A: A Novel

Andy Warhol

Grove Press, 1998 - Art - 458 pages

One of the major literary works by Andy Warhol, the subject of the new Netflix documentary The Andy Warhol Diaries, executive produced by Ryan Murphy

Conceptually unique, hilarious, and frightening, a: A Novel is the perfect literary manifestation of Andy Warhol's sensibility. In the late sixties, Warhol set out to turn a trade book into a piece of pop art, and the result was this astonishing account of the artists, superstars, addicts, and freaks who made up the Factory milieu. Created from audiotapes recorded in and around the Factory, a: A Novel begins with the fabulous Ondine popping several amphetamines and then follows its characters as they converse with inspired, speed-driven wit and cut swaths through the clubs, coffee shops, hospitals, and whorehouses of 1960s Manhattan.

About the author

Born near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, of immigrant Czech parents, American artist Andy Warhol studied art at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh. He then worked as a commercial artist in New York City. In the early 1960s, Warhol became the most famous pioneer of "pop art," which used comic books, advertisements, and consumer goods as subject matter. Warhol's colorful paintings of Campbell's soup can labels, boxes of Brillo pads, and celebrity icons such as Marilyn Monroe, became among the most recognizable examples of pop art. Warhol was also a filmmaker as well as a painter and graphic artist; his more memorable films include Trash (1969) and Frankenstein (1973). His studio, called "The Factory," became infamous as a locale for eccentrics and eccentric behavior, much of it associated with the New York drug scene. It was Warhol who predicted that, "in the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes."

Bibliographic information

• Title: A: A Novel
• Author: Andy Warhol
• Publisher: Grove Press, 1998
• ISBN: 0802135536, 9780802135537
• Length: 458 pages
• Subjects: Art / Individual Artists / Monographs; Fiction / General; Fiction / Literary