Marc Eliot
Auteur van Cary Grant: A Biography
Over de Auteur
Marc Eliot is a New York Times bestselling author and American biographer. He has written over a dozen books on the media and popular culture including the biographies of Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Walt Disney and Bruce Springsteen, and Clint Eastwood. His writing has also appeared in several toon meer publications including L.A. Weekly and California Magazine. Eliot lives in New York and Los Angeles. (Bowker Author Biography) toon minder
Fotografie: courtesy of Marc Eliot
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- 1946-04-18
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Oh, this biography gives the basic facts of the life of Phil Ochs with, as best I can tell, reasonable accuracy and objectivity, not covering up how totally he went bad. Born 1940. Was very strange in school. His parents -- one of whom had bipolar disorder -- mostly let him do whatever he wanted, including paying for a nose job in high school and sending him to a military school. Became a moderately successful topical songwriter in the early 1960s. Was friends with Dylan. Decided he wanted to emulate Dylan in leaving his roots behind. Decided he was better than Dylan. Went broke; went crazy; lost his voice; lost his creativity; blew off multiple wives and girlfriends and spent a lot of time with prostitutes. Turned alcoholic and a valium addict. Went broke. Decided he was not Phil Ochs, he was John Train. Then he was... pretty much nothing. Committed suicide in 1976.
But there are a number of unanswered questions. He hung around with "folk" musicians, and was classified with "folk" musicians, but was there any real relationship other than his native left wing politics? A personal connection rather than a cultural, one might say -- these people were his friends and fellow travelers, but he had no part in the tradition. Was this why it was so easy for him to turn from writing topical material to being a navel-gazer?
And what was it that actually happened to him, that caused him to go from being a protest voice to someone who wanted to be a top-tier pop performer (something he really didn't have the talent to do -- he wasn't a good musician, and while he was clever, he certainly wasn't extraordinarily so). And then to go from there to someone who was crazy, deluded, hostile, drunk, broke, and unable to care for himself, until finally he put himself out of his own misery?
There is absolutely no explanation here for what went wrong with Ochs. The explanation that I've heard is that he suffered from manic-depressive (now bipolar) disorder. I am unable to say -- I never knew the man, and besides, he died before bipolar disorder had fixed diagnostic criteria. But bipolar doesn't seem a great fit for someone who went from unusual to flat-out deluded, but (at least as described in this book) showed few signs of depression until the very end. He had all mania, no depression.
One of Ochs's most biting songs was the titular "A Small Circle of Friends," inspired by the Kitty Genovese murder:
Look outside the window, there's a woman being grabbed,
They've dragged her to the bushes, and now she's being stabbed.
Maybe we should call the cops and try to stop the pain
But Monopoly is so much fun, I'd hate to spoil the game
And I'm sure it wouldn't interest... anybody...
Outside of a small circle of friends.
Who were Ochs's friends? I'm not sure I know.
Maybe we can't answer these questions. After all, Ochs is dead -- and, given the way the last years of his life went, I think that may be a mercy for him. But if we are to learn from a biography, we need to understand the subject of the biography. And I never felt myself understanding Ochs. Or, indeed, understanding anyone in the story -- why did they put up with so much for so long, and why didn't they give him any help? And what message would Ochs leave us if he could?… (meer)