WHEN THE HOST WAS A NOVELIST: 4/10: "Hollywood Before the Mast," a story from the collection, "Gordon Liddy is My Muse," by John Calvin Batchelor. January 1, 1990. Read by the host.
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
4.5 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 31 December 2023
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
https://www.amazon.com/Gordon-Liddy-Muse-Calvin-Batchelor/dp/0671690787
From Publishers Weekly
Posing as hack writer Tommy "Tip" Paine, Batchelor ( The Birth of the People's Republic of Antarctica ) offers a comic and often provocative look at contemporary America in this episodic "autobiographical" novel. In eight chapters, each self-contained, Tip roams from Moscow to Hollywood to New England to his ultimate destination, G. Gordon Liddy's Firearms Security Academy in Arizona. While in Russia, he watches a boyhood friend progress, over the years, from awed admirer of American western movies to KGB superstar to an official non-person, "disappeared" as part of that nation's changing politics. In Hollywood, despite the warnings of his decidedly offbeat agent, Tip falls into the clutches of a woman who is not what she seems. In New England, together with his "imaginary best friend, McKerr," Tip solves a multiple murder and uncovers what is possibly a relic of American history. Finally, in the Arizona desert, he posits an arguable identity for the still-elusive"Deep Throat" of the Watergate scandal. Other tales in this totally engaging work recount run-ins with famous literary personages, wealthy Texans and restless Vietnam veterans, or suggest a dark and ancient secret hidden in the heart of Germany. This may be Batchelor's breakthrough novel to the wide audience he deserves.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
The narrator of this inventive picaresque novel is Tip Paine, formerly a spook for the National Security Agency and now a moderately successful sci-fi/spy writer. In eight exuberant episodes Tip ranges from Moscow to Hollywood. He provides mystery (a tale of murder and mayhem in a small New England town), commentary on international politics (an elegiac account of a Russian KGB agent who falls victim to glasnost), and wickedly funny satire of pomp and foolishness in Texas high society, a university writing workshop, and a desert training academy for mercenaries. By alluding frequently to the classics of American literature (e.g., Moby Dick, The Last of the Mohicans ), Batchelor creates illuminating but highly entertaining commentary on contemporary society.
- Albert E. Wilhelm, Tennessee Technological Univ., Cookeville
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.
1940 Hollywood and Vine
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Gordon Liddy is my muse. |
| 0:02.0 | Hollywood Before the Mast. |
| 0:05.0 | Four. |
| 0:06.0 | Now comes Ahab, along with love and money, |
| 0:09.0 | the three things I didn't want in L.A. |
| 0:11.0 | coming at me like a harpoon. |
| 0:14.0 | Ahab was not at the hyped up screening of a new Stephen Spielberg movie about, |
| 0:18.0 | what else, Stephen Spielberg making movies. |
| 0:21.0 | Also, Ahab was not at Yaki's Fantasy Country Club with this overlush |
| 0:26.2 | but playable fantasy golf course. Yaki worships golf, though he cannot play, because he worships his best friend Billy Ben, who was away |
| 0:35.4 | on Australian links that January. |
| 0:39.3 | Where Ahab abided was at that promised most polite party at the marina, which was not a party but a charity |
| 0:47.5 | benefit for the current fashion, L.A. Street Gang Rehabilitation. I know I've also declared that Ahab is not, that he doesn't exist |
| 0:56.5 | outside of paper and neither does that fat white fish, M-Dick. I'm not trying to trick you anymore than I tricked me. This is a salty Hollywood |
| 1:08.4 | yarn, and as the spectacular former Swabi President Reagan has said often, it's all smoke and mirrors. |
| 1:17.0 | Well, Ahab smokes naturally and he lives in my looking glass. |
| 1:21.1 | Here he comes, after some details, and the first trick is that this time around he's very female. |
| 1:27.0 | The marina was at Santa Monica sunset. The crowd on the enclosed deck was as polite as charity can afford. |
| 1:35.4 | So many goods that the Scabbres crew members looked intimidated away from their usual vandalism. |
| 1:40.8 | Of note instantly was that it was a very A-list mail gathering. |
| 1:44.3 | You want names? |
| 1:45.4 | You don't know the goods to hear them. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from John Batchelor, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of John Batchelor and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.