I think pretending golems are real is a pretty big tipoff that other stuff might not be true, either.

Perhaps, as one sees on book covers, Mr. Chabon should be required to wear a sign that says "A Novelist"?

Sheesh. Is there a corollary of Godwin's Law that says nothing makes people nuttier than working the Holocaust into the conversation?

"A writer that has frequently fudged facts for fun has fingered a fellow fabulist for fictionalizing facts for fortune, even though that fabulist foretold his fictions before his oration."

I can't even read that without getting confused, let alone say it.

The affair has a fulsome whiff of flimflam or even foofaraw.

No, no, no, no, no. If you read Paul M.'s essay in its entirety -- it isn't available online, but there's an excerpt here -- you'll see that it's ridiculous to suggest, as Matthew Brogan does, that it was written "in the hope of stirring up a scandal."

Maliszewski makes very clear that he doesn't take offense at Chabon's story-telling, per se. (Indeed, he suggests that as a serial hoaxster himself, he was initially impressed by, and attracted to, Chabon's playfulness and trickery here.)

In the end, Maliszewski does criticize Chabon -- in a subtle and relatively gentle way -- for the content of his hoax, which Maliszewski finds sentimental and evasive.

Brogan, and the Times item itself, seem to have badly missed the point of the essay.

Uh, dude, I think you're the one missing the point, which is for Bookforum to sell more magazines. Your theory sounds all reasonable but doesn't explain the incredibly offensive headlines "Michael Chabon's Holocaust Hoax" and so forth. Check out their ad on Bookslut. It's a clear bid by them and Maliszewski to raise their profiles at Chabon's expense.

And your reading ignores all of Malisz.'s wounded cries of "I was fooled."

If you listen to the lecture, it's clear that Chabon called it a memoir, and Maliszewski interviews a lot of people, including a fellow at Nextbook, and all of them except Brogan said they believed the Holocaust story to be true. The fellow even says if it's not true, Chabon should be stopped. You've also manage to overlook, as did the Times, the fact that Chabon has been going around the country telling a supposedly true story that people are believing in which a real man - CB Colby - is identified as a Nazi propagandist in hiding. And, as Chabon admits, that is a lie. Colby was a children's book author who served in the Air Force Auxillary after WW II, and he's dead now, which is lucky for Chabon. Otherwise, he'd likely have a case of defamation on his hands.