![]() First edition cover | |
Author | Michael Chabon |
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Cover artist | Paul Bacon |
Language | English |
Genre | Novel |
Publisher | William Morrow and Company |
Publication date | April 1988 |
Publication place | United States |
Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) and audio cassette |
Pages | 297 (hardcover edition) |
ISBN | 0-688-07632-7 (hardcover edition) |
OCLC | 17108799 |
813/.54 19 | |
LC Class | PS3553.H15 M97 1988 |
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is a 1988 novel by American author Michael Chabon. It is a coming-of-age tale set during the early 1980s in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
It was Chabon's first novel, which he began writing as a 21-year-old undergraduate at the University of Pittsburgh. He continued to work on it during his studies (1985–87) in the Creative Writing Program of the Department of English at the University of California, Irvine, where he submitted it as his thesis for the Master of Fine Arts degree. One of his advisors, the novelist MacDonald Harris, sent it to his literary agent. It was published in 1988 and became a bestseller.
A film adaptation starring Jon Foster, Sienna Miller, Peter Sarsgaard, and Nick Nolte was released in 2009.
Art Bechstein is the son of a mob money launderer, who wants him to succeed in a legitimate career. (He has even set up a job for him at the end of the summer in Baltimore at a financial firm managed by one of his old friends.) When Art graduates from the University of Pittsburgh, he has only a vague hope for a summer of adventure before he commits to the rest of his life. Bechstein almost immediately meets a charming young gay gentleman, Arthur Lecomte, and his friend, a highly literate biker, Cleveland Arning, who become his partners in many summer adventures. Art begins a relationship with an insecure young woman named Phlox Lombardi. As Art's attraction to Arthur grows, it destabilizes both relationships and reveals he may be bisexual. Art is also troubled when Cleveland begins moving deeper into the city's organized crime families, drawing him closer to his father's dangerous mob connections. Art's relationships with his dad, friends, and lovers become more and more entangled, causing a series of fallings out and unforeseen consequences.
The novel takes place during summer. It begins in April, just after Bechstein has finished his four-year undergraduate education at the University of Pittsburgh. Specific settings include Carnegie Mellon University, Chatham College, Hillman Library, Lake Erie, Presbyterian University Hospital, Schenley Park, Schenley Bridge, and the Pittsburgh neighborhoods of Oakland, Squirrel Hill, Shadyside, Downtown, Mount Washington, East Liberty, Fox Chapel, and Highland Park. A boiler plant, informally labeled The Cloud Factory, located in Junction Hollow between Carnegie Mellon University and the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, plays a special role in the novel.
Because of the book's straightforward, even playful, treatment of gay love and bisexuality, Chabon was early-on identified as a gay writer. He has frequently been asked if this identification concerned him; his usual reply is that he worries that gay readers might feel he was being presented to them, under false pretenses, as one of their own.
A recently reissued edition featured an Author's Note entitled "P.S.", which details some of the novel's inspiration, problems, and process. For example, he often had to balance his early-model computer precariously on an old tool table. Many fans of his work asked about Chabon's sexuality, because of the gay characters in his novels. On page 12 of the expanded Notes section, he reveals that, although he is currently married to a woman, he has had same-sex relationships in the past. [1] He also describes some of his inspirations, crediting experiences with Marcel Proust, The Great Gatsby , and Philip Roth as encouraging him to write.
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology and began granting four-year degrees. In 1967, it became Carnegie Mellon University through its merger with the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research, founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon and formerly a part of the University of Pittsburgh.
Michael Chabon is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, D.C., he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, graduating in 1984. He subsequently received a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine.
Oakland is the academic and healthcare center of Pittsburgh and one of the city's major cultural centers. Home to three universities, museums, hospitals, shopping venues, restaurants, and recreational activities, this section of the city also includes two city-designated historic districts: the mostly residential Schenley Farms Historic District and the predominantly institutional Oakland Civic Center Historic District, as well as the locally-designated Oakland Square Historic District.
Schenley Park is a large municipal park in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located between the neighborhoods of Oakland, Greenfield, and Squirrel Hill. It is also listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a historic district. In 2011, the park was named one of "America's Coolest City Parks" by Travel + Leisure.
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is a 2000 novel by American author Michael Chabon that won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2001. The book follows the lives of two Jewish cousins, Czech artist Joe Kavalier and Brooklyn-born writer Sammy Clay, before, during, and after World War II. In the story, Kavalier and Clay become major figures in the comics industry from its nascence into its Golden Age. Lengthy, Kavalier & Clay was published to "nearly unanimous praise" and became a New York Times Best Seller.
The Escapist is a superhero character created by Michael Chabon in the 2000 novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. In the novel, the Escapist is a fictional character created by the comics writer protagonists. The character later featured in the metafictional work Michael Chabon Presents the Amazing Adventures of the Escapist and Brian K. Vaughan's comic The Escapists.
Carnegie Mellon University is home to a variety of unique traditions, some of which date back to the early days of its over 100-year history. Many of these traditions hearken to the university's strength in engineering, such as the buggy races and the mobots, while others are purely social in nature, such as Spring Carnival and The Fence.
Henry Hornbostel was an American architect and educator. Hornbostel designed more than 225 buildings, bridges, and monuments in the United States. Twenty-two of his designs are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, including the Oakland City Hall in Oakland, California and the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum and University Club in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is a 2008 comedy-drama film based on Michael Chabon's 1988 novel of the same name. The film was written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber. It was produced by Michael London and executive produced by Omar Amanat. Shooting in Pittsburgh ended in October 2006, with the film set for release in 2008. It made its world premiere in January 2008 at the Sundance Film Festival. Set in 1980s Pittsburgh, the film follows the affairs of two young men with one woman, and later also with each other.
Stephen Foster is a landmark public sculpture in bronze by Giuseppe Moretti formerly located on Schenley Plaza in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Formerly sited along Forbes Avenue near the entrance of Carnegie Museum of Natural History, in the shadow of Dippy, a life-size sculpture of a Diplodocus dinosaur, and in close proximity to the University of Pittsburgh's Stephen Foster Memorial, the Foster statue is one of the city's best known and most controversial. It was removed on April 26, 2018 on the unanimous vote of the Pittsburgh Art Commission.
Junction Hollow is a small wooded valley bordering the west flanks of Schenley Park and the campus of Carnegie Mellon University and the southern edge of the University of Pittsburgh's campus in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The Schenley Bridge is a steel three-hinged deck arch bridge spanning Junction Hollow in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It carries Schenley Drive between Oakland on the west and the main part of Schenley Park on the east, connecting Schenley Plaza, the Carnegie Institute, and the Frick Fine Arts Building with Frew Street, Flagstaff Hill, and Phipps Conservatory. The bridge spans 620 feet (190 m) and arches 120 feet (37 m) above the hollow.
Forbes Avenue is one of the longest streets in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. It runs along an east–west route for a length of approximately 7 mi (11 km).
Franklin Felix Nicola (1860–1938) was an American real estate developer.
Bellefield Boiler Plant, also known as "The Cloud Factory" from its nickname's use in Michael Chabon's 1988 debut novel The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, is a boiler plant located in Junction Hollow between the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University in the Oakland district of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Gladys Leonore Schmitt was an American writer, editor, and professor.
Eve Shelnutt was an American poet and writer of short stories. She lived in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Athens, Ohio, and Worcester, Massachusetts. Over the course of her career, she taught at Western Michigan University University of Pittsburgh, Ohio University, and The College of the Holy Cross.
Frank S. Curto was the chief horticulturist for the Pittsburgh Department of Parks and Recreation.
Conflict Kitchen was a take-out restaurant in Pittsburgh that served only cuisine from countries with which the United States was in conflict. The menu focused on one nation at a time, rotating every three to five months, and featured related educational programming, such as lunch hour with scholars, film screenings, and trivia nights. After opening in 2010, the restaurant introduced the cuisines of Iran, Afghanistan, Cuba, North Korea, Venezuela, Palestine, and most recently, Iroquois. Referring to the informational brochures distributed with meals, NPR described the restaurant as "an experimental public art project—and the medium is the sandwich wrap."
Suzie Silver is an American artist based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, whose artistic focus lies primarily in queer video and performance art. Silver received her MFA from the School of the Art Institute in of Chicago in 1988 and her undergraduate degree from the University of California in 1984 and is currently a professor at Carnegie Mellon University in the School of Art.