Tom Robbins

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Tom Robbins at a reading in San Francisco in 2005

Thomas Eugene Robbins (born July 22, 1932 in Blowing Rock , North Carolina ) is an American writer.

Life

Tom Robbins was born as the oldest of four children. His two grandfathers were Baptist ministers , his mother was a nurse and wrote stories for children that were printed in religious magazines, and the father worked for a utility company.

Tom's younger sister died in 1943, and his mother soon gave birth to twin sisters. The family moved to Burnsville , North Carolina. The family then moved again, this time to Warsaw , Virginia . At school, Tom was often the class clown and got into a lot of trouble. He moved to the Hargrove Military Academy , where the 15-year-old majored in basketball. Robbins married for the first time at 16, and his son Rip was born in 1954. In the same year Robbins began studying journalism at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia , in 1956 he was expelled from his fraternity "for throwing biscuits at his housemother" and then left Washington and Lee University and hitchhiked all over the place for some time through the United States. At the end of 1956 he went to New York “to become a poet”. In 1957 Robbins enlisted as a soldier in the United States Air Force and subsequently served for three years in Korea, where he worked as a meteorologist. In Tokyo he attended courses in Japanese culture and aesthetics. In 1960 he left the Air Force and returned to civilian life in Richmond, Virginia .

There he studied art at the Richmond Professional Institute (RPI), later Virginia Commonwealth University . During this time he worked for the student newspaper Proscript of the RPI, in which he published a column entitled Walks on the Wild Side & The Robbins Nest . He also worked as a proofreader for the Richmond Times-Dispatch newspaper . In 1961 he graduated from the RPI. He worked on Baboon Family art happenings with BH Hendricks and Mary Lou Davis and married his second wife Susan. He lost his job with the Richmond Times Dispatch after posting a photo of Sammy Davis Jr. in the newspaper . In 1962 Robbins moved to Seattle and attended the School of Far Eastern Studies at the University of Washington . In the same year, the marriage with Susan was divorced again.

He also took part in public happenings in Seattle : Low-Calorie Sacrifice to the Goddess Minnie Mouse (in Kirkland ), Stronger than Dirt (Pioneer Square in Seattle).

He completed his studies in Seattle with a Masters degree , and then went on a trip to South America with Joseph Campbell .

During his time in Seattle he worked a. a. as an editor and art critic for the Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer . In July 1963 he had his first experience with LSD . In 1964 he moved to the Village in New York City. There he took u. a. with Allen Ginsberg participated in a campaign to legalize marijuana , attended lectures by Timothy Leary and became personally acquainted with him. In 1965 Robbins moved to San Francisco , soon afterwards back to Seattle, where he worked as a disc jockey for a while. In July 1967 he attended a concert by the Doors and found his own typical writing style while working on a review of this concert.

In 1968 Robbins discussed with Luther Nichols, the "West Coast Editor" (editor responsible for the west coast) of Doubleday , his novel plans for Another Roadside Attraction for the first time . For a year he tried to put his vision on paper without making much progress. In the same year he married Terrie Lunden. He moved to South Bend , Washington state and continued working on his novel. In 1969 he received an advance of $ 2,500 and went on a trip to Japan . In 1970 Robbins moved to the fishing village of La Conner , Washington, and bought a Victorian house there. In 1971 his son Fleetwood Star was born and Robbins finished work on his book Another Roadside Attraction , which was published in hardcover that same year. Also in 1971 the marriage with Terrie was divorced again. Another Roadside Attraction was published as a paperback in 1972 . In 1976 Robbins' second novel Even Cowgirls Get the Blues was published , in 1980 the third, Still Life with Woodpecker . At a book signing at Papa Bach's bookstore in Santa Monica , he became friends with Timothy Leary. Robbins married Donna Davis in the early 1980s, but the marriage was soon divorced. In 1984 Jitterbug Perfume (Eng. "Pan Aroma") was published, the following year Robbins made a trip to Tanzania .

In 1987 he played the role of the toy maker in the film Made in Heaven . In 1990 Robbins published his fifth novel Skinny Legs and All . The author traveled to Timbuktu in the early 1990s . 1993 Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Gus Van Sant filmed in the lead roles are Uma Thurman and Keanu Reeves to see. In 1994 Robbins married Alexa D'Avalon, in the same year appeared Half Asleep In Frog Pajamas, and Robbins starred in the film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle . In 1995 Half Asleep ... rose to the New York Times bestseller list . In 1997 Robbins bought a house above Skagit Bay , but kept the old house in La Conner as a "writing house". Also in 1997, Robbins received the Golden Umbrella award at the Bumbershoot Seattle arts festival . In 2000, Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates was released and quickly hit the bestseller lists.

Tom Robbins was close friends with Terence McKenna , who died in 2000, and whose influence can be clearly felt in several of Robbins' works. One of the main characters ("Larry Diamond") in the novel Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas has theses similar to McKenna's, including promoting the use of psilocybin to expand consciousness . In 2003 Robbins' eighth novel Villa Incognito came out.

In addition to his eight novels to date, Robbins has also published poems, short stories, essays, travelogues and other things in newspapers and magazines such as Esquire , Playboy and the New York Times . He also created the album title for Chris Gelbmann 's first singer-songwriter album The Pink Beast Of Love .

A collection of such shorter writings was published in English in 2005 under the title Wild Ducks Flying Backwards , the German translation was published in 2007 under the title Chop Suey .

In 2014 he published his autobiography, Tibetan Peach Pie. In 2017 the German edition called Tibetischer Pfirsichstrudel was published.

Works

  • Another Roadside Attraction (1971), novel; German Ein Platz für Hot Dogs - Another Roadside Attraction (1982) ISBN 3-499-15429-3 (translation by pociao and Roberto de Hollanda)
  • Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1976), novel; German Sissy, Fateful Years of a Hitchhiker (1981) ISBN 3-499-15324-6 (German by Thomas Lindquist)
  • Still-Life With Woodpecker (1980), novel; German great spotted woodpecker (1983) ISBN 3-499-15148-0 (German by Thomas Lindquist)
  • Jitterbug Perfume (1984), Roman; German Pan Aroma - Jitterbug Perfume (1985) ISBN 3-499-15671-7 (German by Nikolaus Hansen)
  • Skinny Legs and All (1990), Novel; German Salome's seventh veil (1992) ISBN 3-499-13497-7 (translation from pociao )
  • Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (1994), novel; German half asleep in frog pajamas (1997) ISBN 3-499-22442-9 (translation by pociao and Walter Hartmann)
  • Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates (2000), Roman; German peoples of this world, relax! (2002) ISBN 3-499-23546-3 (translation by pociao and Roberto de Hollanda)
  • Villa Incognito (2003), novel; German Villa Incognito (2005) ISBN 3-498-05770-7 (translation by pociao and Roberto de Hollanda)
  • Wild Ducks Flying Backwards (2005), German CHOP SUEY. A reader. (2007) ISBN 3-499-24295-8 (translation of pociao)
  • B is for Beer (2009), German B for Beer: A Book for Big Children (2010) (translation by pociao)
  • Tibetan Peach Pie (2014).
    • German: Tibetan peach strudel , (translation from pociao). Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-499-26955-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Tom Robbins: A Critical Companion in Google Book Search
  2. ↑ 1963: Tom Robbins , Tripticon of November 25, 2018.
  3. ↑ So at least his own representation in this CNN portrait - (he "found his voice")
personal data
SURNAME Robbins, Tom
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Robbins, Thomas Eugene (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American writer
DATE OF BIRTH July 22, 1932
PLACE OF BIRTH Blowing Rock , North Carolina