I met Ned Rorem so long ago we once got drunk together. that nite is mentiond in "Swimmers Out of Water."
altho he was best known for his music my first attraction to Ned was his writing. there was a time when reading his diaries was de rigueur for the gay cognoscenti. when my name appeard in one of them I felt as if I had a brick in my own house of fame.
in an unpublishd journal I wrote:
impressions of Ned Rorem on first meeting
1. looks younger than his years
2. speech defect noticeable but charming
(& based on some 5 minutes of conversation:)
3. appears less arrogant than anticipated
from the beginning he was honest & critical & quite the gossip.
I recall my making him a rueben sandwich & he fixing me scrambled eggs.
if I am a footnote in his life I suspect it wd be that I was the first (& perhaps only?) person to ask him to read from his diaries. that was at Kent State. I also publishd him in "A Festschrift for Djuna Barnes on Her 80th Birthday" & "My First Movie."
as often happens we lost touch over the years.
here's his contribution to "Gildzen at 50" :
No comments:
Post a Comment