Gawker: andrew wylie

Crabby Old Book Agents Fight Over Trinidadian Nobel Laureate

Richard Lawson — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:56:32 EDT

Book agent fight! Book agent fight! Wily Andrew Wylie has stolen Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul away from his old partner and mentor, Gillon Aitken. The 76-year-old author was likely wooed astray with promises of more monies and better international representation.

The New York Observer describes the dramz as such:

[Wylie's] play against Mr. Aitken for the Naipaul account included an extra bit of drama, in that he was seeking to usurp not just a competing agent but a former partner who served as something of a mentor to him when, starting in 1986, the two of them worked together as part of the international agency Aitken, Stone, and Wylie. It was during those 10 years, which ended when the firm broke up in 1996, that Mr. Wylie got his first taste of working with Mr. Naipaul, selling his U.S. rights while Mr. Aitken handled the rest.

Oh these hot young ambitious kids, always fighting! Next thing you know Janklow will be battling Nesbit over sizzling newcomer Joyce Carol Oates.

Is Andrew Wylie Really The "Most Powerful And Prestigious" Lit Agent?

Emily Gould — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 15:00:42 EDT

Today's Observer piece about new-minted literary agent Scott Moyers contains a controversial assertion: That Moyers' boss Andrew Wylie's Wylie Agency is "the most powerful and prestigious in town." Some of the publishing types we contacted for comment would beg to differ. And others were like "Well, yeah!"

"I think he's the most powerful in England. Here he has to compete with Esther [Newberg, ICM], Binky [Urban, ICM], Suzanne [Gluck, William Morris], and [Robert] Gottlieb [Trident]. Wylie has the highbrow stuff but I suspect the others' lists are probably more lucrative than Wylie's because they have so many huge commercial stars," says a senior editor who works on both fiction and nonfiction.

Interesting answer because: Can you really use "lucrative" interchangeably with "prestigious?" We think maybe yes. However, we'd also then have to say that it's easier to rake in the lucre when you're working for a big, connected mega-agency.

That view is seconded by an editor at a super-commercial house: "Wiley is def the most prestigious (at least for nonfiction). But in terms of brute power I'd say WMA and ICM are more powerful—Suzanne, JRW, Esther, Binky... etc. And all those Hollywood connex don't hurt. How else could Greg Behrendts have really gotten a talk show? That man is so lame."

"Also, 'gentle' isn't an adjective normally ascribed to Scott." Intriguing!

A prestigious and powerful editor of mostly literary fiction has the final word on the subject. "Do you know, I read that this morning and thought: unusual non-hedging of that claim instead of the standard 'among' to avoid pissing anyone off. And that made me wonder if it's true, and I decided — well, yes! There are plenty who are powerful (JR Walsh, Esther N, Janklow, etc) with varying degrees of prestige, but none packs the same punch as AW in terms of the client list (I mean, my GOD — and unlike those other folks who balance between high and low, like the rest of us mortals, you can't really point to a Strictly Commercial [bad] writer on his list) and the indomitable force of his 'negotiating' technique."

Okay, we give! Observer junior newsboy (and our former Weekend Editor!) Leon Neyfakh wasn't wrong. This time.

The Michael Hastings Memoir: Book Proposals Kill

Choire — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 12:46:56 EDT

On Friday at a little after 5 p.m., the New York Observer posted up a 131-page book proposal by Michael Hastings, a Newsweek Baghdad correspondent. The memoir is about his time overseas and the death of his fiance. The Observer post promptly disappeared. Besides the obvious copyright issues with making the whole shebang available, there was another reason mega-lit agent (and poet!) Andrew Wylie wanted the proposal disappeared from the internet: it was going to get people killed in Iraq.

The letter we got from Wylie about linking to the Observer's post went like this:

Please immediately remove from your website any material drawn without authority and in violation of copyright from a proposal by our client Michael Hastings. The dissemination of this material endangers individuals' lives, in addition to being a breach of copyright.

While al Qaeda doesn't obsessively monitor Gawker yet, despite the frequent aid we supply to terrorists by means of identifying ideal targets (Simon Hammerstein's Box theater and Schiller's Liquor Bar—plus all of Blue States Lose!), there is the question of why then it'd be acceptable for Wylie to distribute a book proposal that identifies targets in the first place.

More explicit information is in the letter that the Observer received from Covington & Burlington LLP:

In addition, please take notice that Mr. Hastings advises us that the Work contains information that relates to the security of personnel at the Baghdad bureau of Newsweek and identifies certain news sources by name. Obviously such material was never intended for public distribution [actually, sic: It's a manuscript], and by publishing the Work in its website, the Observer is potentially endangering all of these persons. Continued posting of the Work on the Observer's website only increases the chances that some harm may result.
Furthermore, Mr. Hastings advises us that private and information [sic] regarding the late Andrea Parhamovich, as yet not know [sic] to her own family, is reflected in the Work.

Okay, so, that's just messed up. The military-industrial-entertainment complex that was so quick to encourage young Hastings to sell his diaries at a tasty price is in way over its head. They felt compelled to put this on the market so fast that no one even did any sort of clearance, including with the family of the woman the book is ostensibly about. Sick. Was there some reason this had to rush to market? Was there a competing, equally tragic memoir? Are purchasing editors going to be "over" Iraq memoirs in the next couple months?

We sorta figured that the whole Didion death memoir thing would go seriously wrong on the next iteration anyway.

Apparently the person that we understand is the purchasing editor, Scribner's Nan Graham, is qualified to possess material that supposedly endangers Americans abroad—material that, given all these claims, will need to be removed before publication anyway. Meanwhile, Andrew Wylie can't be enjoying that he's spending down his $75+K commission on lawyers with minimal English skills. —choire

Previously: (Not an) April Fools Book Proposal: 'I Lost My Love in Baghdad'
[Disclosure: According to Radar, Hastings briefly guest-blogged on Gawker anonymously some time ago.]

Lit Agent Andrew Wylie's Verses, Dirty And Not

Emily Gould — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 11:46:37 EDT

So, just how satanic are Salman Rushdie's agent's verses? Ira Silverberg, who owns the 1972 chapbook of Wylie's stylings that was mentioned here yesterday, was kind enough to share some of them, but first he wanted to make one thing very clear: "I'm a huge fan of Andrew ... Nobody gets that he's one of the least pretentious people in the biz." Well, these poems are certainly unpretentious. They barely pretend to be poems! A selection, including the possibly prophetic "I've (#1)," is after the jump. —Emily

BLACK

black,
skin, black
light

black leather
jackets

THIGHS

thighs
on my neck

I suck
the clit

I'M A (#1)

I'm a tramp

a trap

I'm a trap

I'M A (#2)

I'm a
profit

I'VE (#1)

I've
got my
price

I'VE (#2)

I've
left my
hand behind

I've
left my
foot behind

Earlier: Lit Agent Andrew Wylie's Dirty Verses

Lit Agent Andrew Wylie's Dirty Verses

Emily Gould — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 18:52:31 EDT

~~British~~ lit agent Andrew Wylie is a very august person, with some very respectable clients: Philip Roth! Salman Rushdie! Nigella Lawson! But we were all young and not-august sometime, and when Wylie was younger, he fancied himself a poet. Another high-powered agent, Ira Silverberg, happens to own a copy of a chapbook that Wylie published in 1972, which he generously shared with Bookforum. "There's a rumor that he has tried to buy up all of the copies," Silverberg told them. But why? "One can only imagine what a Wylie client like, say, Benazir Bhutto would make of such poems as "Hands up Your Skirt," "Warm, Wet Pants," and the determinedly unlyric "I Fuck Your Ass, You Suck My Cock." Oh! Well now. Being fans of dirtiness, we'd love to know more about these poems. Do any of them contain the words "light" or "water?"

He Is Curious (Yellow) [Bookforum]