Executive Overview
In the realm of contemporary personal essay and creative non-fiction, few works capture the elusive, fragmented, and deeply human nature of companionship quite like Jane Gillette’s memoir, Old Friends. Published in The Missouri Review’s vibrant online-only prose anthology, BLAST, Gillette’s narrative resists the tidy, hagiographic impulse that so often defines modern memorialization. Instead, it offers a raw, idiosyncratic, and poignant exploration of what it means to truly know someone across the vast expanse of decades, shifting geographies, and evolving identities.
The catalyst for Gillette’s memoir is the death of her lifelong friend, Steve, who succumbed to pancreatic cancer on August 17, 2018. When Gillette attended Steve’s memorial service more than a year later, in September 2019, she found herself sitting among mourners whose recollections bore little resemblance to the man she had known. While family members, colleagues, and acquaintances eulogized Steve through the lens of his public life—his fervent anti-war activism, his political engagements, and his passion for teaching tax law—Gillette realized her Steve was an entirely different entity.
Driven by the inevitable flaws of human memory and a profound urge to reconcile these divergent portraits, Gillette embarks on a literary excavation. Her memoir examines the makings of the people we know or once knew, arguing that the love and remembrance lingering for our "Old Friends" provides a sanctuary to which we can always return, even when that space is strictly confined to the architecture of memory. This piece serves not merely as a retrospective tribute, but as a masterclass in the journalistic and literary investigation of intimacy, illuminating how platonic soulmates shape our intellectual, professional, and emotional trajectories.
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Detailed Chronology: A Tapestry of Decades
To understand the depth of the bond between Jane Gillette and Steve, one must trace a timeline defined less by rigid dates and more by cultural epochs, academic disillusionment, political turmoil, and domestic reconfigurations.
The Academic Underground and "The Committee"
The friendship originated within the intellectual ecosystem of a university setting during a period of intense social upheaval. Born in 1945 (with Gillette born slightly earlier in 1943), Steve inhabited what Gillette fondly terms "the olden time." Their paths crossed when Gillette was an adjunct professor of English. Every Friday afternoon at five o’clock, she participated in meetings of "The Committee" at The Tombs, a local watering hole where academics gathered to celebrate the conclusion of the week.
While the rest of the cohort consisted of assistant professors destined for tenure in Classics, English, Philosophy, or Economics, Gillette remained an adjunct—a position she recognized she would never transcend, largely because her literary output was confined to short stories rather than institutional criticism. The Committee was both a social sanctuary and a witness to historical shifts. When student activists established a shantytown in front of the university to protest South African apartheid, resulting in arrests and subsequent university-brokered negotiations, the institution co-opted The Committee. Transformed into "students" under the direction of a law professor, this collective reconvened on Wednesday afternoons to study apartheid.
It was within this crucible of radical politics and academic theater that Gillette and Steve recognized a kindred spirit, though their shared histories brushed against one another earlier, notably during the 1970 Vietnam War Moratorium efforts.
The Crucible of Divorce and Deepening Intimacy
As life progressed, Gillette and Steve experienced the standard drifts and pulls of adulthood. Their friendship solidified into something profound and sustaining during a period of simultaneous personal collapses. When Steve’s first major marriage to Gaylord dissolved—prompted by Gaylord exiting the closet—Steve turned to Gillette as a daily confidante. Simultaneously, Gillette’s own marriage came to an end.
These parallel heartbreaks transformed an intermittent academic friendship into a nightly ritual of telephone conversations. They dissected their readings (The Charterhouse of Parma, The Magic Mountain, Love in the Time of Cholera), navigated new romances, and offered psychological ballast. Notably, when Gillette found herself terrorized by a stalking ex-lover, Steve intervened by introducing her to Daryll, a prominent Washington lawyer whose strategic advice—having an out-of-town friend threaten exposure to the stalker’s wealthy wife—neutralized the threat.
Professional Salvage and Generosity
Steve’s practical influence on Gillette’s life was transformative. Following her disillusionment with and departure from institutional academia, Gillette transitioned to a career at the National Trust for Historic Preservation. During this transitional phase, Steve stepped in as an operational advisor. He demystified the tax code, assisted her with her unfamiliar financial filings, and gifted her a laptop computer. This technological lifeline empowered her to write short stories at night, directly facilitating the creative output that would later earn her a Lawrence Foundation prize, an O. Henry prize, and publication in prestigious outlets like the Hopkins Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, and Michigan Quarterly Review.
Later Chapters and Final Shadows
As the decades rolled into the 2000s, Gillette relocated to the West Coast with a new husband, while Steve eventually found stability and happiness with Laura, a New York University law professor. The nightly phone calls tapered off because Steve was finally content, dividing his time between Washington, a Nantucket retreat, and European travels.
The final chapter of Steve’s life arrived with a brutal diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. Despite the logistical and emotional barriers erected by Steve’s wife, Laura—who barred visitors as Steve’s condition deteriorated—Gillette’s internal imperative to bear witness remained unabated. Steve passed away on August 17, 2018, leaving behind a legacy that transcended the political and legal accolades cited at his memorial, resting instead in the private archives of those he quietly anchored.
Supporting Context & Metrics: The Anatomy of a Literary Voice
To fully appreciate Old Friends, it is essential to contextualize the work within Jane Gillette’s broader literary career and the publishing platform that houses it.
The Author: Jane Gillette
Jane Gillette is not a novice chronicler of human nuance. Her pedigree as a master of short fiction is well-documented:
- Awards: Recipient of both an O. Henry Prize and the Lawrence Foundation Prize.
- Publications: Her short fiction has graced the pages of America’s most discerning literary journals, including the Hopkins Review, Antigonish Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, and The Missouri Review.
- Collected Works: In Fall 2017, Missouri Review Books published her acclaimed collection, The Trail of the Demon and Other Stories.
The Platform: TMR’s BLAST
Old Friends: A Memoir was published under BLAST, an online-only prose anthology curated by The Missouri Review. Designed specifically for works "too vibrant to be confined between the covers of a print journal," BLAST serves as a digital incubator for essays, memoirs, and narratives that push the boundaries of conventional prose forms by embracing stylistic daring, emotional urgency, and structural fluidity.
Metrics of Memory and Relationship Dynamics
While empirical data is rarely applied to human friendship, Gillette’s memoir outlines several quantifiable patterns of platonic longevity:
- Duration: A friendship spanning over four decades, bridging the late 1960s to 2018.
- Geographic Span: Navigated across academic bars in Washington, D.C., transatlantic commutes to London, West Coast relocations, and Santa Fe retreats.
- Literary Touchstones: Ranging from classic European realism (The Magic Mountain) to modern geopolitical milestones (the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989, which coincided with Gillette’s divorce decree celebration).
Official Statements and Reflections
While traditional journalism relies on press releases and corporate statements, personal memoirs draw their authority from interior monologues, retrospective admissions, and the testimonies of surviving witnesses. In Old Friends, the "statements" are found in the tension between public eulogies and private reckonings.
At Steve’s memorial service in September 2019, the official narrative cast him as a crusader for social justice:
"Speakers at Steve’s memorial service… focused, quite appropriately, on his anti-war activities, his political concerns, and how he loved to teach tax law."
Gillette’s internal counter-statement highlights the divergence between public persona and private intimacy:
"Well, I thought, mine was a different Steve. Although I’m hampered by memory’s flaws, I am now writing down some memories, flawed or not, because I feel they address the issues of why my Steve was different from their Steve and what an old friend is."
Further complicating the official record are the playful contradictions of shared memory. When recounting the elaborate, perhaps mythical academic subterfuge of The Committee reconvening under the guise of apartheid-study students, Gillette notes the skepticism of fellow alumna Vicky:
"(My friend Vicky says the fake Committee class didn’t happen. She says I just dreamed it up. But if it didn’t happen, why do I remember it?)"
This rhetorical inquiry strikes at the core of memoiristic truth: emotional resonance often supersedes documentary precision. Whether Steve moonlit for the Secret Service during Clinton’s second inauguration—a whispered rumor at a cocktail party—or whether he simply mastered the art of transatlantic travel via alternating glasses of red and white wine, the "official" truth of Steve is secondary to the psychological truth he provided.
Future Outlook: The Legacy of Memory
As personal essayists and creative non-fiction writers continue to navigate the digital age, works like Jane Gillette’s Old Friends offer a vital blueprint for the future of life-writing. In an era dominated by hyper-curated digital footprints and public grief displays on social media platforms, Gillette models an alternative approach: quiet, idiosyncratic, and fiercely independent remembrance.
The Evolution of the Memoir
The publication of Old Friends in an agile, digital-first space like BLAST signals a shift in how readers consume memoirs. Long-form introspection is increasingly finding a home in dynamic online anthologies where narrative voice can bypass traditional publishing bottlenecks to reach audiences instantly. This ensures that intimate, non-commercial reflections on ordinary human relationships remain accessible to readers seeking depth over sensationalism.
The Unending Conversation
Gillette concludes her memoir with a characteristic blend of secular melancholy and literary wit, imagining Steve "up there in Heaven making new Old Friends."
For readers, the future outlook provided by this memoir is a challenge to reevaluate their own interpersonal histories. Gillette reminds us that the people who shape us are rarely the monolithic figures presented in obituaries or formal eulogies. Instead, they are mosaics of midnight phone calls, shared Chinese takeout from Yenching Palace, misplaced pets at veterinary clinics, and quiet acts of professional salvation.
In committing these flawed, vibrant memories to the page, Jane Gillette ensures that her Steve—the confidante, the tax lawyer, the travel advisor, the anchor—survives not just in the archives of her own mind, but as a universal archetype of the enduring power of old friends.
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