Golk
A Novel
Published on 16. December 2014
203 pages
978-1-4976-8528-4 (ISBN)
Description
"The first really good book I have read about television." -Norman Mailer
In midcentury America, one man is determined to take over the airwaves with a program as audacious as it is entertaining. Bald, bombastic, and irresistible, Golk is his name and You're On Camerais his show. To "golk" someone is to trick her, on camera, into betraying her true nature. The more combative the personality, the better the joke, and to help trap his victims Golk enlists a team of misfits, including Herbert Hondorp, a scholarly layabout turned photogenic decoy, and Jeanine Hendricks, a twenty-three-old debutante with a bitter worldview.
But Golk has bigger plans than just catching average Manhattanites unawares. As popular as You're On Camerahas become, he knows the show is capable of making a greater, more transformative impact. The question is, will Herbert and Hendricks go along with his revolutionary agenda? Or will they bow to the power of the network and the seduction of celebrity?
Combining high drama with surreal hilarity and presenting a remarkably prescient view of the future of television, Golkranks with Nathanael West's The Day of the Locustas one of the finest novels ever written about the American entertainment industry.
In midcentury America, one man is determined to take over the airwaves with a program as audacious as it is entertaining. Bald, bombastic, and irresistible, Golk is his name and You're On Camerais his show. To "golk" someone is to trick her, on camera, into betraying her true nature. The more combative the personality, the better the joke, and to help trap his victims Golk enlists a team of misfits, including Herbert Hondorp, a scholarly layabout turned photogenic decoy, and Jeanine Hendricks, a twenty-three-old debutante with a bitter worldview.
But Golk has bigger plans than just catching average Manhattanites unawares. As popular as You're On Camerahas become, he knows the show is capable of making a greater, more transformative impact. The question is, will Herbert and Hendricks go along with his revolutionary agenda? Or will they bow to the power of the network and the seduction of celebrity?
Combining high drama with surreal hilarity and presenting a remarkably prescient view of the future of television, Golkranks with Nathanael West's The Day of the Locustas one of the finest novels ever written about the American entertainment industry.
More details
Person
Richard Stern (1928-2013) was the acclaimed author of more than twenty works of fiction and nonfiction, including the novels
Other Men's Daughters,
Golk,
Stitch, and
Natural Shocks. Born in New York City, he attended the University of North Carolina and received his master's degree from Harvard University and his PhD from the University of Iowa. The recipient of many honors, including the Award of Merit for the Novel, given once every six years by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Stern was a longtime professor of English at the University of Chicago, where he taught alongside Saul Bellow. He counted Flannery O'Connor, Norman Mailer, Anthony Burgess, Lillian Hellman, John Cheever, John Berryman, and Philip Roth among his many other literary admirers.
Content
- Cover Page
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Chapter One
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- Chapter Two
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- V
- VI
- Chapter Three
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- V
- Chapter Four
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- Chapter Five
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- V
- Chapter Six
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- V
- VI
- VII
- VIII
- Chapter Seven
- Chapter Eight
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- About the Author
- Copyright Page
