Answered Prayers

Truman Capote‘s last, unfinished novel, which he planned as early as 1966, but never seems to have written more than a few chapters of. It was supposed to be his magnum opus, the sixties answer to Proust, but he got a little distracted by the success of In cold blood, which came out later that year, and then somewhat discouraged by the furore that broke out when he published three completed chapters in Esquire magazine in the mid-70s. The wealthy New York ladies he liked to hang out with weren’t very happy to see their juiciest private gossip appearing in print, and Capote suddenly found people weren’t returning his calls…

It would have been quite a book, if he’d ever written it, but he didn’t, so all we have are these three show more chapters (according to Capote‘s account, there were two more, which are presumed to have been either lost, destroyed, or never written in the first place). “Unspoiled monsters” introduces the narrator, the foundling, masseur, part-time sex-worker, social climber and sometime short-story writer PB Jones; ”Kate McCloud” takes Jones to Paris and Tangier and links him with a beautiful, sad and wealthy widow; and “La Côte Basque” — the chapter that caused all the trouble — is a virtuoso thirty-page slab of non-stop gossip overheard in a fashionable New York lunch spot. Over the course of the three chapters several hundred prominent names are dropped, most of which seem to belong to actual celebrities of the time, whilst corresponding quantities of cocktails, drugs and expendable sex-objects are conspicuously consumed. All good, salacious fun, reported with Capote’s characteristic verve and economy of language, but it’s hard to see where, if anywhere, it might have been going. Less Proust than a very long and very funny gossip column, really — perhaps it would never have got written even if Capote hadn’t earned enough from violent crime to keep him in gourmet lunches for the rest of his life. show less

Every novel is a form of catharsis in one way or another. It's the deal we make when we buy a book: if the author packages their woes, hopes and gripes well and in an entertaining way, then we will patiently listen and even enjoy ourselves. With all the reader oriented writing Truman did in his career, in the final analysis it's clear that he ultimately did not understand for whom he was writing. In Answered Prayers we see the world through Truman's eyes as he must have experienced life on earth from his humble beginnings up until his humble death. In between he became fascinated with the sordid lives and lifestyles of the rich and famous. Answered Prayers reads in some ways as Martin Luther's accusation and is about the same show more size.

Through Answered Prayers Truman wanted to establish himself as the modern day Proust and he sincerely believed it was his masterpiece. Instead we read page after page about the diversification of vices throughout the 20th century. Almost every sentence demonstrates that Truman saw life through the eyes of inanimate objects, amongst which he counted all his living 'friends'. With great ease he rattles off litanies of then well known names and luxury brands, most of which nobody will have heard of today. Another great mistake I feel since, unlike Proust, Truman immediately dates his work and made it instantly ephemeral.

Granted the writing is as usual of a high quality and extremely mellifluousness, but that doesn't save the work in the least. How much do we really care about the main character, and by proxy about Truman himself? Do we believe everything he says? Do we care if we believe him or not?

In the end the book attempts to answer the one question Truman tried to answer all of his life for himself: "With all these unspoiled monsters, why am I the unlovable one?" show less

El protagonista de la novela, ingenioso, encantador, bisexual, absolutamente amoral logró escaparse de un orfanato a los trece años, aprendió el oficio de masajista y se las ingenió para convertirse en un pícaro moderno y codearse con los ricos y los famosos, desempeñando unas veces el papel de confidente, otras el de bufón y, para los lectores de esta novela, el de divertidísimo cronista de las disparatadas vidas de la jet-set. Este libro es, en buena parte, un roman à clef y, a veces, ni siquiera necesita claves, pues por sus páginas desfilan junto a retratos tenuemente disfrazados de escritores como Tennessee Williams, actrices como Greta Garbo, millonarios como Niarchos personajes reales, como las inefables Mrs. Mathau y show more Mrs. Cooper, cuyos diálogos sobre la vida y costumbres (preferentemente sexuales) de otros miembros de la alta sociedad están reproducidos con cruel fidelidad. show less

At first I was nervous - afraid that Answered Prayers would prove to be a queeny catalogue - yawn...

The queer narrator's voice is established promptly, skillfully. All too quickly I found myself carried along by the delightful prose and by the beguiling PB Jones. It is a joy just to read a page, maybe that's why it just doesn't seem to matter that this is an unfinished novel.

Here's some of my favourite bits:

"As a matter of fact, I am writing this on YMCA stationery in a Manhattan YMCA, where I have been existing the last month in a viewless second-floor cell. I'd prefer the sixth floor - so if I decided to climb out the window, it would make a vital difference."

"Perhaps what I wanted in the way of a wife was the city itself, my show more happiness there, my sense of inevitable fame, fortune. Alas, what I married was a girl."

"...her parents came to visit us: a pair of Swedish brutes from Minnesota, a mammoth twosome twice the size of their daughter."

"Mr Boatwright was the fiction editor of a women's fashion magazine...He came to my attention, or rather I came to his, when one day he spoke to our writing class. I was sitting in the front row, and I could tell, by the way his chilly crotch-watching eyes kept gravitating toward me, what was spinning around in his pretty curly-grey head."

"The editor, with a sleepy gesture meant to disguise cobra alertness, motioned me toward it (his own chair, as I later discovered, contained a little pillow with an embroidered inscription: MOTHER)."

And I'm only seven pages in. You get the picture... this is a really rewarding read if you love skillful writing. show less

Agonized through this depressing curiosity. What did Capote expect of this? What did we expect of him?

For years after Capote published In Cold Blood, he told everyone he was working on a masterpiece that would rival Proust's Remembrance of Things Past. It would be called Answered Prayers, and it would incorporate everything Capote knew about writing both fiction and nonfiction.

Unfortunately, though he thought about the work obsessively, he only wrote three chapters. Those chapters are what make up this book. And they leave you positively hungering for more. Answered Prayers is a roman a clef where the names have been changed, but certainly not to protect the innocent. I don't think there's an innocent character in this book. They're all obsessed with sex or money or power. And sometimes the name change is the only thing fictional about show more the character.

This book is a perfect companion read to Capote by Gerald Clarke because in it you get the facts that form the basis of the barely disguised fiction in this one.

This is a must read for fans of Capote. But it will leave you wishing he'd spent more time writing and less time boozing and pilling his way to the grave. show less

Over the years, I've read a couple other works by Capote. I wasn't bowled over by them (Breakfast at Tiffany's and In Cold Blood), but I wasn't exactly disappointed in them. I found this book to be a disappointment.
I wouldn't have even known about it if it weren't for the series streaming on Hulu: Feud: Capote vs. The Swans. I've only seen a few episodes, but it got me wondering about this fabulous novel that Truman was continuously promising and not following through on. One of the chapters in the book serves as the basis for the beginning of the "feud," so I was most intrigued by that chapter.
In reality, it's all fluff. Capote is basically alternating between self-loving journal entries and bitchy diatribes against the wealthy women show more who fed him and clothed him and kept him in the lap of luxury. I can understand having a bitterness toward people who are exceedingly better off, monetarily--but the way he repays the favor of their love and adoration is appalling. Perhaps if the writing were better, it would've been more enjoyable. He'd clearly blown his wad by the time he began (and never really ended) this novel. Save your time--read something else. show less