Curse You, David Kamp! [Nov 10, 2003]

I generally don't read The New York Times, because I prefer to get my news from sources unsullied by a baldly anti-American agenda. Nonetheless, I forced myself to read last Sunday's Book Review. My editor had informed me that my novel Never Mind The Pollacks was the subject of a politically-motivated takedown by a jealous rival with the unlikely name of David Kamp. It's almost certain that you missed the review, because no one pays any attention to the Times anymore, but you can read it here.

Unlike David Kamp, I'm not a practitioner of what I like to call "snark," a word fungus that has completely destroyed the once-noble profession of book reviewing. A review is snarky by definition if it criticizes something written by me or by my friends, and particularly if it refers to me as "an ordinary humor dork, yet another doughy, 35-ish white man with a goatee and thinning hair." Reviews should only praise books in general, and should always give a flattering impression of the writer's appearance in particular. Would the great Lionel Trilling, whose wife Diana used to provide me with a weekly hummer, ever have referred to, say, John O'Hara as a "doughy 35-ish white man?" I think not. These are books we're writing here, people! Sacred objects of a bygone age! Books! How dare you criticize me, David Kamp? Have you no shame, man? Have you no respect for the temple of literature?

Further complicating the situation is the fact that David Kamp has been stalking me for nearly a year. The editors of the Times should have known this. Assigning him this review was a clear conflict of interest.

A couple of weeks ago, I was signing books after I'd given a reading before 10,000 enraptured people in a San Diego-area basketball arena. A man stepped to the front of the line, camcorder blazing.

"Where are you staying while you're in town?" he asked.

"I'm actually staying up in L.A.," I said. "I got a room at the Chateau Marmont. Big orgy later. Wanna come?"

In retrospect, that was a huge mistake.

"Sure!" he said.

He gave me his book to sign.

"What's your name?"

"David Kamp."

"OK, David. I'm in Suite 317. Don't forget to bring that camera!"

In retrospect, another huge mistake.

So I guess what I'm saying is that the "Neal Pollack" in the Neal Pollack Sex Tape that David Kamp has been making available for the last week on his website, goateedanddoughy.com, is, in fact, me, and yes, those are the Hilton Sisters who've got me in that sandwich and yes, I am doing that thing to Diego Luna. I'm not ashamed. It's a right sexy tape, and people have been emailing me all week surprised at the evident quality and quantity of the videotaped sex. But I think that Kamp should have been disqualified from reviewing my book after he publicly made available footage of my threesome with Drew Barrymore and Fab Morretti. Don't you?

On the night of the orgy, Kamp wrote, on his website, “I have looked evil in the face. I’ve been in the same room with it, and, in fact, watched someone come on that face. I don’t know how else to describe my feelings now except to say that I feel unclean, and I’m having to fight being afraid. And I wish my erection would go away.”

The next morning, he woke up and reviewed my book.

The editors of the New York Times Book Review owe me an explanation, an apology, and a re-review by a writer of my choosing. If they don't provide those, it would represent a moral failure of the highest order.

With that, I must sadly announce that this site is going on indefinite hiatus, which I recently trumpeted in two whiny emo-style posts that have since been deleted because I'm ashamed of sincerity. I shall return sometime next year, when I'm sure that things will be going great in Iraq and the Bush Presidency will be in its final months. Let us pray.

Please buy Never Mind The Pollacks. Also don't forget to buy the accompanying album, on a now-defunct record label. Thank you, and good day.