Dan Fante (2 Viewers)

Well good for him, definitely. A shame if small publishers like Burning Shore and Sun Dog can't publish him any more.

Plus... I really despise Harper. A lot.
 
Hi,
I agree. Plus, if I know Dan Fante, he will still let the littles publish him. I think that it is a great thing. As much as I loved seeing him on Sun Dog, Harper will give him the kind of distribution that may really break him out.

Bill
 
Sellout $$$$$

If I was more creative I'd make a plush version of Dan Fante with a big dollar sign on it like the guy with the stupid twin towers pillows.
 
The fact is that Dan Fante will not change how he writes or who he is because of this deal. If they accept him and will work around him, then it is them that came to his way or thinking, not him selling out to them, if that makes sense.

If Oprah picks him for her book club, then I'll have to agree, but I do not see that happening. I see him continuing to write the way that he writes and I see them not pushing a heavy editorial hand in the work.

Bill
 
Well, that's the problem with the "you've sold out!" types. If Fante did not change a word - in fact if Oprah chose one of his existing books - the people who enjoyed Fante as a starving cult figure would cry sellout when he became rich, even though he became rich from the very thing they claimed to have loved. You have to suffer for these fuckers. They do not want to see you comfortable or happy. Once your income rises above the poverty level you are a sellout.
 
Of course I agree with mjp.
Chump Change is translated in Dutch,
I don't think it sold quite well.
But who knows since he has signed on to Harper,
w'll see more Fante books translated in Dutch.
Most of his father's books are translated.
Spread the word. Yeah.
 
If Dante Fante starts selling Hostess Snak-Cakes, shilling for Applebee's or some industrial-strength cleaning products ("Hi friends, I'm Dan Fante, & when people used to vomit in the back of my cab I used...") then we can talk about selling out.

If Dan Fante (or anyone) writes books & then has the nerve to take money from a publisher who wants to publish them--how is that selling out? You're saying it's contingent upon who does the paying? If Press A pays--it's legit; oh, but if press B pays it's selling out?

He's a writer. He wants to write (say, instead of driving a cab or telemarketing). & he wants what he writes to reach people. What's wrong with that?

There's nothing wrong with being paid to do what you love...in fact, isn't that the DREAM?
 
yeah, a writer signing on with a big publishing house....what the fuck is he thinking!

do what the rest of us do: shave your head, tattoo your novel on the shaved skull. let "head up yer own arse quarterly" photograph it for an issue that never gets released because the funding falls through.

let your hair grow back, but smile smugly at the people on the bus, because they do not know the brilliance inked on your skull!!

unless you go bald. then you're a twat. and a sellout.

or something.
 
Maybe this is the wrong time to mention it, but I have a Television Special being hosted by Amazon.com during the later part of December. On the show will be singing, dancing, and comedians in Tuxedos. I will read one poem.

I hope you all can attend.
 
Maybe this is the wrong time to mention it, but I have a Television Special being hosted by Amazon.com during the later part of December. On the show will be singing, dancing, and comedians in Tuxedos. I will read one poem.
This reminds me of the appearance of Elliott Smith at the oscars in 1998.
They put him in an awful suit and Ellliott asked for a barstool to sit on.
They refused.
Elliott wasn't a tall guy but: [This video is unavailable.]
 
so ponder, you a fan? he actually wanted to wear the white suit because john lennon wore a whit suit on the cover of abbey road. great song...
 
I'd like to bump this bad boy up to congratulate Dan on his first Harper published novel "86'd" which appears to be due out around the same time as Buk's new collection, October.

At least, that's what my computer at work tells me. That's all circumstantial until I actually hold the book in my sweaty palms...

Anyone with more info on this? I assume it'll be published on the Ecco imprint. They'd be stupid not to, what with other guys like Vlautin, Bukowski, and his father... and other whatnot on it...
 
And it doesn't show online yet (at least not on BN's website) but they're also reprinting Mooch, Chump Change, and Spitting Off Tall Buildings come December... so HC is really getting behind him and getting some backlist titles out too...

More good news for Dan!
 
I read an advance copy of 86'd yesterday, and I thought it was very strong. I read the whole thing through nearly nonstop. If you dig Dan Fante, it's definitely something worth looking forward to.

86'd Proof Copy.jpg
 
Hi All, I apologize if this belongs in a different category but do you know where I could get a copy of the "Sad Flower In The Sand" Fante documentary? The PBS site doesn't have anything and i've never seen it on my local station :( Thank you.
 
And it takes about... 2 weeks or so for it to arrive... Mine's sitting on top of my entertainment center, just waiting for me...

I'm glad to hear 86'd was good. I can't wait to pick it up.
 
For anyone who's interested, Kissed by a Fat Waitress, Dan Fante's latest book of poetry has just been published by Sun Dog Press. [...]

Surprised to read this. Somewhere I picked up the idea that Sun Dog Press was no longer publishing new titles. Guess that's not true.
 
Well the original post is more than a year old now... Copies are still floating around in warehouses though. I really need to read more Fante poetry...
 
Just ordered 86'd, although it doesn't come out until November over here. I can't wait. I've just finished 'Short Dog' which was good but not as good as the three novels I've read. I might have to give Kissed by a Fat Waitress a go before this comes out.
 
I haven't read either volume of Fante's poetry, but the individual poems I've read, I like... one of these days, I'll pick up the Sun Dog Press volumes...
 
Impression of D-Fante

Worth seeing. Likable. Vibrant. His nervous energy bubbling over. You can sense his father's DNA pulsing through his veins. I see the Fante physical resemblance.

"Bruno's relationship with his father" - father Fante appears to remain a huge presence in his life and not a very likable one, it seems - very much love/hate, a relationship Fante the younger is working out through the characters in his book, including the DOG. (The DOG?)

Seems about as American as John Fante was Italian, and likes the total freedom of American culture despite its harsh realities. As an Italian-American (or vice versa), he either couldn't or wouldn't speak Italian - in Italy. Maybe he's renounced it. Still, I would have liked to hear him in stripped down Italiano. (Was subtitled.)

He writes as a "slap in the face" to the reader and "to awaken." He feels it's a privilege to be allowed inside the head of the reader. The spiritual connection and experience he talks of is very different than what I would expect, and hard for me to see how it's a presence in his life - he appears not to be particularly at peace or calm with himself. Fine. Just my take on it.

In detective fiction, I believe he was trying to recollect the name...Raymond Chandler - the big d.f. cannoli who is famous after Dashiell Hammett.

Likes Bukowski's poetry better than his novels but has read P.O. and Facto. He pulls up short, holds back on what he feels is missing in Buk's writing - but one can guess that it just wasn't pop POP POPPING enough.

Thanks, Ponder for posting.
 
Reading 86'd as we speak... the anti-James Patterson sentiment on page 83 will probably be carved on my tombstone... good work all around...
 
I'm reading it now. I laughed out loud when I read this part This is during a job interview in a diner, with David Koffman, who is gay.... (Bruno, who is having serious alcohol withdrawl, speaks first):



"Hey, this is the United States of America if I'm not mis-taken! Okay. We have laws relating to espionage and wire-tapping here. The particular rectumshitbreath jerkoff I'm referring to was a vindictive Persian prick. A pernicious towel- head un-American alien pompous shitsucking dorf. And the sonofabitch beat me out of my final paycheck. Okay! Five hundred and eleven bucks. If that's not the definition of a card-carrying cocksucker then I don't know what the hell is?"

"I can see that we're not on the same page here."

"The page you're on is the page I'm on. Ten thousand per-cent the same page. I promise you."

"So, is it your car? Or the flu? Or are you upset about your last boss?"

"Okay, look, I'm sorry about the cocksucker remark, David. I apologize. Okay. It was uncalled for and off-the-cuff, completely out of context and inappropriate to our discussion. I'll just say this: In my book a cocksucker can be male or female, anatomically. Cocksuckers are"”let's say"”potentially inter-changeable. That doesn't make 'em right or wrong. I think we can both agree on the definition of the word cocksucker as sort of neutral. Okay. I mean you yourself may or may not suck cock. That's none of my concern. It's a private matter between you and your conscience and any other consenting adult whose cock you might be sucking. What I'm saying is that it doesn't necessarily follow that all homos must ipso facto be cocksuckers. Perhaps most are but who says we should throw the baby out with the bathwater. Right?"




Classic Dan Fante....

Bill
 
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Why does he end that rather well-written dialog with a hackneyed cliche? Was it the part of Bruno who is just so damned cliche, or what? He had me up until that last line. Then, not so much.

Even if he was trying to portray a hackneyed cliched character, couldn't he have changed horses in midstream?
 

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