Sir, thank you very much for writing Fat Men from Outer Space and Lizard Music, they changed my life.
Daniel Epstein -- I am glad to hear it. Others have told me the same thing, but I'm never sure if they are thanking me or accusing.
well. i’m very irritated. i DISTINCTLY remember seeing the meaning of
life posted here…it was something involving bagels…
hello. im a collitch student, and i have no idea how i managed to get
here after reading so many of your books…i would think that would be
on all the applications…HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU READ ALAN MENDELSOHN
THE BOY FROM MARS???
dooo dooo dodo dooo do (tuneless humming)
i am an extremely unworthy individual, i bow before you, do you really
levitate?
please write more books, i will stand on street corners and distribute
them to passersby as i wait for the #22 clark bus.
have you been to 57th Street Books in chicago? i mention them because
not only are they one of the few bookstores that has voluntarily had
book such as young adult novel in stock, but they carry many other books
such as Well Wished which deserves to be plugged also, even though
d.m.p. didn’t write it. anyone passing through chicago should stop by
and SUPPORT YOUR INDEPENDENT BOOKSELLERS–they’re the only ones that
sell books by people like d.m.p.
merci
d -- Was the post from rschroed received via the web, or was it, as I suspect, pressed into your hand by someone in the crowd at the Sunday Brooklyn Outdoor Kosher Computer Market, printed in tiny letters like the exterior of a Dr. Bronner's soap bottle, on a crumpled sheet of paper? This is the dark side of DMP book-culture. We don't know who rschroed is, and that may be for the best. We only hope that s/he will accept our good wishes, and not do us any harm.
I recently received some heinous spam email about 5 Novels by D. P. It must have contained some form of mind control because I dutifully went out and purchased a copy, even though I’d read 4 of the 5 novels several times previously. Now I am left pondering, why these 5 novels? A good omnibus might have all the Spiegel works together, or both Snarkout novels. I suspect the selection was intended to have a second collection “Son of 5 Novels,” with the missing related works. Is this your heinous plot?
Complain to my heinous editor, Mr. Wesley Adams at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. He made the choices--I merely held my breath and approved whatever he wanted. I was happy some company was willing to take on such a project. See, for publishers, bringing out some well-liked books collected in an inexpensive paperback edition is as daring as space-walks. If enough copies sell, yes, there will be another collection. You can help this happen by giving copies to persons known to you, who can read, as holiday gifts. (Cheap ones, too).
I think Adams's idea was to provide a sampling. Probably, he did not dream there might be another collection, and expected to get fired after talking his company into risking more than $4,000 on such a radical project.
My own wish was to make it a really overstuffed 2-volume set with about 20 out-of-print books--and I offered to let FSG do so for the same paltry sum they ultimately advanced me--but it was just too scary for them. I am delighted 5 Novels exists, and hope it does well enough for them to bring out another.
Mr. Pinkwater,
Though I’ve been reading for as long as I can remember, the first books that REALLY got my attention were “Lizard Music” and “The Last Guru.” Memories of them stick with me to this day. You were my first favorite author back in the fouth grade or so, and I want to thank you very much for the hours of enjoyment I got from your books.
I was delighted to discover your commentaries on ATC a couple years ago and always enjoy them. I continue to enjoy your work very much 20 years after first discovering you–something I cannot say for any other author. We should all write to ATC and request more and longer Daniel Pinkwater commentaries (if you’re up to doing them)!
Thanks again, best regards and keep creating,
Chad Kirby
Clearly your early experiences, (including reading my books), gave you a disciplined and creative mind. All write to ATC? You mean atc@npr.org? What an interesting idea. And it's your belief that many communications from listeners would cause them to appreciate me and air my stuff? Well, I've said all along that I attract exceptional readers. This is just another example.
Dear Mr. P.
Well, it’s been a while since i’ve written so I guess I’ll write again. How is your diet going? I noticed that the main (human) character in Mush: A Dog From space is distinctively female. Is this the first book of yours with a female for the main character? I thought it was kind of strange. Also, I’m sure you’ve been asked this for the last twelve years or so but are you or did you already finish Young Adults? I just had to ask because I just read Young Adults for the first time and although I read Young Adult Novel in high school I enjoyed the subsequent chapters even more. I’m looking forward to the publication of The Education Of Robert Nifkin. I have it pre-ordered from amazon. I’m doing my best to keep ratatouille on your table.
Christel Gause -- I wish to emphasize the important distinction between eating a healthy diet, and being on a diet. Many people think that my insane consumption of ratatouille, and guzzling of the product of my 40 horsepower industrial juice extractor, have as their ultimate end making me a little skinny-boy stick-figure of a lightweight wimp. This is not so. I remain round, just terribly healthy. Young Adults? Is that something I wrote? I'm starting to forget things. Have to bulk up on the zucchini.
I am a 23 year old musician. I don’t know if you’d say I was aspiring, but I’m having fun. I am also a big fan of your slightly warped mind. It has greatly influenced my own slightly warped mind since elementary school when my 5th grade teacher Mr. Hibbard would read us your stories. I am in the process of writing a song based on Lizard Music and was wondering: A) is this legal, and B) if so, would you mind? If you would like to screen my lyrics/music first, they can be internetidly reached at
Chris, as far as I know, it is not illegal to write songs. However, I am no lawyer. There are many local laws on the books. It is illegal to converse with chickens, or other poultry, in North Carolina, and to do so on Sundays in Delaware, for example. It may not be legal to write songs in your community. Before putting pen to paper, I would seek counsel, or visit a law library. You are prudent to raise these questions before undertaking the arduous work of composition.
When I read Lizard Music when i was a kid I got to the part about the gorilla eating the guy “like a cookie” and physically lost control of myself. I distinctly remember jumping up and then hurling myself headfirst at the sofa.
Today I am a professional juggler and magician named The Chicken Guy. My chicken is stuffed and doesn’t do tricks, but she does sit on my head during every performance.
Is the story you tell in Chicago Nights/Hoboken Days about a “boy from mars” causing a riot at your school true?
Thanks a million times over-Tom A. The Famous Chicken Guy of Akron, Ohio
Chicken Guy--you carry on a noble traditon, as a chicken-entertainer. That is to say, one who entertains incorporating a chicken in his act, not one who entertains chickens, which is another matter entirely.
Of the 120 or so books you’ve written, have you ever considered one on the experiences of an NPR commentator? Or are you just going to skip all that now that you’ve progressed to Chinwag Theatre? By the way, is Chicago one of the markets where Chinwag is broadcast? Just how many books do you write every week?
Chicago is, in effect, a market where Chinwag Theater is broadcast, as it is distributed by satellite and goes pretty much everywhere. Of course you can't hear it because there has not been sufficient pressure brought to bear on WBEZ...letter-writing campaigns, group visits to the offices, persons chaining themselves to the building, sky-writers, and full-page ads in the Trib have not yet been employed to persuade the conservative administration to carry the program, which is free of cost to the station. Notwithstanding, in at least 26 cities, none of which are Chicago, listeners are delighting in our droll antics. Programs Numbers 13 and 14 are in preparation as I type these words.
PS: I write eleven books, except for those weeks with national or religious holidays in them.
I’m a 43 year old teenager who’s relived his childhood reading the wonderful adventure novels of Daniel M., especially the Snark Out Boys, Kukumlima, Lizard Music. If Goosebumps can kick out dozens of schlocky stories, why can’t you do the same with the Snark Out Boys? The Snark Out Boys and The Bagel of Doom, The Snark Out Boys and the Very Scary Rhododendron. Son of Lizard Music. Get to work, Pinkwater!
Brad, it takes me some little time to crank out a schlocky story. That's why there is no Snarkbumps series, and why the creator of Goosebumps deserves his wealth. Speed is everything, and I am not built for speed. (See my response to Jason, above). You can write fast and well, or you can write slow and lousy. I prefer the latter, and so do my readers, who also tend to like spam with cream sauce, and off-brand toothpaste. There's room for everyone in the Great Democracy.
Dear Mr Pinkwater,
It is hard for me to write this but I truly wish you had been born and bred southern. Your outlook on the slight unpleasantness of the 1860’s as a result of the Northern invasion of the fair south would be delightful.
Seriously, I enjoy your contributions to NPR and your writings. Thank you– you would have made a great southerner ( a fairly delightful compliment from a Tarheel ).
Yours truly,
Michael J Barnett
Born in Memphis, Tennessee, sir. Spoke with a drawl, and used to stand to attention when Dixie was played. However, I was taken to Chicago when still a child, and rehabilitated. My comments on the Woah are encapsulated in the forthcoming novel, ""The Education of Robert Nifkin,"" Farrar Straus and Giroux, scheduled for spring of '98. I won't quote myself out of context, but I will tell you that my remarks about General Lee are unlike any you will have read or heard.
In my youth, I was a graduate student in literature, and assumed that my path in life would be profoundly influenced by Henry James, Charles Dickens, Walt Whitman, and Herman Melville. And others.
So now I am a whole lot older. My 13 year old son spends hours writing Kevin Shapiro stories and my cat is named Borgel, causing a rift in our previously warm relationship with the veterinarian. I just thought you should know.
With affection, JR and family
Borgel is a traditional name for cats, like Puss, Tom, Moggy, and Shlomo or Shloime. I submit it has nothing to do with me, or my work. Probably your kid is heavy into Joseph Conrad, and you do him an injustice.
I’m one of the people who runs the Hoboken Chicken Emergencyclopedia and I thought you might like to know that the site has been getting a lot of traffic from employees of the federal government over the last few days. In the last two days alone, there have been visits from the EPA, the Patent and Trademark Office, the Bureau of Land Management, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and, (most ominously) the Navy’s Space and Sea Warfare Systems Command.
I don’t get it. Is there something subversive in your books (alien invasion, plastic fish, Walter Cronkite) that it would attract attention from all of these authority figures? Or is it just that, now the Cold War has defrosted itself, the guys hunched over the screens in the war room have the time to diddle on the web and look up pages devoted to their favorite nuclear-holocost-is-inevitable predicting author?
Are you kidding? Do you really not know why the goverment types are hitting your site? They're backroom boys. They think it's code. Is it? I thought it was.
Dear Mr. Pinkwater — I heard you talking on NPR the other day about your new web page, and logged on the first chance that i got — how wonderful — of course i love listening to you on NPR, but i first became a fan of yours when i read ‘the big orange splot’ to my daughter about 10 years ago — it remains one of my most all-time favorite books — my husband and i (both anthropologists) are in the process of planning to take off the roof of our old 1940’s bungalow in our cosy little neighborhood of tiny homes — and having a grand second story built on top — sometimes our ideas seem a bit radical for our street — but i always have in the back of my mind — ‘i am my house and my house is me — maybe i’ll check into some frangipani for the backyard
Anthropologists, roofs...you remind me of the time I was living in an African village, and there was an anthropologist studying the tribe. She didn't know how to ask questions without prompting a specific answer. She asked a bunch of young men, ""You never lived in thatched huts, did you? They were gone in your grandfathers' time, right?"" Naturally, they told her they never had. Then when she left they began talking about how they'd steal bits of kindling from the roof, and their mothers would holler at them. ""So you all lived in thatched huts,"" I said. ""Why did you tell the anthropologist you never did?"" ""Well, what's the difference?"" they said. ""Besides she wants to think of us as modern people--so why disappoint her?"" I think she wrote a book about the tribe. Tricky business, anthropology.
Hi, Mr. Pinkwater. Are those Yeti still eating your crayons? I need to say thanks for the reply. Your answers earned me an “A” in my Art Institute classs! Forever grateful, E.S.
Answers which earn A's are always available at this site at competitive prices. Ask about specials on term papers and Master's theses.
You spoke on NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday (the April 4 show) on a couple of new poetry books for children. I thought they were great, so of course I cannot find the titles I wrote down. Could I get those titles again? Any info would be greatly appreciated.
Answer to your query a few down. Thanks for listening.
