife, he is survived by a son, Joseph, of Columbia, and three daughters: Mary, of Manhattan; Josephine Owens, of San Francisco; and Arlyn, of Corinth, Vt., as well as seven grandchildren.

New PAL

O'Hara Rightfully Listed From James MacDonald I wrote the O'Hara entry for PAL, and Paul Reuben has placed O'Hara in 'Early Twentieth Century' lit. So so it makes more sense. I'm not sure how prestigious PAL is. But any inclusion of O'Hara is to be welcomed.