![]() Schjeldahl, a huge fan of Frank O’Hara, had contracted to write a biography of the poet, and he traveled far and wide to get interviews with a range of people who knew, and mostly adored, O’Hara. ![]() The triggering incident for the memoir is Ada’s discovery of a cache of cassette tape interviews in the dusty basement of her father’s East Village apartment. Yet she still desperately wants his approval, and the tension between a daughter’s need and a father’s indifference is at the center of Also a Poet. When he isn’t outright ignoring his daughter, he’s taking advantage of her generosity, or throwing her gifts in the garbage, or fawning over an acolyte with the pseudonym “Spencer,” who is apparently much more interesting than Ada. Actually, “kind of” is putting it politely. As he appears in Also a Poet: Frank O’Hara, My Father, and Me, Ada Calhoun’s father, The New Yorker art critic Peter Schjeldahl, seems like kind of a dick. ![]()
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