Fran Lebowitz (FL) is an author and raconteur of witty social commentary. FL is also ignomoniously known as a writer with an ongoing writers' block. Her career is experiencing a revival thanks to two recent documentaries breathing life into her caustic humor and astute observations. "Public Speaking" (2010) and Martin Scorsese's doc. miniseries, "Pretend It's a City" (2021). Scorsese is a brilliant director who knows to refrain from reining in his subjects. "Pretend It's a City" begins each episodes with FL glibly walking past the brownstone in NYC where she joins Martin for banter. Lebowitz's love for gab, cigarettes and NYC all come to light through her non-stop diatribe. Fran pays tribute to her beloved city. She can talk the talk as well as walk the walk. The streets and subways are tinged in soft hues as we gladly tag along after our formidable guide. Can she write the wrongs in captious comments of people and things that have come before? She often stops and thinks about them to voice her, misgivings. Recently, I had the pleasure of hearing FL speak. Her onstage intro was brief leaving Fran to take Q&A's from the audience. Some questions were insipid, and some perceptive. Regardless, Fran's repartee was fast, clever and funny. The event piqued my interest to read her early works. "Fran Leibowitz's Reader" combines her two books from '78 and '81. I found her writing wanting in alacrity and aptitude. FL was self-aggrandizing and most egregious of all, dull. Much of the writing wanes on about not writing. "As for not writing, well, when it comes to not writing, I'm the real thing, the genuine article." The same can be said for the vast amount of time spent in bed. "My schedule could not, at this time, accommodate such a task, seeing as how I was up to my ears in oversleeping." She's known for friendships with celebrities like Martin Scorsese and Toni Morrison. After hearing FL be entertaining with an audience, I agreed, with her assessment, she's a contemporary Oscar Wilde. FL is not reticent letting us know how brilliant she is. "Gifted though I might be with a flair for international politics, I will renounce the practice of exhibiting this facility to my passengers." "Even though I am breathtakingly bilingual, I will not attempt ever again to curry favor with waiters." A meme in her book portrays the snobbish, class society in NYC. "Wealth and power are more likely to be the result of breeding than they are of reading." Her massive collection of books is legendary. Lebowtiz should be esteemed for her relentless rhetoric which works when heard but not through her written word. If you prefer, sleep is suggested. "Sleep is the consummate protection against the unseemliness that is the invariable consequence of being awake."
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