Read The Purple Decades Online
Authors: Tom Wolfe
The Purple Decades (48 page)
His hostess came up and made a fuss over him! Exactly! She had read
Under Uncle's Thumb!
So had quite a few of the men, infernal pants and all! Lawyers and investment counselors! They were all interested in him! Quite a streamâhe hardly had to move from the one spot all evening! And as the sun went down over the ocean, and the alcohol rose, and all of their basted teeth glistenedâhe could almost see something â¦
presque vu!
⦠a glimmer of the future ⦠something he could barely make out ⦠a vision in which America's best minds, her intellectuals, found a common ground, a natural unity, with the enlightened segments of her old aristocracy, her old money ⦠the two groups bound together by ⦠but by what? ⦠he could
almost
see it, but not quite ⦠it was
presque vu
⦠it was somehow a matter of taste ⦠of sensibility ⦠of grace, natural grace ⦠just
as he himself had a natural feel for the best British styles, which were after all the source of the Boston manners ⦠What were the library stairs, if they weren't that? What were the Lobb shoes?
Under Uncle's Thumb!
So had quite a few of the men, infernal pants and all! Lawyers and investment counselors! They were all interested in him! Quite a streamâhe hardly had to move from the one spot all evening! And as the sun went down over the ocean, and the alcohol rose, and all of their basted teeth glistenedâhe could almost see something â¦
presque vu!
⦠a glimmer of the future ⦠something he could barely make out ⦠a vision in which America's best minds, her intellectuals, found a common ground, a natural unity, with the enlightened segments of her old aristocracy, her old money ⦠the two groups bound together by ⦠but by what? ⦠he could
almost
see it, but not quite ⦠it was
presque vu
⦠it was somehow a matter of taste ⦠of sensibility ⦠of grace, natural grace ⦠just
as he himself had a natural feel for the best British styles, which were after all the source of the Boston manners ⦠What were the library stairs, if they weren't that? What were the Lobb shoes?
For here, now, surfacing to the top of the pile, is the check for $248 to John Lobb & Sons Ltd. Boot Makersâthat was the way he wrote it out, Boot Makers, two words, the way it was on their bosky florid London letterheadâ$248!âfor one pair of shoes!âfrom England!âhandmade! And now, all at once, even as
chuck chuck chuck
he punches it into the calculator, he is swept by a wave of sentiment, of sadness, sweet miseryâguilt! Two hundred and forty-eight dollars for a pair of handmade shoes from England ⦠He thinks of his father. He wore his first pair of Lobb shoes to his father's funeral. Black cap toes they were, the most formal daytime shoes made, and it was pouring that day in Chicago and his incomparable new shoes from England were caked with mud when he got back to his father's house. He took the shoes off, but then he frozeâhe couldn't bring himself to remove the mud. His father had come to the United States from Russia as a young man in 1922. He had to go to work at once, and in no time, it seemed, came the Depression, and he struggled through it as a tailor, although in the forties he acquired a dry-cleaning establishment and, later, a second one, plus a diaper-service business and a hotel-linen service. But this brilliant manâoh, how many times had his mother assured him of that!âhad had to spend all those years as a tailor. This cultivated man!âmore assurancesâoh, how many yards of Goethe and Dante had he heard him quote in an accent that gripped the English language like a full nelson! And now his son, the son of this brilliant, cultivated but uneducated and thwarted manânow his son, his son with his education and his literary career, his son who had never had to work with his hands more than half an hour at a stretch in his lifeâhis son had turned up at his funeral in a pair of handmade shoes from England! ⦠Well, he let the mud dry on them. He didn't touch them for six months. He didn't even put the shoe trees (another $47) in. Perhaps the goddamned boots would curl up and die.
chuck chuck chuck
he punches it into the calculator, he is swept by a wave of sentiment, of sadness, sweet miseryâguilt! Two hundred and forty-eight dollars for a pair of handmade shoes from England ⦠He thinks of his father. He wore his first pair of Lobb shoes to his father's funeral. Black cap toes they were, the most formal daytime shoes made, and it was pouring that day in Chicago and his incomparable new shoes from England were caked with mud when he got back to his father's house. He took the shoes off, but then he frozeâhe couldn't bring himself to remove the mud. His father had come to the United States from Russia as a young man in 1922. He had to go to work at once, and in no time, it seemed, came the Depression, and he struggled through it as a tailor, although in the forties he acquired a dry-cleaning establishment and, later, a second one, plus a diaper-service business and a hotel-linen service. But this brilliant manâoh, how many times had his mother assured him of that!âhad had to spend all those years as a tailor. This cultivated man!âmore assurancesâoh, how many yards of Goethe and Dante had he heard him quote in an accent that gripped the English language like a full nelson! And now his son, the son of this brilliant, cultivated but uneducated and thwarted manânow his son, his son with his education and his literary career, his son who had never had to work with his hands more than half an hour at a stretch in his lifeâhis son had turned up at his funeral in a pair of handmade shoes from England! ⦠Well, he let the mud dry on them. He didn't touch them for six months. He didn't even put the shoe trees (another $47) in. Perhaps the goddamned boots would curl up and die.
The number ⦠248 ⦠is sitting right up there in slanted orange digits on the face of the calculator. That seems to end the reverie. He doesn't want to continue it just now. He doesn't want to see the 6684 for Martha's Vineyard up there again for a while. He doesn't want to see the seven digits of his debts (counting the ones after the decimal point) glowing in their full, magnificent, intoxicating length. It's time to get serious!
Discipline!
Only one thing will pull him out of all this: work ⦠writing ⦠and there's no way to put it off any longer.
Discipline
, Mr. Wonderful! This is the most difficult day of all, the day when it falls to his lot to put a piece of paper in the typewriter and start on page 1 of a new book, with that horrible arthritic siegeâ
writing a book!âstretching out ahead of him (a tubercular blue glow, as his mind comprehends it) ⦠although it lifts his spirits a bit to know that both
The Atlantic
and
Playboy
have expressed an interest in running chapters as he goes along, and
Penthouse
would pay even more, although he doesn't want it to appear in a one-hand magazine, a household aid, as literary penicillin to help quell the spirochetes oozing from all the virulent vulvas ⦠Nevertheless! help is on the way! Hell!âthere's not a magazine in America that wouldn't publish something from this book!
Discipline!
Only one thing will pull him out of all this: work ⦠writing ⦠and there's no way to put it off any longer.
Discipline
, Mr. Wonderful! This is the most difficult day of all, the day when it falls to his lot to put a piece of paper in the typewriter and start on page 1 of a new book, with that horrible arthritic siegeâ
writing a book!âstretching out ahead of him (a tubercular blue glow, as his mind comprehends it) ⦠although it lifts his spirits a bit to know that both
The Atlantic
and
Playboy
have expressed an interest in running chapters as he goes along, and
Penthouse
would pay even more, although he doesn't want it to appear in a one-hand magazine, a household aid, as literary penicillin to help quell the spirochetes oozing from all the virulent vulvas ⦠Nevertheless! help is on the way! Hell!âthere's not a magazine in America that wouldn't publish something from this book!
So he feeds a sheet of paper into his typewriter, and in the center, one third of the way down from the top, he takes care of the easy part firstâthe working title, in capital letters:
RECESSION AND REPRESSION
POLICE STATE AMERICA
AND THE SPIRIT OF '76
POLICE STATE AMERICA
AND THE SPIRIT OF '76
No. 1. The Down-filled People
T
hey wear down-filled coats in public. Out on the ski slopes they look like hand grenades. They have “audio systems” in their homes and know the names of hit albums. They drive two-door cars with instrument panels like an F-16's. They
like High-Tech furniture, track lighting, glass, and brass. They actually go to plays in New York and follow professional sports. The down-filled men wear turtleneck sweaters and Gucci belts and loafers and cover parts of their ears with their hair. The down-filled women still wear cowl-necked sweaters and carry Louis Vuitton handbags. The down-filled people strip wood and have interior walls removed. They put on old clothes before the workmen come over. In the summer they like cabins on fresh water and they go hiking. They regard
Saturday Night Live
and Steve Martin as funny. They say “I hear you,” meaning “I understand what you're saying.” They say “Really,” meaning “That's right.” When down-filled strangers are at a loss for words, they talk about real-estate prices.
hey wear down-filled coats in public. Out on the ski slopes they look like hand grenades. They have “audio systems” in their homes and know the names of hit albums. They drive two-door cars with instrument panels like an F-16's. They
like High-Tech furniture, track lighting, glass, and brass. They actually go to plays in New York and follow professional sports. The down-filled men wear turtleneck sweaters and Gucci belts and loafers and cover parts of their ears with their hair. The down-filled women still wear cowl-necked sweaters and carry Louis Vuitton handbags. The down-filled people strip wood and have interior walls removed. They put on old clothes before the workmen come over. In the summer they like cabins on fresh water and they go hiking. They regard
Saturday Night Live
and Steve Martin as funny. They say “I hear you,” meaning “I understand what you're saying.” They say “Really,” meaning “That's right.” When down-filled strangers are at a loss for words, they talk about real-estate prices.
No. 2. Bliss SoHo Boho
O
h, to be young and come to New York and move into your first loft and look at the world with eyes that light up even the rotting fire-escape railings, even the buckling pressed-tin squares on the ceiling, even the sheet-metal shower stall
with its belly dents and rusting seams, the soot granules embedded like blackheads in the dry rot of the window frames, the basin with the copper-green dripping-spigot stains in the cracks at the bottom, the door with its crowbar-notch history of twenty-five years of break-ins, the canvas-bottom chairs that cut off the circulation in the sural arteries of the leg, the indomitable roach that appears every morning in silhouette on the cord of the hot plate, the doomed yucca straining for light on the windowsill, the two cats nobody ever housebroke, the garbage trucks with the grinder whine, the leather freaks and health-shoe geeks, the punkers with chopped hair and Korean warm-up jackets, the herds of Uptown Boutique bohemians who arrive every weekend by radio-call cab, the bag ladies who sit on the standpipes swabbing the lesions on their anklesâoh, to be young and in New York and to have eyes that light up all things with the sweetest and most golden glow!
h, to be young and come to New York and move into your first loft and look at the world with eyes that light up even the rotting fire-escape railings, even the buckling pressed-tin squares on the ceiling, even the sheet-metal shower stall
with its belly dents and rusting seams, the soot granules embedded like blackheads in the dry rot of the window frames, the basin with the copper-green dripping-spigot stains in the cracks at the bottom, the door with its crowbar-notch history of twenty-five years of break-ins, the canvas-bottom chairs that cut off the circulation in the sural arteries of the leg, the indomitable roach that appears every morning in silhouette on the cord of the hot plate, the doomed yucca straining for light on the windowsill, the two cats nobody ever housebroke, the garbage trucks with the grinder whine, the leather freaks and health-shoe geeks, the punkers with chopped hair and Korean warm-up jackets, the herds of Uptown Boutique bohemians who arrive every weekend by radio-call cab, the bag ladies who sit on the standpipes swabbing the lesions on their anklesâoh, to be young and in New York and to have eyes that light up all things with the sweetest and most golden glow!
No. 3. Victims of Inflation
S
o I go to the place and I tell the guy I want four of those captain's swivel seats for my van, in leather, to go with the lounge banquette underneath the thermo bay in back, and you know what he tells me? One-half down, 20 percent
interest on the balance for two years on a five-year payout basis with a $750 balloon payment at the end!”
o I go to the place and I tell the guy I want four of those captain's swivel seats for my van, in leather, to go with the lounge banquette underneath the thermo bay in back, and you know what he tells me? One-half down, 20 percent
interest on the balance for two years on a five-year payout basis with a $750 balloon payment at the end!”
“I hear you. This dude who's giving my wife flying lessons, he says he's gonna start charging $35 an hour. I told him he can fly that one right up the freaking pipe!”
The Modern Churchman
H
e was a socially acceptable but obscure minister to the Tassel Loafer & Tennis Lesson Set until the day in 1975 when he announced that he was a pederast. He not only announced it, he enunciated his theory that the sexual life of the
child was an essential part of, not an obstacle to, the spiritual life of the child, and that anyone who doubted that God had created a link of sexual attraction between generations was an upland Tennessee aborigine. Half of his congregation walked out, but the other half was stimulated by the television coverage. The diocesan governors had long been troubled by declining church membership and felt that here, at last, was a Modern Churchman who could Reach the Urban Young People. Emboldened by a measure of fame and official support, he enunciated the theory that terrorists were God's Holy Beasts, arguing that Jesus had entered the temple with a flog or cat-o'-nine-tails, according to which Renaissance painting one looked at, to drive the moneychangers out and that the Mexican artist David Alfaro Siqueiros had once led a machine-gun raid on the home of Leon Trotsky. He was a great supporter of the arts, and in his home, an old carriage house redone in nail patterns by Ronaldo Clutter, the interior designer, the painting frame had replaced the cross as a religious symbol. When he held a Holy Roller Disco Night in the sanctuary and urged the recitation of the prayer book “in tongues,” he was featured in the Religion sections of both
Time
and
Newsweek,
and his elevation to bishop was said to be imminent.
e was a socially acceptable but obscure minister to the Tassel Loafer & Tennis Lesson Set until the day in 1975 when he announced that he was a pederast. He not only announced it, he enunciated his theory that the sexual life of the
child was an essential part of, not an obstacle to, the spiritual life of the child, and that anyone who doubted that God had created a link of sexual attraction between generations was an upland Tennessee aborigine. Half of his congregation walked out, but the other half was stimulated by the television coverage. The diocesan governors had long been troubled by declining church membership and felt that here, at last, was a Modern Churchman who could Reach the Urban Young People. Emboldened by a measure of fame and official support, he enunciated the theory that terrorists were God's Holy Beasts, arguing that Jesus had entered the temple with a flog or cat-o'-nine-tails, according to which Renaissance painting one looked at, to drive the moneychangers out and that the Mexican artist David Alfaro Siqueiros had once led a machine-gun raid on the home of Leon Trotsky. He was a great supporter of the arts, and in his home, an old carriage house redone in nail patterns by Ronaldo Clutter, the interior designer, the painting frame had replaced the cross as a religious symbol. When he held a Holy Roller Disco Night in the sanctuary and urged the recitation of the prayer book “in tongues,” he was featured in the Religion sections of both
Time
and
Newsweek,
and his elevation to bishop was said to be imminent.
Primitive Cultures
Professor Nkhrani Emu
Chairman, Department of Anthropology
University of Chembuezi
Babuelu, Chembuezi
Chairman, Department of Anthropology
University of Chembuezi
Babuelu, Chembuezi
Â
Most Esteemed Professor:
Â
Â
As you know, dear Sir, our research team is approaching the end of its field study of “The Sexual Mores of the Americans.” I hereby request, most respectfully, that we be granted an extension of the term of our project and a renewal of funding for this work. It is impossible
for anyone in a society such as ours to envision from afar the bizarre sexual customs, practices
and rituals to be observed among the American people.
for anyone in a society such as ours to envision from afar the bizarre sexual customs, practices
and rituals to be observed among the American people.In the republic's largest city, New York, the most prestigious form of entertainment takes place in theaters that have been converted to dance halls. Hundreds of young males may be seen dancing with one another to flashing lights and recorded music in a homoerotic frenzy, while prominent citizens, including politicians, lawyers, financiers, and upper-class matrons, as well as every sort of well-known figure in the arts, most of them heterosexual, look on, apparently greatly stimulated by the atmosphere. This is described in the native press as “disco fever.”
In fact, the mores that have grown up among the Americans concerning homosexuality are apt to be most baffling to the investigator first arriving from a society such as ours. In the United States it is the homosexual male who takes on the appearance that in our society is associated with heterosexual masculinity. Which is to say, he wears his hair short in a style known as the
crew cut
or
butch cut
; he wears the simple leather jacket, sleeveless shirt, crew sweater, or steel-toed boot of the day laborer, truck driver, soldier, or sailor; and, if he exercises, he builds up the musculature of his upper arms and chest. The heterosexual male, by contrast, wears long hair, soft open-throated shirts that resemble a woman's blouse, necklaces, gold wristwatches, shapeless casual jackets of a sort worn also by women; and if he exercises, he goes in for a feminine form of running called
jogging
.
crew cut
or
butch cut
; he wears the simple leather jacket, sleeveless shirt, crew sweater, or steel-toed boot of the day laborer, truck driver, soldier, or sailor; and, if he exercises, he builds up the musculature of his upper arms and chest. The heterosexual male, by contrast, wears long hair, soft open-throated shirts that resemble a woman's blouse, necklaces, gold wristwatches, shapeless casual jackets of a sort worn also by women; and if he exercises, he goes in for a feminine form of running called
jogging
.
The most popular periodicals in America consist of photographs of young women with gaping pudenda and text of a purportedly serious nature, such as interviews with presidents of the republic (!). These are known as “one-hand magazines.”
It is the custom throughout the native schools of America to give sex
education
in the classroom to children by the age of thirteen. The children are taught that sexual intercourse is natural, beautiful, and the highest expression of human love. They are also taught that sexual energy is one of a person's most powerful and creative forces, that it will find expression in some form, that it should not be denied. Yet the Americans are at the same time baffled by the fact that the number of pregnancies out of wedlock among schoolgirls rises continually. In this the Americans are somewhat like the Kombanda tribesmen of our country, who, ignorant of the causal relation of activities separated by time, believe that pregnancy is caused by the sun shining on the bare midsections of females of a certain age. The administrators of the American schools remain bewildered, saying that in the sex-education classes females are given pamphlets clearly outlining birth-control
procedures. At the same time, their own records show that only a fraction of American secondary-school graduates can read.
education
in the classroom to children by the age of thirteen. The children are taught that sexual intercourse is natural, beautiful, and the highest expression of human love. They are also taught that sexual energy is one of a person's most powerful and creative forces, that it will find expression in some form, that it should not be denied. Yet the Americans are at the same time baffled by the fact that the number of pregnancies out of wedlock among schoolgirls rises continually. In this the Americans are somewhat like the Kombanda tribesmen of our country, who, ignorant of the causal relation of activities separated by time, believe that pregnancy is caused by the sun shining on the bare midsections of females of a certain age. The administrators of the American schools remain bewildered, saying that in the sex-education classes females are given pamphlets clearly outlining birth-control
procedures. At the same time, their own records show that only a fraction of American secondary-school graduates can read.
So, most revered Sir, we beseech your support in obtaining for us the resources to complete our work. You will recall, Sir, pointing out to us the importance of Diedrich's discovery of the Luloras, the tribe that made its women climb trees and remain there throughout their menstrual periods. Well, Sirâin all humility!âwe are convinced that through our work here we have uncovered a yet more primitive layer in the anthropology of human sexual evolution.
Your worshipful student and friend,
Pottho Mboti
Pottho Mboti
Â
New York City
United States of America
United States of America
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