Fred Exley had one book in him, a wonderful book called A Fan's Notes. Although never a bestseller, the so-called "novel" (so deemed because his publisher worried about being sued for libel), the book has stayed in print since its debut in 1968. A new hardback edition has been issued as a companion to Misfit: The Strange Life of Frederick Exley (Modern Library, $16.50).
No one who reads A Fan's Notes will be able to forget this wild book about a wild man, a sad sack braggart who drank continuously (some friends claim they never saw him sober). But Jonathan Yardley's compulsively readable biography observes that Exley, the tortured native of Watertown, NY, never wrote save when he was sober.
His debut book was totally concerned with the world according to Fred, a man whose relationships with women crashed and burned, whose principal interest in life was himself, who struggled for two decades after the release of A Fan's Notes to repeat the magic. It didn't happen. Pages from a Cold Island came out in 1975 and was savagely attacked by several critics. The final book in the series, Last Notes from Home, reached book stores in 1988. Both volumes demonstrated that Exley had nothing left to say about himself, and wasn't interested in any other topic.
Despite being a one-book wonder (and that book was not a commercial success), despite dying from the lifelong embrace of booze that led to the collapse of his body, despite being a weirdo whose relationships with others were marked by his taking advantage of the kindness of friends, who continued to forgive poor Fred for his sins, Exley retained an appeal that was puzzling but strong.
Yardley, a distinguished book reviewer for The Washington Post, never met Fred Exley, but talked to him often when the woozy Exley would make his famous phone calls at all hours, delivering monologues that varied from brilliance to alcoholic indiscretions. Early in the book, Yardley writes brilliantly about Exley's magnum opus, a book Yardley sees as one of the great books of the modern era.
Great writers often have led messy lives. Alcohol has fueled many talented people and the predilection for liquor seems a steady hurdle that authors can't leap across. Yes, Fred Exley was a bore, a terrible husband and an inconsistent father. But despite all his problems, there remains the intoxicating words that make up his deliriously delightful epic, A Fan's Notes.
More book reviews
Back to Front Page