Tales of a Cultural Conduit

Jay Landesman

Tales of a Cultural Conduit is the third volume of Jay Landesman's memoirs, and includes an edited version of the first two volumes of Jay Landesman's reminiscences Rebel Without Applause (Bloomsbury) and Jaywalking (Weidenfeld and Nicolson).

The book also includes for the first time The Nervous Set, Landesman's unpublished novel of his exploration of life in New York in the 1950s. Gershon Legman who urged him to publish it 40 years ago, said: 'It's a perfect portrait of the period which I do not believe has ever been portrayed at all, let alone so well.'

Tales of a Cultural Conduit takes us from Landesman's life as an antique dealer in St. Louis, to New York and his magazine Neurotica: the Authentic Voice of the Beat Generation and on to the Crystal Palace Cabaret Theater in St Louis where he invited artists to break in their cabaret acts, including Woody Allen, Barbra Streisand, and Lenny Bruce. 'The cocktail hour was orchestrated like an opéra bouffe – music, booze and just the right mix of jarring people... Landesman produced Waiting for Godot instead of South Pacific and thus heralded the cultural renaissance,' wrote John Clellon Holmes.