He's a pitcher, part yogi and part recluse. Hes just trying it out and will come back and write a book about his experiences. I always thought it sounded similar to the accent of William F. Buckley, Jr., who I believe was not reared in Boston. 1) The linguists have a name for it: they call it Mid-Atlantic English. I dont like this name, for reasons Ill explain in a minute. The Writer's Chapbook A Compendium of Fact, Opinion, Wit, and Advice from the Twentieth Century's Preeminent Writers. Indeed, the police deposition the filmmakers managed to uncover may be the only time my dad ever spoke about the tragedy, publicly or privately. Butch, he says, because he always called me Butch. (Newsreels ran in movie theaters, of course: what better critique of the high newsreel style than the new movies that jarred against it?). He majored in English. George Plimpton, journalist extraordinaire, trains with and then performs as Quarterback for the Baltimore Colts. We made $15,000-20,000. It was so tiny that if you saw him in it, you couldnt believe hed be able to get himself out of it. George Plimpton, the New York aristocrat and literary journalist whose career was a happy lifelong competition between scholarly pursuits and madcap attempts -- chronicled in self-deprecating. I remember the Lowell Thomas documentary films of the 50s where Mr. Thomas' mellifluous tones and distinct radio-style pronunciation gave him a respectability that a similar huckster could hardly hope to replicate today by the mere application of such an artifice. Richard Howard, poetry editor, the Paris Review:I worked with George for 10 years on the magazine. I think he came down [to the shooting of Paper Lion in] Florida once. Except at parties. Youd be on the phone with him and get to the end of the conversation, and youd say I love you, Dad, and at most, hed reply, without subject or object, Love, like he was signing a letter. How widespread, numerically and geographically? He was an actor and writer, known for Good Will Hunting (1997), Nixon (1995) and Just Cause (1995). Hed have that and a scotch on the rocks, his favorite drink. 1 draft choice of the Lions in 1965. 1. [3] During the summers, he lived in the hamlet of West Hills, Huntington, Suffolk County on Long Island. Gay Talese, author:As a young man not long out of university, at 26, 27 years of age, George Plimpton went with his friends to Paris to be benighted in the tradition of Paris culture. Several weeks later at a book party, he spotted two writers who had played in that game. He joined us in Monte Carlo when we won the international [fireworks] competition. At Harvard, Plimpton was a classmate and close personal friend of Robert F. Kennedy. I knew that between the time Id asked Plimpton to do the auction and the night itself, he had probably received five invitations for a better evening, but he would never have reneged. He plays the 'fancy pants' to our outhouse Americana," Flaherty asserted. George had three siblings: Francis Taylor Pearsons Plimpton Jr., Oakes Ames Plimpton,[15] and Sarah Gay Plimpton. Get a life. December 17, 2022 Rafael Garca. They spoke in this manner, and it seemed perfectly natural, evocative of a background spent among the gentry of the northeast.. Whether on the football field or on a golf course or in a poem or an essay, the notion of human talent in whatever form excited him. Plimpton appeared in the 1989 documentary The Tightrope Dancer which featured the life and the work of the artist Vali Myers. I had made about five thousand egg and tuna sandwiches. It was a hot, sweltering day. He liked the fact that I had broken my nose in defeat. The enormously popular speech styles of Brando and Dean (and I could add Elvis Presley) clearly pushed vernacular style into a kind of mainstream acceptability, then desirability. They all sound just like George. Robert Silvers, editor, the New York Review of Books:I met George on the Ile Saint-Louis in 1953 as I was leaving NATO headquarters. His friendships testified to what an eclectic man he was. I thought Id died and gone to Olympus. Several readers wrote in with specimens of Americans who had gone to England and ended up speaking in this mid-Atlantic way. ), this isnt some kind of morbid contest to see who can be the first to inform the board of some celebritys death. The limited frequency response of the recording technology of the late 19th and early 20th centuries has left us with only a pale, and sometimes caricatural image of the original sound. Description above from the Wikipedia article George Plimpton, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of . George Plimpton was born on March 18, 1927 in New York City, New York, USA. It was so violent that it brought a lot of people to the windows. Its a shot from a YouTube video that itself is a fascinating time-capsule portrait of language change. "He speaks with an oddly mannered accent, sounding as though on the verge of a stammer, polite, genteel, perhaps just a little Woosterish. The list of authors interviewed is extraordinary, and stretches from Hemingway years ago to Amy Hempel (in the 50th anniversary issue that has just been published). Timothy Seldes, George Plimptons literary agent:Whenever George wanted me to do something for him, he would call me up and say, Hello, Old Tim. One day, I got a call, and heard his voice, and my heart sank. Just listen to very early recordings from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, back even before microphones, when singers had to yell directly into a large cone and over-enunciate so that their voices would be recorded into something intelligible on a spinning wax cylinder or disk. Whee!! I mean, if George Plimpton wasnt my father and Id never met him, and I heard that voice emerge from his lips and matched it with his severe Roman features and his usual blue blazer, oxford shirt, and tie, I might have assumed that he was a little pompous or snooty or affected. A few days after, I went to a Paris Review party and showed off my damaged nose and two black eyes to George. He modestly shrugged off the compliment, but his bright smile betrayed his pleasureand ours. With a little more practice, you could give us boys in the big leagues a run for our money. Over the years, we held a lot of dinner parties for him, and he brought a lot of people inmany, many writers. Losing, he knew, always makes a better story than winning. Plimpton died on September 25, 2003, in his New York City apartment from a heart attack later determined to have been caused by a catecholamine surge. Plimpton himself described it as a "New England cosmopolitan accent"[36] or "Eastern seaboard cosmopolitan" accent. Ken Auletta, author:Sometime after age 70, when his reflexes dulled, George took to the sidelines in the Artists and Writers softball game in Easthampton, N.Y. Each year his name was announced, and each year he was hailed by the crowd, who paid more attention to him than to the game. Listen to Caruso singing or Bix Beiderbecke playing his cornet to hear how muffled was the recording of those sounds. "[25] He had a recurring role as the grandfather of Dr. Carter on the NBC series ER. The Scout Is a Lonely Hunter. Get book recommendations, fiction, poetry, and dispatches from the world of literature in your in-box. How do I know you're not George Plimpton? My dad and I could not lose each other, but we could never quite find each other, either. It is the kind of study . Consider his duties as host of Mousterpiece Theatre (my first intro to my father as celebrity), a childrens TV show in which he debated the adventures and psyches of Donald Duck and Goofy in that marvelously serious voice: Is Donald Duck really a strident existentialist and a hero? How wonderfulwhat fun!to have a constant reminder emerging from your lips that life was absurd, and identity, too; all of it a great game to be played at, enjoyed. George Ames Plimpton (March 18, 1927 - September 25, 2003) was an American journalist, writer, literary editor, actor and occasional amateur sportsman. George Plimpton: what kind of accent? He was one of her original supporters and had published an article about her work in The Paris Review. That he died in his sleep was impressive. George Plimpton, who has died aged 76, became a best-selling author by not only writing about sporting heroes but by participating in those sports as well. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to these men speak. Ill try to give a representative range, and I am grateful for the care and thought that have gone into these responses. The clearest example of the Mid-Atlantic accent is the accent of the Frasier & Niles Crane characters on the TV show Frasier. Billy Collins, poet:Im one of these people who went from crashing Georges parties in the 70s to being invited in the 80s. He is widely known for his sports writing and for helping to found The Paris Review. I thought they were terrific. That was when Westbrook van Voorhis, the famous March of Time voice, did the intro narration of the pilot episode of The Twilight Zone. 2) Truman v. Kaltenborn, 1949. Orson Welles also comes to mind, though I noticed he spoke in this mode more often during his early days, on and off screen. In that regard, Plimpton is the perfect candidate, and the proof is in "George, Being George," the compulsively readable oral biography edited by his friend Nelson W. Aldrich Jr. He thought Castro might come. His father co-founded the law firm Debevoise Plimpton. My fathers voice was like one of those supposedly extinct deep-sea creatures that wash up on the shores of Argentina every now and then. Almost twenty years ago, writing quirky sports pieces for the Village Voice, I decided to enter the world of championship arm wrestling.Like many young writers, I was inspired by the sports adventures of the gaunt but game George Plimpton, who had made a literary career out of placing himself in . George Plimpton was a literary man about town who did it all, from co-founding The Paris . We were bound to play the roles of father and son, unable to simply be ourselves. [47][48] Plimpton brought the Left Bank to NYCpeople like Peter Mathiessen, William Styron, Terry Southern. [37] His son, Taylor, described it as a mixture of "old New England, old New York, tinged with a hint of King's College King's English."[14]. Is your language rhotic? He was one of her original supporters and had published an article about her work in The Paris Review. Puss, and my father enjoyed nothing more than holding the beast high in the air and making strange, affectionate sounds in that distinguished voice: Yeanngghh, Puss Yeaannngh Puss Puss Puss.) He called my sister Puss, too, sometimes, though mostly I think with her it was Kiddo, which he also called me, though there was a period in which he occasionally called me Ernie, which was the dogs name. And the many candidates for the crown of Last American to Speak This Way. You can. Tom Nowatzke, fullback, Detroit Lions (In the 1960s, Plimpton briefly played with the Detroit Lions asresearch for the best-selling book Paper Lion, which was later made into a film):I was the No. Since all we have are recordings of those long-vanished voices, we do not and cannot know whether people spoke "this way" when they were not being recorded, although I would be willing to wager that they did not. I always thought it sounded similar to the accent of William F. Buckley, Jr., who I believe was not reared in Boston. The flipped prestige markers point here is fascinating. "[27], Plimpton was a member of the cast of the A&E TV series A Nero Wolfe Mystery (200102). With a little more practice, you could give us boys in the big leagues a run for our money. Family (1) Spouse He knew we were just as good as he was, but in a different field. Ive lived in Boston for 30 years and have never heard a George Plimpton accent; so I guess it must be a Larchmont accent, *Originally posted by Carnac the Magnificent! They were divorced, and had been for a while, but they still talked, and visited every now and then, and they would sit on my moms porch on Long Island and look out over the pond at the birds and tell each other stories and laugh until the tears came to their eyes, but he could not ask her this directlyHow are you, Freddy? He had lost my mom, at least in part because he had been unable to communicate with her, to show his love. George Plimpton. As such, it was popular in the theatre and other forms of elite culture in that region. If he couldnt be taken quite seriously, that was fine with him (he took himself lightly, and relished being in on the joke). It was always a surprise. He rounded first as if he were about to go for a double, then glided back to the base, with fans waving and cheering. Kennedy died the next day at Good Samaritan Hospital. Did he have the celebrated Boston Brahmin accent, or was it a psuedo-Brit affectation? Bill and I met in Rome, several months after the Paris Review was startedwe were, as they say, courtingand he drove me to Paris so George and Peter [Mathiessen] could look me over. During my fight, my nose got badly broken in the second round, but I did last all four scheduled rounds, though I lost. *Originally posted by j.c. * The s. And later I woke upat 6 a.m. Later I called up George, I said, What happened?, I thought it over, he said, and I took mercy on you. I can understand your frustration, but celebrities die every day. (What else happened that year??? Orson Welles notably spoke in a mid-Atlantic accent in the 1941 film Citizen Kane, as did many of his co-stars, such as Joseph Cotten. Along with all the other things he does, George is an editor of the Paris Review, a literary quarterly published by the Aga Khan's uncle, Sadrudin, and his apartment is overstuffed with the comforts and legends of its use as a literary salon. Starring George Plimpton as Himself, the writer James Salter said of Plimpton that "he was writing in a genre that really doesn't permit greatness. Plimpton appeared in the 1989 documentary The Tightrope Dancer which featured the life and the work of the artist Vali Myers. Besides, third is a very respectable showing! This periodical has carried great weight in the literary world, but has never been financially strong; for its first half-century, it was allegedly largely financed by its publishers and by Plimpton. Both of Plimpton's maternal grandparents were born with the surname Ames; his mother was the granddaughter of Medal of Honor recipient Adelbert Ames (1835-1933), an American sailor, soldier, and politician, and Oliver Ames, a US political figure and the 35th Governor of Massachusetts (18871890). The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Cond Nast. And what have we here? My moms initial impression was that he was a little hoity-toityI mean, who did this guy think he was?, But the second time they met, it was, in fact, my fathers voice that won her over. I remember getting the news: It was my wife Madeleines birthday, Aug. 7. The picture at the top of this post is of the same Westbrook Van Voorhis who epitomized FDR-era announcer-speak but didnt fit the sensibility of the early-cool-cat-era Twilight Zone. But looking back on it, its funny, too. **, In this case, Mid-Atlantic refers to speech in which the attributes of British English and American English meet halfway. Few could give a toast or tell a story with equal humor. Jonathan Ames, author:Back in the fall of 1999, in preparation for my one and only boxing match, I read George Plimptons great book, Shadow Box, where he recounted his foray into the world of boxing and his famous encounter with Archie Moore. He was immensely generous in every waygenerous about sharing the work and about giving one a chance to edit things. The film used archival audio and video of Plimpton lecturing and reading to create a posthumous narration. Plimpton would not boast of his feat, so we did. Between 2000 and 2003, Plimpton wrote the libretto to a new opera, Animal Tales, commissioned by Family Opera Initiative, with music by Kitty Brazelton directed by Grethe Barrett Holby. They were born to Plimpton and his second wife, Sarah Dudley, 26 years younger than he, who is chairwoman of the East Harlem Tutorial Program, for which he was a trustee. If you say, I parked my car in Harvard Yard, you are being rhotic. The Curious Case Of Sidd Finch. Ive always heard it referred to as a patrician accent. Here's a look inside the space, where the Paris Review editor hosted legendary parties. Jean Stein became his co-editor. [3], He was the son of Francis T. P. Plimpton[4] and the grandson of Frances Taylor Pearsons and George Arthur Plimpton. Final Twist of the Drama. That life couldnt contain him, hed burst its seams like it was an old coat two sizes too small.