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Born in 1964 in Los Angeles, California, Bret Easton Ellis was just a junior at Bennington College in Vermont when his first book, Less Than Zero, was published by Penguin Publishing. In fact, it was because of his student status that the book came to be, as the rough draft of the book was originally written for a tutorial that he was taking. Spotting Ellis’ talent, the professor realized that, though it needed some work, the story of a group of ultra-bored and ultra-rich kids living in Beverly Hills was certainly a marketable tale. Working with Ellis to help him hone his craft, that same professor eventually passed the story along to his own editor, and saw it published in 1985.
At 21 years of age, Ellis was a published novelist—and a successful one at that. Though filled with subject matter and situations that were likely far removed from the audience the book found, Less Than Zero spoke to the disillusioned youth of the time. Shortly thereafter, the book was optioned as a movie script, with Ellis set to adapt the novel for the screen. Though met with critical boos, the film, starring Andrew McCarthy, Robert Downey Junior, Jami Gertz and James Spader, secured Ellis’ future as one of the great voices of the generation.
For Ellis’ sophomore effort, Simon & Schuster published The Rules of Attraction in 1987. Again, the characters at the center of this tale were a group of spoiled rich kids, but this time the setting was not the glamour of Beverly Hills, but Camden College, a small, affluent liberal arts college in New England. a collection of short stories that—again—broached the topic of spoiled rich kids in LA. With this novel, which revisited the dark themes presented in Less Than Zero, Ellis seemed to be making a personal statement on the current state of youth in America. And, once again, Ellis’ work spoke volumes to the younger reading audience, leading Simon & Schuster to offer Ellis an advance of $300,000 to publish his next (as of then, not written) novel, American Psycho.
Even today, critics and audiences alike are still at odds over the making and meaning of American Psycho. Essentially, it is a story about a mixed-up young man who, when he is not watching TV or making plans for expensive dinners in his Wall Street office, can usually be found mutilating and/or killing unsuspecting homeless individuals and women throughout New York City. Though the themes are much deeper routed than any synopsis could explain, the basic idea of the story threw the entire publishing industry—and several women’s rights group—into an uproar. After paying an advance for the rights to publish American Psycho, Simon & Schuster refused to publish the book when it was actually completed and in the hands of the company’s editors. Deemed inappropriate, pornographic and violently misogynous by various members of the company and the public at large, the fate of Ellis’ book was uncertain.
Finally, in 1991 Vintage Contemporaries, a division of Random House, picked up the book for publication. Though, again, the book (and its author) were met with much criticism, it is a title that has continued to sell well (and be debated) since its publication. Condemnation of the book resurfaced again in 2000 when film director Mary Harron (I Shot Andy Warhol) decided to turn the story into a feature film. Though it certainly renewed interest in the moral debate surrounding the book’s text, it also renewed the public’s interest in the book and its author.
Since American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis has published only two other works. 1994’s The Informers was a collection of short stories that revisited Ellis’ earlier themes of opulence, death, casual sex and drugs (with a bit of vampirism thrown in for good measure). Ellis’ most recent novel, 1999’s Glamorama, took a long hard look at the worlds of fashion and celebrity in the nineties New York and beyond (it essentially becomes a “conspiracy” tale), and was certainly considered Ellis’ first attempt at creating a real literary structure. Though Ellis has maintained a large and loyal following of readers—many of whom grew up and came of age in the eighties, the decade that Ellis likes to revisit so often—for better or worse, he has never been able to recreate the commotion surrounding American Psycho—and no other book Ellis could possibly think up is likely to do so.
Included among Ellis’ favorite writers (though he is always careful to distinguish between his “favorite” writers and those who have “influenced” him) he counts Norman Mailer, John Updike and Philip Roth. Among his many influences, he cites Ernest Hemingway, Joan Didion, Don DeLillo, James Joyce and Thomas Pynchon.
Though he has remained within the literary mainstream since publishing Glamorama—writing articles for popular magazines, emerging with the release of the feature film version of American Psycho, etc.—there’s no doubt that whatever he comes up with next, it is sure to have readers and critics alike talking.
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