I am trying to understand the outrage behind the JT Leroy saga. Laura Albert is a writer and actress. She created what she called an ‘avatar,’ JT Leroy. She wrote a novel which became a best-seller. She followed up with another work of fiction, a collection of stories. This book was picked up by Hollywood and a film was made. So let me ask, what’s wrong with that?
The outrage comes because Albert hired an actress to portray Leroy. The subterfuge worked for a while, but eventually an investigative reporter found out that Leroy was Albert’s pen name. The problem is that Albert had told people that Leroy was not a pen name but a real person.
All of a sudden, the books and film became worthless, part of what has been called a literary “hoax.” Even though JT Leroy was not real, the books certainly were. And at no time did Albert, or the actress she hired, claim that the books were anything other than what they were, i.e., works of fiction. So why the outrage?
Steven King used the name “Richard Bachman” to write a series of novels. When the world found out that Bachman was King, Bachman’s books were merely added to King’s ouevre. Yet Albert was unfairly ostracized, even though one could argue that the whole JT Leroy portrayal was astonishing performance art.
What is a novel, anyway? And should the author’s true identity always be a consideration? Do we damn J.R.R. Tolkien because he never visited Middle Earth? Eileen Myles’ Inferno: A Poet’s Novel is really a memoir, isn’t it? When she writes about afternoons spent at the home of Ted Berrigan and Alice Notley, she is referring to the author of Tambourine Life and his wife, the author of The Descent of Alette. By saying, “this is a novel” is Myles warning, “I have modified the facts?”
T K. Madden’s recent Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls approaches the question from the opposite direction, billing her work as a memoir but warning that her subjective memories of facts are her own. The level of detail in Madden’s work is similarly the opposite of the Latin legal rule, falsus in unus, falsus in omnibus: the truth of the details she recounts is strong evidence of the truth of the whole. Madden brings South Florida to life, she brings the 90’s to life: mentioning the padded strap of a Sony videocamera is but one accurate detail in a book full of trenchant observations.
Yet Myles’ book is full of observations as well. Annie Ernaux’s works fit well within what the French call autofiction , the Japanese the I-novel and sometimes read like a letter to a friend.
Those who claim “memoir” but actually write fiction are treated harshly–Little Pieces comes to mind. Laura Albert was treated just as harshly, but made no claim of truth.
Noam Chomsky once asked, “do the facts matter?” Perhaps the facts only matter when presented as facts. A journalist who lies is outside the pale. A novelist writing narrative fiction should be able to tell a story, whether that story is based on historical facts or invented, as they say, out of whole cloth.
Were JT Leroy’s “Sarah” to become popular today, would anyone care that Laura Albert had used a pen name?
Earle Stanley Gardner was an American lawyer, novelist and creator of Perry Mason, a crime-fighting lawyer who jumped from the novels to radio, film and finally a hit television series in 1957 starring Raymond Burr. Mason’s adventures were informed by Gardner’s work as a practicing attorney. The character was re-introduced in a new HBO television series that premiered during the pandemic.
Gardner never gave his readers Mason’s origin story; that story is the basis for the new series. Gardner went to law school in Indiana but never finished; he read for the law and took the bar exam in California, a state which then as now allows postulants to qualify without a law degree.
The new series is set in 1932. Mason is a private detective working for a newly invented character, a 74 year-old lawyer named “E.B. Jonathan” who is played by John Lithgow.
Jonathan and Mason are working on the defense of a sensational case, the kidnapping-murder of a young boy. Newspaper reporters constantly interrupt their work, but savvy Jonathan knows that playing the press is part of the defense. The district attorney grandstanded the arrest of their client while she was attending her own son’s funeral amidst a press riot. Jonathan must, as best as he can, present his client as an innocent victim as well.
At first, talking about the great California jurist and Supreme Court justice, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jonathan flaunts his own youth in comparison. Jonathan is 16 years younger than the 90 year old Holmes. In his own mind, Jonathan is younger still. He still very much has his wits about him.
But no matter. Old age stalks him. He has health problems, foreshadowed in previous episodes; feet that swell at night. Mason teases him by pointing out that he doesn’t suffer from the same ailments, to which Jonathan replies, “but you will.” Jonathan has fallen asleep in his clothes in his office; he asks Mason to help him with his shoes. The two men reminisce over their first meeting; Mason’s father had a property dispute; Jonathan’s office was between a blacksmith’s and a saddle maker’s. Those trades are gone, but Jonathan remembers the past fondly. He complains to Mason, just wait till “half your friends are in the cemetery and a million strangers on the street.”
Unfortunately, the wealthy grandfather of the victim who hired them has cut them off, now that he believes the child’s mother was involved in the crime. Jonathan moans that they have gone from being well-funded to defending the case pro bono. The Latin term, short for pro bono publico means, “for the public good.” What people do not understand is that the phrase also means, “the lawyer pays.”
Jonathan’s practice is not what it was. Time has taken away not only friends, but clients. The strangers in the street do not find their way to his office to seek a solution to their legal problems. While Jonathan still insists that his secretary answer the phone with both his name and the phrase, “and associates,” Jonathan knows that there are no more associates. He is the only lawyer in the office. But Jonathan knows how a case must be defended and how to defend a notorious case.
In a previous episode, Jonathan visited a colleague to ask for a loan. That colleague turned him away. When you need money, no one has it. Worse, the colleague reminds him of decades-old questionable financial maneuvering at the time of the First World War.
Jonathan has raided his savings to keep his office afloat. Unlike others, he was not destroyed by the 1929 Depression, but those events are still taking their toll. He has a payroll to meet, and Mason is not the only investigator he has working the case. With the loss of his client’s funding, he goes to his bank to seek a “measly” four month loan so that he can finance the case, his office, his secretary and the two investigators. But his bank officer, his friend Howard, is no longer with the bank and has retired. The new bank officer assigned to his file is unfamiliar with his business and sees only that Jonathan’s assets that survived the Crash are already mortgaged. There will be no bank loan.
Meanwhile, the district attorney has learned of the financial irregularities—to keep the lights on during the war, Jonathan “borrowed” from his trust account, though he replaced the funds and no client was harmed. For many years lawyers have been taught to view such conduct with horror, but a century ago the relationship between lawyers and banks was symbiotic in a way unimaginable today. Lawyers kept interest-free trust accounts at banks, which provided free banking services to the lawyer, such as covering checks that might otherwise bounce and providing automatic lines of credit.
The district attorney threatens Jonathan with disbarment if he does not try the case or take a plea. The DA doesn’t want his investigator, Perry Mason to keep nosing around, either.
With no money to finance the case, Jonathan visits his client in jail to suggest a plea, which would at least give them both a way out. She would avoid the electric chair and he would be free of the case. In explaining the plea to her, he explains that sometimes when the power of the government is aligned against you, there is little you can do. Believing herself innocent, the mother refuses the plea. Jonathan gives a short inspirational speech, “we’ll fight then.”
But he doesn’t have the money to fight the case and now he cannot withdraw discreetly and honorably. If he withdraws, the newspapers will be merciless. The DA is threatening him with a very public disbarment. His life as a lawyer will be over.
Jonathan goes home to sleep and to think about the best course of action. The next morning he dresses as if to go to court. An old newspaper protects his kitchen table, displaying a story featuring a case he was once involved with, a reminder of ephimeral past glory. He arranges a chair, puts a towel under the kitchen door, turns the gas on and sits down.
This episode is not about Jonathan, not about the difficulties of practicing as a solo, not about the personal threats suffered by those who practice criminal law, not about the danger of getting involved in notorious cases or the thanklessness of pro bono work and certainly is not about the danger posed by trust accounts.
Bahrain’s doing pretty well. 5374 active cases at the beginning of July and 2995 at month’s end. Last time there were only this many active cases was May 11. Let’s hope the downward trend continues.
