|
|
|
|
| |
Nearly a quarter of a century ago, a wiry, intense fellow began to visit my shop. He was usually accompanied by a large and phlegmatic friend who spoke in distinctive, clipped sentences. Book shops are a magnet for characters (witches, tattooed anarchists, and half-mad professors are a dime a dozen) but I'd never met anybody quite like Harvey Pekar and Toby. Harvey, I learned, was a file clerk in the VA hospital system. In lieu of the time-consuming and untidy work of actually getting to know someone, I've always taken the shortcut of sizing up people by the books and records on their shelves. Self-help books, mysteries with cats on the dust jacket, inspirational books, celebrity cookbooks, records by mopey singer-songwriters--these are a few of my least favorite things. Harvey Pekar, on the other hand, regularly brought in boxes of amazing books for trade: novels and short stories from writers I'd never heard of and whose names I would have trouble even pronouncing. It immediately became apparent that Harvey was worth getting to know. Of all the people who passed through my shop's doors, none was better read than Harvey. And he could directly and honestly describe a book free of critic's buzz words, academic theory-of-the-month, and other jargon. Our friendship earned me a handful of appearances in American Splendor, mostly as myself but also once as a jazz buddy of Harvey's who'd suffered an emotional breakdown and found himself institutionalized. I'd never thought that I might resemble a disturbed jazz musician but if the shoe fits who am I to argue?When Mark Dawidziak and I began discussing people to contribute forewords to the Tully reprints, Harvey became an obvious choice. Who better to describe a library rat than another library rat? Harvey, who not only knew Tully's name (very rare) but had read Tully (unprecedented), quickly agreed and we were rewarded some weeks later with his fine, insightful essay on Circus Parade.
|
|
|