Joe Gould's Secret

A classic!

This book, a biography not a novel, was recommended by the writer Clare Allan at a readers event I attended It is now out of print, but can be picked up for a penny plus postage here on Amazon.Mitchell, a writer comes across a homeless man in the Village in New York. Gould who would be described as a tramp or hobo in today's vernacular, is somewhat kindly and exotically described as a Bohemian, after the style of the artists and poets of the era. Gould himself is working on a book, an Oral History reflecting contemporary life in New York through the conversations of its inhabitants. He is celebrated by some of the greats of the day, E.E Cummings for example is a personal friend, but lives a very odd lifestyle subsisting on handouts, black coffee, cigarette butts, fried eggs and ketchup.I was a little frustrated to discover there were two parts to this book, Joseph Mitchell's original profile for the New Yorker called 'Professor Sea Gull' and then 'Joe Gould's Secret' an expanded biography of Gould, but one which unfortunately and unbeknownst to me repeats some of the same anecdotes from the Professor Sea Gull section which I'd thought was the beginning of the book. I think its still important to read Professor Sea Gull, because the moment Joe Gould's Secret expands from follows the aftermath of the publication of that initial profile.I had further problems with Joe Gould's Secret. I didn't much care for Gould himself, a man I found to be a conceited bombast, and I didn't much care for his biographer Mitchell either. Although I entirely understand the reasons why Mitchell got fed up with Gould and ultimately found him a nuisance; it must be remembered that Mitchell was the one who tracked Gould down, got involved in his world and used his story for professional gain, not once, but twice.This book with both the profile and the biography is just 187 pages long, but I found myself page counting calculating how long I had left to go, which is to me, a REALLY BAD SIGN. Although, it's cover and inner page are littered with quotes praising it. All the other reviews here seem to be five star. Clearly the book has fans, so if you like stories about real life folk, you may like this. I'm afraid I didn't really. 5/10

If, like me, you first discovered this book when watching the movie of the same name, you won't be disappointed with the source material. This volume compiles two long articles originally published in The New Yorker in 1942 and 1964. Joe Gould was a transient who scurried about Greenwich Village in New York City for over twenty years. Throughout that time, he would beg, borrow, or steal pretty much every meal he received; even more important, however, was where he could find his next drink. The alleged reason for his homelessness was his complete devotion to a single project: An Oral History of Our Time. This supposed book, compiled from thousands of conversations with Gotham residents, sought to preserve for posterity the flavor and unconscious ambience of the era. In the process, he also made himself a nuisance to almost everyone through his shameless begging, political bomb-chucking, and occasionally screaming like a seagull at dinner parties.Joseph Mitchell met Gould in the late 1930s and knew he would be a great profile for the magazine. In exchange, Gould was supplied with drinks and had a new person he could mooch off of. He also began forwarding his mail to Mitchell's office address, which gave another excuse to drop by. When Mitchell and others pressed Gould to allow them to read some of his book, Gould provided a few pages. Although jumbled and mostly unimpressive, there was an occasional flash of brilliance. When Mitchell and prospective publishers requested more, Gould dodged and claimed the manuscript was safely sequestered away on a farm for the duration of World War II. It was in his frustration at Gould's intransigence that Mitchell finally stumbled upon what Gould had disguised for years.So what exactly was Joe Gould's secret? His secret was that his masterpiece didn't exist. Instead of writing new material as he met new people, Joe Gould would write the same half-dozen or so stories about his own life repeatedly in dingy notebooks. Whenever he finished a notebook or story, he would move on to the next with slightly different words. "It isn't a question of laziness," Gould replied when asked why he did so. Although never explicitly stated, mental illness and a bad case of writer's block probably foiled Gould's attempts.Eventually, Gould began to lapse into senility, spent his final years in a group home, and died in 1957. Mithcell debated whether to reveal his story, but ultimately decided that Gould's love of exhibitionism, especially now that he was dead, justified telling it. Somewhat ironically, Mitchell's story of Joe Gould's writer's block would be his own last major piece. Although he lived for another thirty years, Mitchell created almost no new work. Like some disease that can infect only one carrier at a time, Gould's secret became Mitchell's curse.Although the book clocks in at just over 180 pages, it can be finished in a single evening. The print is large and the pages small. The first piece is relatively short and describes Gould before Mitchell discovered his secret. The second, longer item sheds more light on their relationship and what dealing with Gould was like. Were it not for his alleged masterpiece, Gould would have been like so many other forgotten bohemians of the early twentieth century. Through his lie, however, Gould created a real story worth reading.

The book paints a vivid picture of New York City and One of its stranger characters. Based on a series of interviews, the author tells a fascinating story of a man who lives on the streets and gets by on very little for his entire life. He tells the story of the author of an oral history of the world; a book that will sit in the great libraries in the future.The sense of place and time, the 1920s to the 1950s, is amazing. You can see how catsup can be a meal and how you can live on hand handouts from day to Day and have a plastic bag full of cigarette butts means you always have a smoke when you need it.

Mitchell was a terrific writer and a brilliant observer of human nature. Joe Gould and others come alive in this short, enjoyable book.