One of America's greatest living writers, and possibly the most unpresentable, the pulp historian of the American Twentieth Century, James Ellroy, whose "Blood's A Rover" is coming out in less than a month and who's more often than not unjustly overlooked by critics -- maybe for the fact that he writes in the noir vernacular and that's supposed to be a bad thing, maybe for his politics, or maybe for his more recent gleefully insane Glenn-Beck-style hystrionics (YouTube link, language NSFW) -- is also, famously, a huge classical music fan (his apartment is decorated with framed Deutsche Grammophon LP covers).
Dear friend of Opera Chic, Tim Mangan, just visited the novelist.
And he has a signed copy -- with a cute "Viva Beethoven!" -- to show for it.
American Tabloid is genial! What an incredible writer!
Posted by: Paolo M. | August 28, 2009 at 10:33 PM
That inscription is so cool!
Posted by: Dr. Faust | August 29, 2009 at 02:56 AM
Sorry, Ellroy's intolerance has ruined his writing for me. It also didn't help that he's become more and more gratuitously violent with each book.
Posted by: Robert in New orleans | August 30, 2009 at 01:26 AM