He became an instant celebrity with a novel that captured the 80s zeitgeist with precision and skill while harking back to his literary predecessors, especially unmistakable allusions to F. Jay McInerney exploded onto the literary scene in 1984 with his first novel, Bright Lights, Big City. A couple of weeks ago, looking for new reading material, there it was. I bought the McInerney book on a whim when it hit the shelves last summer and never opened it.
Over the past couple of years, I have abandoned old habits like going to movies and plays and hiking and reading fiction and so it’s good to see that my attention to novels and short stories, at least, seems to be renewed. One good thing about all of this is that it seems that I am regularly reading novels again. His reply is that he likes to have options. In it there is a flashback to the ‘80s in which one of the characters asks another – a bad boy novelist – why he wears his button-downs unbuttoned. This memory was sparked by the fact that I just finished Jay McInerney’s latest novel, Bright, Precious Days (Knopf, 2016). I guess it’s an affectation, but it’s a subtle and harmless one … until now, when I have announced it. Life’s too short to return clothes that fit so, more often than not, I will wear the button-down with the collar unbuttoned. Indeed, I still don’t like button-downs but occasionally I will accidentally buy one.
I liked the shirts but never liked button-downs and I guess the look was a subtle rebuke to the preppy movement of the day. This was true but I had never called attention to it and didn’t realize anyone had noticed, much less remembered. He recalled that I had a tendency, during my long grad school stint, to wear Oxford cloth button-down shirts with the collar unbuttoned.
A few years ago, I reconnected with a college acquaintance whom I hadn’t seen in decades.
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