The Paris Review was an early publisher of Roth's stories, and I expect Roth has been grateful to Plimpton ever after. I thought that, in context, the Plimpton episode in Exit Ghost flowed pretty naturally. Yet another example of the unstable and uncertain interplay between Roth and Zuckerman, which I personally enjoy but may not be to everyone's taste.

If it is the george that wrote sports i like him.

George Plimpton wrote The Paper Lion, about his experience playing football with the Detroit Lions. Alan Alda starred as Plimpton in the movie.

Does that help?

yeah, and Plimpton wrote "Shadowbox" about Archie Moore, Mohammad Ali in his young days..he fought Archie, sort of..and a lot of Sports Illustrated Stuff.

Listen, you guys misunderestimate the man's stuff. While I agree, not the most profound writer of the 20th dentury, he was fun, and gossipy, and graceful, a Larry King in a way.

If you remember what things were like with intergration and riots, a little human gossip and a whiff of nobility was damn near journalistic patriotism.

It's like, was James Michner a great writer? In one way no, but in another way yes, you see? Plimpton is like that, plus his magazine giving opportunities adds to his legecy.

Finally, Plimpton was about a certain generosity, taking a sane amount of action and punishment in writing his participatory stuff. Ah I agree with another poster, the author was too busy ragging on Plimpton to get to Roth about Plimpton.

But were their positions reversed, I bet Plimpton would have been more generous with this author than said author was to old George. There's no dam generosity anymore, you know that?