I somehow missed this article when it first appeared back in January. Brian O’Neill reacts to the Cloud Factory’s change from coal to natural gas only to later realize that not all that much has changed… or has it?
The whole thing is brilliant.
There’s a great user generated map on Google that marks all the spots mentioned in The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. Click on the map below to check it out.
“In the immemorial style of young men under pressure, they decided to lie down for a while and waste time.”
— Michael Chabon, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
By Michael Chabon
I guess you could say Chabon is a comic book and super-hero enthusiast.
See:
Michael Chabon appeared on the Simpsons in season 18 episode 6, “Moe ‘n’ A Lisa,” alongside Jonathan Franzen, Tom Wolfe, and Gore Vidal.
In the episode Chabon tells Franzen he fights like Ann Rice. Classic Chabon.
This week I’ll be posting a lot Michael Chabon related content in addition to the usual. It’s a bit of a premature homage in anticipation of his upcoming collection of essays, “Manhood for Amateurs,” which comes out this October.
Michael Chabon completed his undergraduate studies in English at Pitt in the early 80’s. It was this time in Pittsburgh that inspired his first novel, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, which became a best-seller. Chabon went on to become one of the most prolific writers of our time, writing such works as Wonder Boys, The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, and the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.
When I remember that dizzy summer, that dull, stupid, lovely, dire summer, it seems that in those days I ate my lunches, smelled another’s skin, noticed a shade of yellow, even simply sat, with greater lust and hopefulness - and that I lusted with greater faith, hoped with greater abandon. The people I loved were celebrities, surrounded by rumor and fanfare; the places I sat with them, movie lots and monuments. No doubt all of this is not true remembrance but the ruinous work of nostalgia, which obliterates the past, and no doubt, as usual, I have exaggerated everything.
A great essay by Michael Chabon from his new essay collection to be released this October, Manhood for Amateurs.
There were so many Pittsburgh poets in my hallway that if, at that instant, a meteorite had come smashing through my roof, there would never have been another stanza written about rusting fathers and impotent steelworkers and the Bessemer convertor of love.
Angel Lady - 28 July 2010
Confluence of Ohio, Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers, Pittsburgh, 1922 (via)
Pittsburgh
Pope Hat Building (by Cashaw)