As Long As It Isn’t True: A Literary Scandals Podcast

The Holly Golightly Sweepstakes

After a long hiatus, As Long As It Isn't True returns for season two. In 1958, Truman Capote published his novella Breakfast at Tiffany's, which would go on to become one of the most beloved pieces of literature of all-time. It would inspire the equally beloved film adaptation starring Audrey Hepburn in 1961, a film we're still talking about today. But Capote's inspiration for the character of Holly Golightly is a whole other story, as well as the flocks of women who started claiming they were the real Holly Golightly on which Capote based the character. Threats of libel lawsuits were made. But the true inspiration for Holly is something of a Freudian tale... Instagram: @literaryscandals [instagram.com/literaryscandals] Selected bibliography: • Fifth Avenue, 5 A.M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman by Sam Wasson • "Gay Pride Book: Truman Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's - the Novel That Saved My Life [https://www.huffpost.com/entry/gay-pride-book-truman-cap_b_5535140?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNhLw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAH333akQCTdSrhPtD8s481SVUURNUTLV2NQYHHxBb0N9fZKvXEcTTFzbaw3_nWJbztMfiw6wLsp9OHd77r3cXnS6uRPFoGt4pLMjNP5FYNyt33px5NUeI9rbUSnSabHtRLQIMsEQDAvtmBkPwDR_kwy_p1EaiOoF7cUuhdJ22LlT]" by Jamie Brickhouse, HuffPost • Capote by Gerald Clarke

Conformity Killed the Radio Star: Jean Shepherd and the Great Literary Hoax of I, LIBERTINE

"The people who believe in these lists are asleep. Anyone sitting up at three in the morning secretly has doubts." Are you a day person or a night person? Ask Jean Shepherd, the infamous late-night '50s radio DJ who concocted an entire literary hoax in the form of a book called I, Libertine. Shepherd believed that Manhattan, and the world at large, depended almost entirely upon lists — like The New York Times Best Seller list. So, he asked his listeners to help him come up with the name of a title of a book that didn't exist, so that they all might visit bookstores the next day and ask for it and watch the confusion grow on the employees' faces. The ruse even started to reach cities overseas like Paris and Rome. It was the greatest book to never exist, until it suddenly did exist... Theme music is credited to Wendy Marcini, Elvin Vanguard, and Jules Gaia. Instagram: @literaryscandals [https://publish.blubrry.com/s-3563083/episodes/e-132875359/edit/instagram.com/literaryscandals] Selected bibliography: • Excelsior, You Fathead!: The Art and Enigma of Jean Shepherd by Eugene B. Bergmann • “The Man Behind the Brilliant Media Hoax of ‘I, Libertine [https://www.theawl.com/2013/02/the-man-behind-the-brilliant-media-hoax-of-i-libertine/],’” The Awl • “An interview with Shepherd on the hoax from Long John Nebel’s radio show [https://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/06/the-i-libertine.html],” WFMU’s Beware of the Blog • “Ballantine Books Makes Hoax Come True [https://web.archive.org/web/20020427051336/https:/flicklives.com/Articles/Wall_Street_Journel/8-1-56/8-1-56.jpg],” The Wall Street Journal

Be Gay Do Crime: The Literary Criminal Career of Lee Israel

After her writing career as a biographer was destroyed by a book that tanked, as well as her off-putting personality, Lee Israel fell into poverty and began forging letters and literary documents of prominent 20th-century authors. She was so good at slipping into the words and minds of others that some of her forgeries even made their way into an early edition of a 2007 biography on Noël Coward. But like all good career criminals, Lee's success would come to an untimely end. She would tell her story in her 2008 memoir Can You Ever Forgive Me?: Memoirs of a Literary Forger, which was adapted into a feature film starring Melissa McCarthy as Lee — for which she would be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Additional narrations were provided by Sharon Hyland. Theme music is credited to Wendy Marcini, Elvin Vanguard, and Jules Gaia. Instagram: @literaryscandals [https://publish.blubrry.com/s-3563083/episodes/e-132875359/edit/instagram.com/literaryscandals] Selected bibliography: • Can You Ever Forgive Me?: Memoirs of a Literary Forger by Lee Israel • "How A Successful Biographer Became A Forger [https://www.npr.org/2008/09/10/94461486/how-a-successful-biographer-became-a-forger]," NPR

Best Minds: Allen Ginsberg and the Poem That Shook the World

“You can’t translate poetry into prose. That’s why it’s poetry.” At a poetry reading at a San Francisco art gallery in October 1955, Allen Ginsberg — one of the defining members of the Beat generation — debuted a poem called "Howl." Lauded for its portrayal of what it meant to be an outcast in 1950s society and for its depiction of drug use and sexuality, its success led to Ginsberg's first collection of poetry. Within five months of its publication, the U.S. government seized some 300 copies of it, only to drop the case fairly quickly. The San Francisco police department, however, was not impressed and launched a local, as opposed to a federal, effort to ban the book from city bookstores. Literary freedom of speech was being put on trial yet again, and the poem was about to have the last laugh. Additional narrations were provided by Sharon Hyland. Theme music is credited to Wendy Marcini, Elvin Vanguard, and Jules Gaia. Instagram: @literaryscandals [https://publish.blubrry.com/s-3563083/episodes/e-132875359/edit/instagram.com/literaryscandals] Selected bibliography: • "The 'Howl' Heard Round the World [https://www.britannica.com/story/the-howl-heard-round-the-world]," Encyclopedia Britannica • Black, Joel (2003). "'Arrested for Selling Poetry!' or 'You Wouldn't Want Your Children Reading This': The Historical Significance of the 'Howl' Obscenity Trial," Concordia University

The Gayest Books: Edward Sagarin and the Cory Book Service

“Rapidly growing interest in the subject of homosexuality has made novels on this theme a big seller...” Happy Pride Month! After one publishing house started finding success with publishing books focusing on themes of homosexuality in the late 1940s and early 1950s, they began keeping a mailing list of those interested in gay books. But the United States Postal Service started catching on, and the publishers were indicted on obscenity charges. That didn't stop Donald Webster Cory, the pen name of American academic Edward Sagarin, from starting his own gay mail-order book business in 1952: the Cory Book Service. But Sagarin was plagued by internalized homophobia, and for decades maintained that homosexuality was a mental illness that can be cured. That is, until another queer academic had enough of Edward's drama. Theme music is credited to Wendy Marcini, Elvin Vanguard, and Jules Gaia. Instagram: @literaryscandals [instagram.com/literaryscandals] Selected bibliography: • Buying Gay: How Physique Entrepreneurs Sparked a Movement by David K. Johnson • "The Book Club That Helped Launch the Gay-Rights Movement [https://www.newyorker.com/news/american-chronicles/the-book-club-that-helped-spark-the-gay-rights-movement]," The New Yorker • "Sagarin, Edward (Donald Webster Cory)," GLBTQ: An Encyclopedia of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender & Queer Culture