STORIES
Gilbert Sorrentino
ANONYMOUS SKETCH OF THE WRITER
A maker of maddening lists, a lister of maddening
names, a namer of glistering fakes, an acre of pains, a wicker of
aches; a flatulent bore, a sucker for whores, an arthritic lout; a
doubter of mythical lore, a chap who on(;e knew semaphore; gas–
tritis is his sorry lot, it's hairy and furry and hot in the belly;
devourer of jelly and jam; the fingers oft crippled with pain of the
pen; a yen for good legs in black hose, a shaker of fists; a lover of
barter, art is his god, a garter adorer, a clod.
As a child he feared Hurley Lees, he bruised bashed and
scraped up his knees; a fool for the prop aeroplane yet reasonably
sane. What popular songs did he like? Peace. He liked many.
Each of his novels stood out a sore thumb (a bad penny). He
ravaged the psyches of friends, rended and plundered their means
and their ends as he bound them in fetters in frostbitten letters.
What did they do to be fixed on the wall with the tinny nail of his
prose? That was their wail. He knew their travail yet he froze them
in language for good and for all. He was humorless, bitter and
sour, they claimed. Yet in his island retreat he laughed to himself
at the pictures his pen so carefully built up and framed. Some
were mere anecdotes, lacking a head or a tale; others morose.
Some murderous, flip, or crudely obscene. Most were tritely rou-
