His fame precedes him: among cultural journalists, James Ellroy (Los Angeles, 1948) is unanimously considered a difficult bone to crack, known for his telegraphic responses and some abduction of bad temper. From the press cabinet of its editorial, Random House, we are warned of the convenience that its interviewers come with the 530 pages of their new novel, ‘The seducers’, well read. He does not want him to be asked about Marilyn, whose death is the axis of history. He does not want him to be asked about Trump or current American politics. However, the man we found sitting in a reserved of the England Hotel – Mondo Cartonian, round mount glasses, elegant striped jacket, cap – seems quiet today and even happy to be in Spain. You may even be willing to talk about any matter.
‘The seducers’ is a trip to the city of Los Angeles in the summer of 62, when the body of ‘The blonde ambition’ is found. “Marilyn Monroe induced fateful agitation in people. I projected a cheap enchantment, that’s all. He appealed to what was stupid, and thus corrupted everyone. Marilyn and Natasha Lytess, her drama coach, who was in love with her. Who are the charming title? The false prophets of the time of Jack Kennedy. ”
Despite the character’s magnetism, the true protagonist of the novel is Freddy Otash, who will already appear as a central character of his American Tabloid. Former corrupt police, detective expelled from the trade, drug addict, violent blackclain. “Freedy there was only one, it was unique,” he says. “It was the strong arm of Confidential Magazine, but I have recreated it in my way and it is 100% fictionalized.”
Hand written
Through Freddy’s investigations, the reader can travel that large city on the west coast of the United States and the Hollywood of the time, that dream factory that was also, already a large scale, of nightmares, and that has been the traditional scenario of the author’s novels. “If I were from Seville, I would probably write similar books about Seville. Geography is a destination, and in this case it favored me. Los Angeles has the best police force, LAPD. Los Angeles has the best murders. I was lucky. I was born in Los Angeles in 1948. I was born in the epicenter of the Noir cinema, at the best moment of Noir cinema. ”
“Now I live in Denver, Colorado, but I can’t imagine writing a novel there,” he clarifies. “Throughout my career I have taken my characters to Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Vietnam, Washington DC, Chicago, but not to Denver. It is just the place where I live. ”
Power, sex and corruption form in Ellroy’s work a kind of triangle, “an inveterate and nameless trinity” to which the writer would today add a fourth factor: Internet. “I don’t like computers, I don’t have a computer, I don’t have a mobile phone. I write by hand, ”he emphasizes.
Another element that has a remarkable weight in the new work of the author of the Confidential and the Black Dalia are drugs. But not the usual illicit traffic, but the drugs of pharmacy, to which many of its characters are addicted. When asked if the country describes is not a kind of nation-dexedrina or nation-nembutal, it releases a loud laugh. “Marilyn herself had been mixing nembutal and alcohol for decades. How did you survive for 36 years? We will never know. ”
A moralist
“This novel, and the two novels that will follow, are set in 1962,” he continues. “The charming covers from April to mid -October. The next book, the book I am writing now, goes from October to November. The third book will cover the month of December. It is the beginning of the 60 Americans, do you remember that Rolling Stones song? ‘It’s Just a Shot Away …’ There are problems, racial problems, problems with rebel youth. And the middle class is becoming addicted to psychiatry and drugs. That is what we see with Marilyn’s stupid psychiatrist who is half in love with her, and also with Freddy Otash, another drug addict. They all take them. ”
At this point in the conversation, it is appropriate to ask Ellroy if he does not believe he projects on his stories, on that modern Babylon that serves as a backdrop to Otash adventures. “Yes, I think I’m a moralist. Certainly. Mine is a Christian vision of a fallen place. The world has fallen. The Bible tells us that. I believe in original sin. I am very literal in my vision of the Bible. Everything is going to change and Freddy can feel it. ”
It is also a moment of changes in the conception of sex, from Marilyn’s voracity to the fact that Freddy himself is between two women. “It was a promiscuous moment. People lived under the wrong fantasy that they could do what they wanted. Freddy is beyond the law, he is a heart criminal, but everything has consequences. ”
European VS novel
When asked if, given his little sympathy by Marilyn, in some cases he proposed with this novel to demon an icon, his gesture becomes serious. “Icon is a very badly used word in this case. She is not an icon. An icon is the crucifix, the star of David, the Islamic symbols. An icon is a religious object. Marilyn was a third actress and an insignificant human being. ”
He has once said that he only reads (or reread) police novel. Any recommendation? “There is a man named Hillary Waugh. Mr. Waugh wrote a great police novel called Last are wearingabout the disappearance of a young woman from a women’s school. The book was published in 1952, so it is from another era. It is a great sociological document. That interests me too, telling what society was like at this or that moment. ”
Ellroy is no stranger to the recurring opposition between American and European black (Nordic, French, Italian, Greek, etc.), but recognizes that he does not have much to say about it. “We, from America, gave the world the Hard-Boiled novel, although I consider the greatest cultural gift in America in the twentieth century is jazz,” he says. “I have not read much European novel, only Sherlock Holmes’ books as a child, and some police novel set in London. I tried to read the men who did not love Stieg Larsson’s women and thought it was madness. ”
And although a good part of his worldwide fame is due to the cinematographic adaptations of his novels, he does not see the seductors on the big screen. “It is too interior. It is an inner monologue. It’s Freddy looking through the files. If you like that kind of thing, if you look through the files, learn something. But it is not the kind of things we see in the movies. ”
I hate communists
At the moment, Ellroy follows his Spanish tour, with a scale in Seville to participate in the Hay Forum. “I am enjoying. I love Spain, it is my favorite country in Europe. The best people on the continent are here. And I love Madrid. I call it the city, it is my favorite European city. I am happy to be here. But deep down I want to go home. ”
The talk derives towards that reference book on Los Angeles entitled City of Quartz, by Mike Davis. “Yes, the author recently died. Rest in peace! I hated me, you know? I thought he was racist, homophobic, anti -Semitic and all that. I hate communists. Hate to Marxists, those fucking [dice en diáfano español]. My new book is anti -communist. ”
And from one thing to another, he ends up talking about his audience supporting Ukraine as a retaining wall of Russia. “America needs to do something very violent and very important there. If Ronald Reagan were president today, he would have already murdered Vladimir Putin. Without Putin, there is no Ukrainian war. We can’t let it happen. ”
“Remember World War II, they knew that the Germans were working in the atomic bomb, that two million Americans would die could die. So Truman did, the American forces bombed Tokyo and killed 145,000 civilians, and that was a flashy call for the Japanese before Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Then they would say, Buh, Buh [finge un sollozo]America is so bad … but it was the solution to the problem. Who started the war? It was not America. ”
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