If You Like Richard Yates You MIGHT LIKE... JOHN O'HARA: RGBIB 213

[@barbaratarbell606]

Don't miss The Doctor's Son, a short story about Pottsville PA, John O'Hara's own hometown ❤️ ❤️.

[@Scottmbradfield]

It sounds familiar, but I've read so many great O'Hara stories over the decades I can't quite tell them apart...s

[@waltervonahn9989]

O’Hara was from Pottsville in the Pennsylvania coal regions. He called it Gibbsville in his writings and many of his stories are about that region. He got his start working for the local paper in that town. He wasn’t very well liked there for a time because many of his characters were thinly disguised prominent residents. But time has passed and he now has a statue. I know this as I live there

[@lyndao7356]

The Hat on the Bed. I’m searching for it now. You’re a dream, Scotty. Beautiful warm day here in the Pacific NW. I’m taking my chair to the park tomorrow to read my books & make the most of every lovely day.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Fun in the sun, Lynda. Stay happy. s

[@joseantoniomoch4006]

The Doctor's Son, The Man who had to talk to Somebody, Pleasure, The public career of Mr Seymour Harrisburg, All the girls he wanted are among my favorite short stories plus his novellas. And yes indeed, they're like you said ,"captivating ".

[@Scottmbradfield]

Thanks, Jose, and welcome to the bathtub! Always great to meet a fellow Gibbsvillian! s

[@JHarder1000]

May I suggest another contemporary of O'Hara? His reputation nowadays is even worse, though that is probably, an injustice. Ironically, he once wrote a novel called The Just And The Unjust. This fellow also wrote about WASP professional men, and his books were usually set in New England towns, though one visited an Episcopalian parish in New York, and his masterpiece was located in an Army Air Force in Florida at the height of World War Two. " I have no thesis other than that life is a raw deal. Life is what it is." And boy, has he ever gotten a raw deal from history. James Gould Cozzens.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Interesting. I never read much Cozens but his rep was sort of crashing when I read first third of LOVE POSSESSED in high school. I believe Dwight MacDonald (I think he reviewed for PARTISAN EVIEW or somewhere like that?) gave him this really scathing critical denouncement in a famous essay? I will try to try him again some ay on your rec. You could always post your own thoughts on Cozzens here or on our Facebook page at: facebook.com/groups/702202229874384

[@JHarder1000]

@@Scottmbradfield "The reviews writers really hate are what I call 'blindside' reviews, like when Chuck Bednarik blindsided Frank Gifford and nearly killed him. " The tragedy (for Cozzens ) was that he was blind-sided after writing one of the best novels about clergymen ever written (Men And Brethren), The best novel about lawyers ever written ( The Just And The Unjust), and finally, the great American novel of World War 2, (Guard Of Honor). Even after McDonald's brilliant hatchet job in Commentary, By Love Possessed still got the Williams Dean Howells medal in 1960 from The American Academy Of Arts And Letters.

[@georgepetroff867]

Thanks for talking about O’Hara. I have read ‘Appointment in Samaria’ and ‘Ten North Frederick’ and enjoyed both. Good character development and very engaging. I have O’Hara’s The New York Stories (Vintage edition) book and this video has encouraged me to read it soon! I understand O’Hara was very popular author in the 1950s and 60s. I am still making my way through all of Iris Murdoch’s novels. Another author you hear little of today.

[@Scottmbradfield]

If you find a bad story, let me know, but it may be hard to do. s

[@jackjohnhameld6401]

The three stories in *Sermons and Soda Water* especially the middle story *Imagine Kissing Pete* cover so many lives and quite a period in time. Likewise his long stories *Pat Collins* and *A Few Tips and Some Poetry*. The first examines friendship between two men, their marriages, and the changes in a small town in Pennsylvania. The second is a sympathetic examination of college lesbianism, some of the material gathered from O'Hara's third wife, Sister. Always the flawless ear for American speech. John Braine said, *How does John O'Hara know so much?* I have his Collected Letters, biographies by Finis Farr and McShane, all the stories, novels, plays. I live in Scotland.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Welcome to the bathtub, Jackjohn! Yeah, O'Hara's stories are bubbling over with memorable characters. I haven't read SERMONS-yet! Stay safe in the bathtub. s

[@jackjohnhameld6401]

@@Scottmbradfield Certain critics were in high dudgeon when John O's books were published as Modern Library Classics: I purchased Appointment and A Rage To Live from Borders in Glasgow; handsome volumes with bronze dustjackets; the first with a photo of young John in a tweed coat, the second of a middle-aged John in a tailored Norfolk jacket. Vidal disliked his work and may have been jealous of his success. Vidal never wrote a story as good as A Doctor's Son about the influenza pandemic. Admirers of O'Hara included Lionel Trilling, Hemingway, George Gershwin, Dorothy Parker, Raymond Chandler, Richard Rodgers, Updike, Truman Capote, Joan Didion, George V Higgins, Mario Puzo, John Braine, Frederic Raphael, William Boyd, and Lee Iaococca. Kingsley Amis was an O'Hara fan until A Rage To Live which he called 'a stinker' (I strongly disagree). Amis like many novelists could not manage the architecture of the long novel which O'Hara mastered : A Rage To Live, Ten North Frederick, The Lockwood Concern, From the Terrace. One of John's friends said it was eerie to think of him writing the latter, working through the night in a house overlooking an old road that figured in the War of Independence, the story of a man who is a failure in his own eyes. One thinks of Julian English in Appointment, signalling the end of the Jazz Age, playing a Jean Goldkette record before killing himself. Julian was based on a man from Pottstown. I have never crossed the Pond but I would like to visit Pottstown PA before I die, and see the Territory, that part of Pennsylvania that O'Hara made his own as much as Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha. It will be clear to you that I am an O'Hara fanatic, Scott. I was a teenager when he visited Scotland, judging from his Selected Letters (edited by Matthew Broccoli) which my late brother sent me from Los Angeles. And I remember my father informing me of O'Hara's death in 1970 in The Daily Express. You will enjoy Sermons and Soda Water. O'Hara was at Capote's masked ball, and somewhere in the crowd was Frank Sinatra, who starred in the movie Pal Joey. Gene Kelly played Joey in the original Broadway show. Keep reading ! John (Jack) Haggerty, Glasgow, Scotland

[@jackjohnhameld6401]

I never managed to get a hold of the Geoffrey Wolf biography. I understand Wolff was somewhat bored with O'Hara. Had I been an American I would like to have written a critical biography. There are so many subtle innovations in O'Hara's stories which the critics never noticed: one notices these even in the later volumes such as The Good Samaritan, and certainly in The Hat on the Bed which Lynda (below) is searching for. I do not find his settings mundane, but then I have only seen America in movies. I have a book with a photo of John O'Hara's daughter in Yale after Yale purchased John's library and papers: they appear to have recreated the study in which O'Hara wrote in his last years. He fell out with The New Yorker after a bad review, but when William Maxwell went to see him, he found a treasure chest of unpublished stories. O'Hara worked all through the night, driven to get down everything he remembered, and died in harness working on The Second Ewings, the only work of his I do not possess. Novels like Elizabeth Appleton and The Big Laugh have been sadly forgotten. A heavy smoker O'Hara defended his habit in a magazine column, collected in a book titled My Turn. John died in his sleep. At the death of his friend George Gershwin, he had written: :*George Gershwin died on 11 July 1937, but I don't have to believe that if I don't want to.*

[@Scottmbradfield]

@@jackjohnhameld6401 Thanks for all that. I kind of gave up on the Wolfe bio, he clearly didn't like the guy much, and it didn't seem that well researched. There's an interesting picture of O'Hara that comes out of Benson's really good bio of Steinbeck, another great writer who remained friends with O'Hara all his life. Stay safe. s

[@jackjohnhameld6401]

@@Scottmbradfield The two Johns: Steinbeck had trouble with his eyes and O'Hara visited him and read to him. O'Hara attended Steinbeck's church funeral and was seen praying. O'Hara revered Scott Fitzgerald (Scott had admired Samarra) and together they hunted down Fitzgerald's out of print novels in used bookstores in Los Angeles: O'Hara rated Tender is the Night higher than The Great Gatsby. O'Hara also corresponded with James Gould Cozzens. I have not been able to discover how O'Hara and Capote became friends. I remember my father (a fan of Steinbeck and Dos Passos) reading In Cold Blood before I did, and telling me what a frightening book it was. My father would have loved America. Scottish people are fascinated with American music and culture, and we are transfixed by the vastness of America, so well described in the novels of Thomas Wolfe. O'Hara's Territory is seen as its best in his monumental novel From the Terrace, though we should remember he was colour blind, and did not have the lyricism of Steinbeck's undervalued East of Eden. O'Hara wrote stories everywhere: Our Friend the Sea, about an ocean voyage, is just a few pages long, and turns on a shipboard friendship between a man and a woman. His Hollywood stories say more about the movie industry than many a long novel ever did. Has any American writer listened to people as O'Hara did? I recall a story about an elderly widow at the hairdresser and it does not touch on money, status, or sex. In Ten North Frederick a wealthy man inquires about the late Joe Chapin's son and says, 'I hear he's no damn good,' reminding me of Black Jack Bouvier's, Jackie's father. From memory I think Gloria Jones, wife of James Jones, grew up in Pottstown and knew some of the characters who appeared in the O'Hara stories. Watch a KZbin film: *The Private World of James Jones.* You will spot Irwin Shaw playing poker a la Jones in Paris. There's an entertaining biography of Irwin written by Michael Shnayerson who suggests that O'Hara's second wife, the mother of his daughter, was anti-Semitic: considering O'Hara's reverence for Gershwin, Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, I find it hard to believe that his wife would look down on any artist for his Jewishness. Incidentally Irwin Shaw's son Adam Shaw is on KZbin talking about his father: *Dan Schneider Video Interview # 79: On Irwin Shaw.* Adam Shaw is a highly experienced pilot and has a couple of videos on 9/11. J Haggerty

[@AndalusianIrish]

Great stuff.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Stay safe, bathing buddy. s

[@raindrops8296]

A writer that’s heavily influenced by O’ Hara is George V. Higgins. Like the guy was a devout disciple of O’Hara. Higgins used to be a big wig lawyer that dealt with criminal trials and he ended up writing the best crime novel of all time called the Friends of Eddie Coyle. He almost won a national book award for it and that’s kind of hard to do seeing as how it’s considered genre fiction. But Higgins loved O’ Hara and that sent me on a hunt to find the guy influencing the guy. Thanks for the great video.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Thanks for sharing the bathtub, Rain Drops. I didn't know that about Higgins, who I did read a bit of years ago for a review, but don't remember that well. Will find a space for him in one of my various stacks! Stay safe. s

[@raindrops8296]

@@Scottmbradfield I just purchased Pal Joey because of you. Can’t wait to watch more of your series.

[@Scottmbradfield]

@@raindrops8296 I don't know that one, but saw the Sinatra movie version when I was a kid. Should be interesting, let us know what you think! s

[@rbg9866]

Just read 10 North Frederick a couple weeks ago. It was surprisingly absorbing. I immediately ordered a hardback that has his first 3 novels.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Yeah I have that one, never read, but there's a LOT of O'Hara out there! s

[@chrisoleson9570]

Thanks for the nudge, Mr. B. I've never read O'Hara. and I can't think of a better time to dig in.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Definitely try him, Chris. Any collection, or for novels, a short one like APPOINTMENT... Report back to your fellow bathers! s

[@chrisoleson9570]

@@Scottmbradfield I've already borrowed a copy of The Hat on the Bed from the Internet Archive and read a couple of the shorter stories in it. Very enjoyable.

[@Scottmbradfield]

@@chrisoleson9570 yeah I haven't hit a clinker yet...

[@nasrinvahidi5515]

I’ll make sure to check him out. Still reading another recommendation of yours, The Statement from Brian Moore and oh wow!!! Fantastic. It reminds me of Camus The Trial, amazing actually. Thank you for recommending these great authors. There’s no way I would have known him any other way.

[@Scottmbradfield]

Great book! Good taste, Nasrin! Keep reading (or listening)! s

[@joebeamish]

You make me want to revisit O’Hara. I really liked Appointment - lots of years ago - and only recall that his short stories were very short indeed, a page or two, almost sketches. I have not read his longer stories.

[@Scottmbradfield]

He's worth revisiting. I don't know his short-shorts that well, most of the ones I've read fall in my comfort zone of about 8 - 50 pages. They are always good (that I know.) S

[@joebeamish]

@@Scottmbradfield I wish short stories would stay short. Fifteen pages, maybe 20, and we’re good. That said, novellas are among my favorite things to read...from Tolstoy to James, from Rachel Ingalls to Ian McEwan. But keep short stories short, I say!

[@dankierson]

Yates a polished writer? And did you say something complimentary about Cheever for Chrissakes 😳 ?

[@donaldkelly3983]

O'Hara has always been just a name I saw. And not particularly praised. He seems to be one of those writers who wrote "New Yorker magazine" stories, like John Updike. But what the hell, why not give him a try!

[@Scottmbradfield]

Yeah I think he pubbed more than a hundred stories in The New Yorker. His stories are a bit livelier than Updike (tho I like Updike, especially late Updike.) You definitely should try his stories, Donald. s