The writer Lee Olds sold
250,000 books in the 1960s and achieved great critical success. After a period in
the publishing wilderness his books are now finally being released by Not So
Noble Books for a new audience. His first novel ‘Too Much Sun’ came out in June
and two of his other novels will be published this summer.
TOO MUCH SUN is
available on Amazon now:
Praise for TOO MUCH SUN:
“The astonishing first novel about a runaway kid in Alaska”
“By Kerouac out of Salinger . . . The pioneer of a new post-Beatnik generation.” New York Herald Tribune
“Rowdy, wild and bawdy. Barry is as engaging as Holden Caulfield and as believable.” Book of the Month Club
LEE OLDS describes himself
thus:
“Grew up in mansion of
rich parents, made honor roll plus athletic plaudits in prep school I detested
and was asked to leave at year's end. Went to work, traveled to Alaska, Got
B.A. from Cal Berkeley, M.A. in philosophy from SF State. My thesis was on
'time, space, and infinity' and though my adviser said his committee had
decided to award me the degree he also claimed if he read it over for six
months he doubted he'd understand it. Worked on waterfront in Manhattan as well
as San Francisco. Was disinherited along the way. Wintered for many years in Puerto
Vallarta. Wrote (and still do) constantly though I have been accused of being
too original to be published, too harsh, too fatalistic, etc. well, I’m still
here writing and perhaps now getting published.
As Condorcet once
said, 'the time will come when the sun will shine only upon a world of free men
who recognize no master except their own reason, when tyrants, slaves, priests
and their stupid or hypocritical tools will no longer exist except in history
or on the stage'. One, of course, wonders if that time will ever come. must
strive for it...”
An Interview with LEE OLDS
Q: You sold 1/4 million copies of Too Much Sun in the 60s What was it
like being a best-selling author? What happened after that?
LO. What was it like
being a 'best-selling' author? Nothing really. I’d just gotten something out
there. it enabled me to engage some interesting people in Manhattan on a
different level, but the publicity wasn't that great since Vanguard Press, the
hardcover publisher promoted it little, and despite rave reviews bookstores
didn't sell (or stock) many. The mass sales took place in worldwide
supermarkets or chain stores of the paperback Bantam edition where people could
pick the book up, read a few pages and either buy it or not.
After that no general
trade house would publish my many submissions. Their invariable answer was
'though I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book I’d never publish it'.
Q: Too Much Sun is a coming of age story, does it mirror your own life?
LO: All first novels
are pretty much bound to mirror one's life. It certainly helped develop my
philosophy of it.
Q: What prompted you to work with Not So Noble, the upstart digital
publishers who are releasing three of your novels?
LO: ‘Not So Noble'
caters to the arcane which my novels are, though how other trade house
publishers have not picked up on this I can't say. Americans, of course, don't
write philosophical novels. Might that be the reason they don't publish them? They’re
too interested in perpetrating the great American myth, i.e. a country beyond
analysis or quantification.
Q: You live in California, I imagine you as a 'Henry Miller in Big Sur'
type figure, how far off am I?
LO: Of course, have been exposed to all the
scenes, jazz, peace movement, rock
movement, so-called spiritual quest in Big Sur and the Haight Ashbury,
sometimes as an integral part of but
mostly behind them as my curiosity works in philosophical, strange, almost voyeuristic
ways. They’re certainly a valid part of me, as valid as any other. I want to
see whether they have any long lasting edifying effects for what one might call
a better society. Or were they merely a gratuitous, hedonistic fad for
capitalism to feed on and make the claim it has artists, more PR B.S.
Q: How has your writing style changed over the years?
LO: My writing style
has changed over the years by becoming more didactically focused, more
cooperation, less competition more socialism and atheism, less capitalism and
religion two latter ideals which I believe as did the late Hitchens and Dawkins
are bringing the world to an unpleasant close. Man has to confront man. Sublimations
won't do it.
Q: Do you read much fiction, if so what, who are your favourite authors
and why, and how has your reading changed since when you wrote Too Much Sun?
Who do I read?
Tolstoy, Hamsun, Gide, Celine, Traven, Lowry, Conrad, Pushkin, Dostoevsky, etc.
etc. VS Naipaul, Neruda, Borges, Marquez, Rulfo, Lillo, Hesse, Mann, Broch,
Musil, Mishima, Ooka, Forester, Mistry, and many others with whom I can
identify with and/or learn from. I don't read American writers much. James, Crane,
Wharton and of course Lovecraft and Poe are among my favorites. The big four, Hemingway,
Steinbeck, Faulkner and Fitzgerald I can do without though some of Faulkner and
Fitzgerald provides interesting psychological insights. As to Pynchon, De Lillo,
Franzen, Bellow, Vollman et al, forget it. As de Beauvoir said, but what about
people. Where, I wonder, is the 'big picture' in America? It’s an interesting
country. It must be somewhere. I’m still looking. I must say I don't consider
myself well read. Foreign films are the same. You go to them to find life; not
to Hollywood the bed of sensationalism and cheap entertainment.
Q: What next for Lee Olds?
LO: Right
now I’m reworking various versions of my past novels that I still hope to have
published. I feel they'll better express my philosophy, i.e., no god, no free
will, no nothingness. Happenstance and disposition as in evolution rule. In my
foreshortening, the style itself suggests the perhaps uncomfortable, claustrophobic
philosophy as well as a closer look, I believe, as to how things in actuality
causally transpire. If we adapt to what I consider to be that more
scientifically valid dictum and everything else goes well for us it just might
lead to a more peaceful coexistence of species.
NOT SO NOBLE BOOKS,
founded by Jasper Joffe and Erik Empson, is always on the look-out for
outstanding authors of any genre.
They can be reached by
pigeon or social media:
Please contact Jasper
or Erik for any press inquiries, interviews, or review copies.
