The New York Times story broke last week that egnimatic author JT Leroy is really Laura Albert, part of the band Thistle. Steven Beachy, a reporter, spent over a year tracking down leads that eventually led him to determine that JT, like his stories, was fictional. The literary community is up in arms that they have been fooled and call JT (Laura) an imposter.
The entire story is a web of crazy tales and even crazier characters. The PR newswire provides a history of the intriguing while slightly disturbing tale of Albert (also known as Speedie in the band Thistle) and her cross-dressing, identity-challenged husband Geoffrey Kaos's manufactured personalities and history, along with the communal house they live in with their tribe of creative gypsies. You have to admit that Albert has done something rather exceptional - one of the most amazing hoaxes ever invented. She has penned 3 (almost 4) novels, signed 2 movie deals, hobnobbed with the celebrities, and gained international fame (her books have been translated into over 20 languages. All while never giving away her true identity.
There have been plenty of people who have written under pseudonyms and created fictional accounts of events. I think there is such an uproar because Albert did it with such convincing finesse. She wanted the limelight and the pulpit and the voice, but didn't want went along with it - I can understand that. Do I think that it is all slightly twisted? Yes. Albert made up stories of living on the streets, doing tricks, sodomy, abuse and other horrors that some actually live through. But isn't she telling all of these victim's stories? Isn't she channeling an unfortunate universal truth?
I find it all a most divine literary justice - the fiction writers living the fiction....
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