Model Behavior: A Novel (Vintage Contemporaries) - Softcover

McInerney, Jay

 
9780679749530: Model Behavior: A Novel (Vintage Contemporaries)
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0679749535 ISBN 13: 9780679749530
Verlag: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2000

Inhaltsangabe

"A Great Gatsby for the end of the century." -- The Baltimore Sun

Jay McInerney's first novel, Bright Lights, Big City, helped bring about a revolution in contemporary fiction in trade paperback. But more importantly, its publication brought us a major writer of great literary talent and incisive perception.

In his latest novel, Model Behavior, McInerney offers us the portrait of a doubting devotee of the city where vocation, career, and ambition (which only occassionally coincide) run head-on with friendship and love--or merely desire. We see Conor McKnight's well-earned ennui fast becoming anxiety as he tries to protect himself from the harrowing fate that unfolds before his bleary eyes. McInerney is at the peak of his craft in what is sure to become a classic at the end of the century.

This edition contains only the novel Model Behavior, and not the additional seven stories which were published in the original hardcover.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Jay McInerney lives in New York and Williamson County, Tennessee.

Von der hinteren Coverseite

"A Great Gatsby for the end of the century." -- "The Baltimore Sun
Jay McInerney's first novel, Bright Lights, Big City, helped bring about a revolution in contemporary fiction in trade paperback. But more importantly, its publication brought us a major writer of great literary talent and incisive perception.
In his latest novel, Model Behavior, McInerney offers us the portrait of a doubting devotee of the city where vocation, career, and ambition (which only occassionally coincide) run head-on with friendship and love--or merely desire. We see Conor McKnight's well-earned ennui fast becoming anxiety as he tries to protect himself from the harrowing fate that unfolds before his bleary eyes. McInerney is at the peak of his craft in what is sure to become a classic at the end of the century.
This edition contains only the novel Model Behavior, and not the additional seven stories which were published in the original hardcover.

Aus dem Klappentext

"A Great Gatsby for the end of the century." -- The Baltimore Sun

Jay McInerney's first novel, Bright Lights, Big City, helped bring about a revolution in contemporary fiction in trade paperback. But more importantly, its publication brought us a major writer of great literary talent and incisive perception.

In his latest novel, Model Behavior, McInerney offers us the portrait of a doubting devotee of the city where vocation, career, and ambition (which only occassionally coincide) run head-on with friendship and love--or merely desire. We see Conor McKnight's well-earned ennui fast becoming anxiety as he tries to protect himself from the harrowing fate that unfolds before his bleary eyes. McInerney is at the peak of his craft in what is sure to become a classic at the end of the century.

This edition contains only the novel Model Behavior, and not the additional seven stories which were published in the original hardcover.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

MODEL COUPLE

When Philomena looks in the mirror she sees a creature fat and unattractive. This despite the fact that she is a woman whose photographic image is expensively employed to arouse desire in conjunction with certain consumer goods. Or rather, because of that fact. Toxic body consciousness being the black lung of her profession. Dressing for the party, she screams that she's bloated and has nothing to wear.
I'm clutching a preparty martini when she makes this declaration. "You look terrific," I say.
She seizes my glass and hurls it at the mirror, shattering both.
It's all right, really. I drink too much anyway.

THE PARTY

The name of the party is the Party You Have Been to Six Hundred Times Already. Everybody is here. "All your friends," Philomena states in what can only be described as a citric tone. It seems to me that they are her friends, that she is the reason we grace this fabulous gala, which takes place in the Waiting Room of Grand Central, presumably evicting dozens of homeless people for the night. We're supposedly on hand for the benefit of a disease, but we were comped, as was everyone else we know. "I'm sick of all this pointless glamour," my glamorous girlfriend says. "I want the simple life." This has become a theme. Weariness with metropolitan life in all its colonoscopic intricacy. I wonder if this ennui is somehow related to that other unstated domestic theme: sex, infrequency thereof.
We are accosted by Belinda, the popular transvestite, whom I am nearly certain is a friend of my girlfriend's, as opposed to one of my very own. I can't exactly remember if I know him from the gossip columns or if I know him personally, from events like these. Belinda is with an actual, ageless woman with striking dark eyebrows and buzzcut white hair, a woman who is always here at the party and whom I always sort of recognize. One of those women with three names: Hi Howareyou Goodtoseeyou. All the women lately have either three names or just one. Even the impersonators.
"Oh God, hide me," says the woman whose name I always forget, "there's Tommy Kroger, I had a bad date with him about five thousand years ago."
"Did you sleep with him?" Philomena asks, raising one of her perfectly defined eyebrows, which looks like a crow in flight in the far distance of a painting by van Gogh.
"God, who can remember?"
"If you can't, then you did," says Belinda. "That's the rule."
Ah, so that's the rule.
"Hello, darlings." Who could it be but Delia McFaggen, the famous designer, streaking toward Belinda, blowing kisses all over everyone. I retreat, slaloming through the thick crowd to find beverages, the first of many trips.

A FRIENDLY FACE

At the bar I encounter Jeremy Green, an unlikely and conspicuous figure at this venue, his golden locks falling superabundantly across the square shoulders of his rented tux--which juxtaposition suggests a flock of begowned angels camped atop the Seagram Building. He is an actual friend, my best friend, in fact, though he ignores my repeated greetings. Not until I pour vodka on his shirt does he deign to acknowledge my existence.
"Fuck off."
"Excuse me. Aren't you Jeremy Green, the famous short story writer?"
"That's an oxymoron. Same category as living poet, French rock star, German cuisine."
"How about Chekhov?"
"Dead." Jeremy pronounces this verdict with a poète maudit manner that seems tinged more than faintly with envy. He doesn't quite add Lucky bastard, but you can see that's what he's thinking.
"Carver?"
"Ditto. Plus, you think the guy who read his gas meter knew who Carver was? You think this bartender knows?"
The bartender, an aspiring model, says "Shortcuts" in midpour. "I saw the movie."
"I think," Jeremy says, "that proves my point. And don't even think about saying Hemingway."
"Wouldn't dream of it. Any particular reason you're ignoring me?"
"I just think I'll feel better about myself if I pretend I don't know anybody at this hideous ratfuck." Finally he turns his wrathful gaze upon me. "Besides, if memory serves, you're the slimy lowlife who talked me into attending this fetid fete."
"Your editor talked you into it," I remind him. "I merely encouraged you by way of saying that I, personally, would be happier and less chagrined if you were among the throng."
Why, I wonder, are all the boys and girls blaming me tonight? Jeremy has a book coming out, and his editor, Blaine Forrestal, thought it would be good for him to be seen. Blaine is part of this world. She wears terrific suits, has a Radcliffe degree and a house in Sag Harbor; Jeremy is the least commercial of the writers she publishes. In fact, one might surmise that she is publishing Jeremy as a kind of penance for the frothy, wildly successful stuff she generally dispenses--memoirs by disgraced politicians, autobiographies by Emmy-winning TV stars. Jeremy's stories tend to appear in Antaeus and the Iowa Review and frequently are set in mental institutions.
"I feel," he says, "like a whore."
"Now you know how the rest of us feel."
"I'm sure this will really boost my lit cred, showing all the media elite that I swim in the same sewer they do."
"Don't worry, I think the media elite's swimming in some other sewer tonight." Indeed, excepting a few young black-clad Voguettes and self, I don't see much in the way of the Fourth Estate.
"Who's that fucking midget over there who told me he 'rather liked' my first book."
Following Jeremy's aquiline nose, I spot Kevin Shipley, book assassin for Beau Monde, in conversation with the New York Post.
"Jesus, I hope you didn't insult him. That's Kevin Shipley."
"He told me he bought it on the remainder table at Barnes and Noble and I said I was deeply honored that he felt he'd gotten his buck ninety-five's worth."
"Just pray he doesn't review the new one. His keyboard's made out of human teeth."
"Yeah, but how does he reach it?"
Finally I have reached the bar, where I request several cosmopolitans, one of which I hand to Jeremy. "Your problem," I say, "is that you don't drink enough. Where's Blaine, anyway?"
"Last I knew she was kissing Hollywood butt. Some fucking troll from Sony Pictures."
"Let's go find Phil," I suggest. "Maybe you can cheer her up."

WHAT'S WITH PHILOMENA?

The love of my life has been decidedly edgy and nervous. I would ask her why, except I'm not entirely certain I want to know. What we need is some ecstasy therapy, drop a few tabs, have a long night of truth and touch. There has been too little rapture of late. Not to mention the touching part.
Fortunately, by the time I find her again, she seems to have undergone a mood transplant. Delighted to see Jeremy, she kisses him and then, for good measure, me.
I introduce myself to the attractive young woman of color with whom Phil has been conversing, whose name sounds familiar.
"Do I know you?" I ask.
"We've never met," she says. "I'm Chip Ralston's personal assistant."
"Well," says Jeremy, "bully for you."
"I was just telling Cherie," Phil tells me, "that you're doing the profile for CiaoBella!"
A photographer suddenly appears: "Philomena, let's get a shot."
My statuesque soulmate breaks into autosmile and gamely reaches for my arm, but, shy guy...

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Verlag
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2000
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0679749535
ISBN 13 
9780679749530
Einband
Taschenbuch
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
192
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
gpsr@libri.de
gpsr@libri.de

Europaallee 1
Bad Hersfeld
36244
Deutschland

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