Talking wrestling with John Irving
The American author John Irving (The World According to Garp, The Cider House Rules, A Prayer for Owen Meany), with our host Dr. Joven Cuanang. Photos by JZ.
Dr. Cuanang hosted a dinner for John Irving last night at the fabulous Pinto Art Museum in Antipolo. I was invited, probably on the assumption that I’d read all the novels of John Irving. In truth I was a huge fan of John Irving in high school, but the last Irving I read was his sixth novel, The Cider House Rules, and he’s written six more novels since then. Everything I know about John Irving is from the early period, when his novels contained wrestling, Philips Exeter Academy, and bears.
The dinner guests were mostly John Irving fans, so if I faked familiarity with his work I would probably get caught. Then I remembered that Andy went to Exeter so I texted him in case he had any inside information: What should I ask John Irving?
Andy replied: Ask him what his win-loss record was in wrestling.
I did. And it was the best possible opening I could’ve used. Thanks, Andy.
You know how you can’t recognize most authors from the photos on the back covers of their books? John Irving looks exactly like his book photos.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
January 11th, 2011 at 04:43
Is he still here? Sayang, had i known, I would have tagged along. I love Irving. Read Garp and The Hotel New Hampshire in I think less than a week in 2009. I have three other novels (A Prayer For Owen Meany, The 158-Pound Marriage and Until I Find You) and am still collecting the rest.
I remember writing the following as my status in one social networking site:
“. . . knows that when a novel starts with the story of a girl name Utch, who was hidden by her mother during the war in the scooped out ribs of a cow, was made to breathe through the carved out anus of the animal, spoke to her mom through its a**hole, and drank with a straw going into a bottle kept among the innards and intestines, she is in for a long night of reading. John Irving, I love you. :-)”
While others may find his stories tragic (one shocking scene in Garp is etched in my mind forever), there are a lot of comic gems in his novels. He was quoted as saying “Whatever I write, no matter how gray or dark the subject matter, it’s still going to be a comic novel.” It’s true.
January 11th, 2011 at 05:53
Aaaaww…Dr. Cuanang. Used to do morning rounds on his patients at the hospital with him. Great Ilocano and teacher.
January 11th, 2011 at 10:41
In these photos, he looks a bit like John Lithgow.
(I don’t know who Dr. Cuanang looks like.)
January 11th, 2011 at 10:52
First, rugby. Now, wrestling. Has this become a blog on gay contact sports? Pls spare us from photos of John or Andy in leotards.
January 11th, 2011 at 12:02
I’m a huge fan of The Cider House Rules. I first read it in softbound, then got a hardbound copy for posterity. How long will he be in Manila? Or is he already gone?
January 11th, 2011 at 13:20
Akyat-Bahay Gangster: Haha the tranny from the Garp movie. Which he did not like. He says he only liked the movies of Cider House (which he wrote) and The Door In The Floor (one-third of A Widow For One Year). “I do not care for the movies,” he declared. I wanted to ask, “Why do you write them then?”
January 11th, 2011 at 13:39
haha john irving!! i’ve read owen meany and hotel new hampshire..haven’t finished garp..dropped it for some reasons..i love the hotel new hampshire, especially the baby boy, egg..i would always laugh (though it hurts) when he says “what??” i even named my dog, which my tatay believes, is a japanese spitz after him..and just like egg, my egg died..but yes, wrestling, exeter, freud, bears, those were the words i remember..
January 11th, 2011 at 18:04
I have his book “The imaginary girlfriend”, with photos of his 2 very handsome sons, who are both wrestlers.
January 11th, 2011 at 18:10
“Why do you write them then?” Haha…I think I know the answer: For the money. I remember Samuel L. Jackson candidly saying in an interview that he did a lot of his movies just for the money and I’m pretty sure same goes for a lot of people who works in and for Hollywood.
January 11th, 2011 at 22:54
Jessica, I actually liked the Garp movie very much — more than the Cider House one. Too bad that Mr. Irving didn’t.
January 12th, 2011 at 01:04
Akyat-Bahay Gangster: Me too. Cider House had a grinding earnestness I did not like. And it came out in a year of great screenplays. It beat Election for Adapted Screenplay?!
January 12th, 2011 at 17:18
I just had a flashback. I hated the Cider House movie—middlebrow effort by middlebrow filmmakers, saved by the actors. When awards season came around I hated it even more. It came out in a great movie year—Magnolia, Being John Malkovich, Three Kings, Election, Fight Club among others—but the Miramax machine worked full-time to get Cider House the nominations. Aaargh.
January 12th, 2011 at 23:16
Being John Malkovich was my favorite of that bunch — but I guess it was too quirky to be a mainstream favorite.
January 13th, 2011 at 15:46
John Irving creates characters so life-like I feel like I can reach out and shake their hands.