Book Review
An artful 'forgery'
By JESSIE THORPE,United Press International
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave, whenfirst we practice to deceive."
Sir Walter Scott certainly was not describingthe intriguing story told in "The Poet and the Murderer"by Simon Worrall, but his prophetic words fit perfectly. Worrallhas taken hold of a complex and interesting subject -- forginghistoric and literary documents -- and untangled its many strandsto weave a coherent and eye-opening narrative.
This true story might seem impossibly opaqueif not for the author's dogged journalistic pursuit of the factsand his ability to construct a plausible chronology and crediblemotivations of the many people involved.
In 1997, Worrall's interest was piqued whenhe read that an unpublished poem by Emily Dickinson had been discoveredand purchased for the Jones Library in Amherst, Mass. Dan Lombardowas the curator who had raised the necessary $21,000 to bid onthis gem at Sotheby's auction house and bring it home with pride.But a further horrid discovery revealed to Lombardo the poem wasa fake, a fraud perpetrated by a master forger named Mark Hofmannwho was serving a life sentence in Utah for murder.
Lombardo's career could be ruined. His onlyhope lay in exposing the hoax along with Sotheby's suspected complicityand thereby restoring his reputation.
Worrall takes the reader into the mind andmission of Hofmann, a man of extraordinary talent who, as an adolescent,began forging rare coins. Raised in the Mormon faith in Salt LakeCity, he broke with the church emotionally and intellectuallywhile maintaining a surface compliance. He wanted to exploit thearrogance and weakness he saw in the entrenched hierarchy andrattle the foundations of Mormonism.
Hofmann began to practice the art of forgery,manufacturing documents so seemingly authentic, yet so potentiallydamaging to the church, that the chief officers paid him hugesums for them, hoping to hide them away. In a period of five years,they bought 450 documents for hundreds of thousands of dollars.Yet Hofmann leaked news of his "discoveries" to thepress in devious ways and made fools of the church leaders.
All this while, Hofmann led a placid existencein the Salt Lake community. An upright married man with threechildren, he set up a laboratory in his basement, mixing chemicalsfor ink and aging elements for paper. As his reputation as a dealerin rare documents grew, he gained access to the finest librarycollections and was not above stealing volumes or ripping blankpages from books to use for his forgeries.
He expanded his range. For chump change,he would purchase first editions of 19th century novels and "autograph"them by Mark Twain or Harriet Beecher Stowe to enhance the value.He created "letters" by George Washington, Abraham Lincolnand Daniel Boone.
Hofmann was a clever genius who manipulatedpeople at first for the sheer fun of it. Worrall makes the pointthat a forger is like an actor, immersing himself in the part,using a "feeling for dialogue and character" to createdocuments with the "ring of authority." Hofmann's forgeriesfooled examiners at the top libraries. Even the FBI could notdebunk his work.
In some ways, this part of the story isenticing and Robin Hood-ish. The dazzling creativity of forgery,the exacting research necessary to emulate authenticity is, well,admirable. This man was dedicated and mostly taking advantageof the highly gullible and wealthy people who hang out at Sotheby'sor Christie's, trying to impress their friends by owning somethingimportant.
I recall so well the hysteria surroundingthe sale of Jackie Onassis' personal belongings and the crowdspaying thousands of dollars for her wastebaskets. The auctionmarket is big business indeed, driven by hype and supported tothe tune of $30 billion a year by people with huge amounts ofdisposable income.
Worrall's astonishing revelation is thateven in this charged and highly voracious atmosphere, gettingaway with selling phony documents is not that difficult! Peoplewant to believe, they want to be told stories. That is the plaintruth. They participate in their own deceptions.
Say as a child, you had fun-loving parentswho carefully placed an old-looking map somewhere for you to "discover,"and that map had a big black X marking the spot of buried treasure.If you wanted to believe so much that you went digging, then youunderstand the wisdom of Worrall's insight.
Hofmann rationalized that if he createda document that was so well done that even experts could not detectthe fakery, there was no fraud. So, what's the harm?
I remember an afternoon in the British Museum-- the old British Museum -- when I pushed aside a blue velvetdrape over a locked glass case and peered down at the originalmanuscript of "Jane Eyre." The thrill is with me now-- Charlotte Bronte's neat writing, her occasional scratchingout of a word, the palpable sense of the moment of creation.
The real scholars -- several of whom arethe heroes of this book, and the reverence they hold for preciousand immortal work, the hours and years they spend toiling awayto collect and preserve manuscripts and letters -- are harmedand mocked by the Hofmanns of the world. Hofmann wanted to makepowerful people look stupid, but he snared good and trusting peoplein his crimes as well.
Hofmann's snarled schemes blew up, literally,as he became more ambitious and desperate for money. Caught inhis own many traps, the only way out seemed to be plotting themurder of two men who were squeezing him for payment, threateninghim with exposure and bankruptcy.
As skillfully and scientifically as he mixedhis forging potions, he constructed bombs and carried out twomurders. He was caught and put in prison in 1985. He was 31 yearsold.
The consequences of his crimes go on. Adozen years later, the Emily Dickinson poem surfaced, auctionedoff by the people at Sotheby's who, according to Worrall, knewbetter. Hofmann is not the only villain here.
Even though this book is excellent reading,
I must note some jarring weaknesses.
One unforgivable paragraph compares Hofmann'sart to Dickinson's, as though the two were analogous. Also, hislengthy psychological analysis of Emily Dickinson depends on gossipand conjecture, unproven to true Dickinson scholars. He makesa lot of assertions about Dickinson's impenetrable inner lifethat seem disrespectful. After all, this book has little to dowith Dickinson per se; only to the extent this criminal foundit possible to fabricate a poem of hers that fooled a few peoplefor a while. Such was Hofmann's hubris; he thought his poem wasbetter even than some of hers!
Worrall includes facsimiles of the forgedpoem and a real poem of Dickinson's -- a useful display. Readthis book for its solid reporting and interesting characters.Skip the passage on Emily's psyche and read one of her poems instead-- this one, for instance.
"Between My Country -- and the Others-- There is a Sea --
But Flowers -- negotiate between us --
As Ministry."
· "The Poetand the Murderer": A True Story of Literary Crime and theArt of Forgery by Simon Worrall, Dutton, 263 pages