The Journals of Spalding Gray
Written by Spalding Gray
Edited by Kathie Russo and Nell Casey
Formats: eBook, 320 pages ; Hardcover, 336 pages
Publisher: Knopf
On Sale: October 18, 2011 - or Pre Order
ISBN: 978-0-307-70052-0 (0-307-70052-6)
Note: Amazon seems to have the best price:
$19.11 vs. $28.95 elsewhere
and only $14.99 on Kindle - Kindle free software can be downloaded for your computer
so you do not need a Kindle (though they are very good to have).
Nell Casey discusses putting together The Journals of Spalding Gray on WNYC
Listen Here:
Short interview on Rosie.com with Nell Casey
by Shelton Hull - Review : Journals of Spalding Gray
Remembering Spalding Gray with Nell Casey and Bill Talen from the Peter Collins Show (podast)
If you can afford it, please pay and help him maintain his podcast.
However, for those that can not afford the cost, Mr. Collins has very graciously given this site permission to
directly link the interview. (Please note that this link is only for this site - further use will require permission from Mr. Collins)
Interview is with Nell Casey (Journals of Spalding Gray) and Bill Talen, aka Reverend Billie (a monologist kinda).
Thank you to Mr. Collins for allowing this site to use his podcast.
For more about Rev Billie, visit his website.
From the Huffington Post:
The Journals of Spalding Gray by Nell Casey on Oct. 17, 2011
Reviews:
New York Times Article, Oct. 9, 2011, with first published material from The Journals of Spalding Gray
A MUST READ!!!
Note: first opening of article seems fine, then second time appears to need sign in/join.
Joining is free and as long as no further emails/promotions are checked, it seems fine to join.
More NYTimes excerpts from the Journals - Oct. 26, 2011
EXCELLENT REVIEW - a MUST READ!!!
Shades of Gray by Daphne Merkin from BOOKFORUM magazine
From the Globe and Mail (one of Canada's National papers with an excellent reputation on reviews of books and movies) :
Turning a year older with the timeless Spalding Gray by LEAH McLAREN (a very perceptive, well written review)
Review by Shelton Hull - very perceptive, well written review by a fan
Chronicles of a life packaged, retold - a good, short review by Concord Monitor with great excerpts
The Kirkus Review - ' The World's Toughest Book Critics' (TM)
Short,perceptive review from stlmag.com
The Unrehearsed Life of Spalding Gray by Ron Hogan from USA Character Approved Blog
On Reading a Spouse’s Journals
Interview with Kathie Russo in NYT (New York edition) - Oct. 16, 2011
From Amazon.com:
Michael Cunningham
“The publication of The Journals of Spalding Gray is a significant event in American arts and letters. If Walt Whitman was our great chronicler of American life toward the end of the 19th century, Gray was his ironic, darkly funny counterpart. He did more than anyone else to record what it was like to be human—achingly human—in the urban America of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This is not only a great book, it’s an important book.”
Copyright by Michael Cunningham and/or Amazon.com
Kay Redfield Jamison
“The Journals of Spalding Gray tell an important story that is painful to read but hard to put down. They bring you into a mind that is original and uncensoring even as it careens off the rails into destruction. Gray’s complex moods, dark imagination and wit are often disturbing and deeply moving.”
Copyright by Michael Cunningham and/or Amazon.com
From Bookforum by Daphne Merkin:
"Private secrets within performed secrets, unspoken confessions behind the public ones: that is what emerges from the pages of Spalding Gray's journals, a document of wrenching and exhilarating honesty, shot through with self-hatred but also with unremitting humor and irony."
Copyright by Daphne Merkin, Bookforum (Sept./Oct./Nov. 2011)
My Review (jb, aka webmanager of this site) - my ongoing thoughts and emotional reactions:
Oct. 10, 2011 - Reading the short snippets again from the NYT, the picture of Spalding on the blog for this site (thank you Clay Walker for the photo use) that shows a very sad Spalding begins to seem more appropriate. It really always was, though I often wanted to have a picture beside it of Spalding smiling and laughing...
I've been anticipating the Dairies for a long time. Now I am beginning to realize the pain that will come with them.
And I am anticipating not only the written pain of a tortured soul, as the NYT uses. Also, the pain that myself and other fans will feel. The great sense of loss. As well as I think I may be reading articles saying 'I told you so. He wasn't always telling the truth. He made up stuff..' That will be difficult to hear as it ignores the clear facts that Spalding was an amazing story teller. And yes, the NYT came up with appropriate words: 'tortured soul'. As the Diaries/Journals seem to be so far just that, glimpses into his soul...and strangely I can hear Spalding using those exact words. That's why the NYT is the NYT... (that is until the unfairbook review of Oct. 18, 2011)...then subsequent reviews in the NYT were postive...
Dec. 1, 2011 - Now that I have read the Book, I realize that the reason that I have taken so long to write this review is that it is difficult. Why? I don't really know totally. My emotional reactions to the Journals are complex - perhaps it is the underlying sadness that persists with me. It is not really the fact that Spalding made some things up or at least modified them. People either suspected this or knew. It is not that Spalding drank alcohol in excess at times. It is not the sexual affairs that are referenced. Perhaps it is the profound sense of the emotional pain that Spalding expresses. Yes that is in the monologues. However, nowhere near the pain that comes out in the Journals.
When I was in NYC for the Memorial in 2004, I went to see the outside of his place on Wooster St.. A neighbour in the same building came out to tell me that the day Spalding disappeared, he had talked to Spalding right after Spalding had that same day seen a Doctor. He said 'Spalding told me that they are all pharmacologists - they don't deal with the pain...'
All I can say really is that this is an excellent book and a must read. And how do I get to the Archives at the University of Texas so that I can read all 5000 pages of the Journals...
jb
Appearances by Editor (of the Journals) Nell Casey, listed on her web site:
As of Oct. 18, 2011 from webpage list:
New York, Austin, Brooklyn, Sag Harbor.
