 | A WRITER'S WIT |  G. Gissing |
My Book World
Israel, Lee. Can You Ever Forgive Me: Memoirs of a Literary Forger. New York: Simon, 2008.
This slim tome of 129 pages is both amusing and instructive. A woman with a biting wit, Israel writes both apologetically and un about her career as a professional forger. Of course, the author of three previously published books, Israel does not intend to take such a path. She always has earned her living as a writer—having never so much as waited on a table—and believes she always shall. She is shocked when any sign of a new book deal vanishes. As she and her cat become destitute, and, because she is such a fine writer and also a small collector of letters, she believes she can succeed in forging letters of celebrities. Yet, as she expands her business, she realizes she cannot do it alone and signs on a colleague who turns out not to be as tough as she is, nor as smart, and she is arrested. Due to having a competent attorney and a kind judge, her sentence is reduced to community service and a five-year probation. She lives out her life working as a copy editor for a children’s publishing company and dies in 2014. The film starring Melissa McCarthy and Richard E. Grant seems to fulfill the truth of the book.
This slim tome of 129 pages is both amusing and instructive. A woman with a biting wit, Israel writes both apologetically and un about her career as a professional forger. Of course, the author of three previously published books, Israel does not intend to take such a path. She always has earned her living as a writer—having never so much as waited on a table—and believes she always shall. She is shocked when any sign of a new book deal vanishes. As she and her cat become destitute, and, because she is such a fine writer and also a small collector of letters, she believes she can succeed in forging letters of celebrities. Yet, as she expands her business, she realizes she cannot do it alone and signs on a colleague who turns out not to be as tough as she is, nor as smart, and she is arrested. Due to having a competent attorney and a kind judge, her sentence is reduced to community service and a five-year probation. She lives out her life working as a copy editor for a children’s publishing company and dies in 2014. The film starring Melissa McCarthy and Richard E. Grant seems to fulfill the truth of the book.
FUTURE BOOK PROFILES: Benjamin Moser's biography Sontag
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