down the Tisch Auditorium steps to the first row to greet Sontag , who had settled in her seat , surrounded by the entourage that had accompanied her to her reading at New York University . Polsky stood before Sontag , then genuflected and kissed her hand . Was it a joke ? Perhaps . She smiled and seemed to take his performance as her due . At the time I did not have access to her correspondence , neither the letters written to her , nor her emails . Now I do . 3 And I am here to testify that Polsky was not alone , and that women and men alike abased themselves before Susan Sontag . Actresses , actors , writers , intellectuals of all kinds , were worshipful , adoring — and , yes — sycophantic . It mattered not that her books were controversial and that even her most successful works received critical — even negative — reviews . She occupied a place on Parnassus , and she was well defended .
So quite aside from what you may think about unauthorized biographers , reflect on what it means to be Susan Sontag and to command legions ready to do anything to remain in your favor — indeed to show you that they can be trusted , even consecrated to your cause . Perhaps , though , before telling my story , I should give at least a flavor of what I mean by the Sontag rapture . Here is a specimen of exaltation confected by Michael Silverblatt , the host of KCRW ' s Bookworm , one of the few 3
Sontag sold her archive to the University of California , Los Angeles . Benjamin Moser , her authorized biographer , has had access to her restricted diaries in the UCLA collection . Moser and two other reporters have written about the contents of the digital archive ( see Works Cited ). Like all other researchers , I was given access to Sontag ’ s correspondence and her e-mails . I am also grateful to Robert Montoya and Jillian Cuellar , UCLA archivists . Cuellar ’ s e-mail to me , January 12 , 2015 , addressed some of my questions about the contents of Sontag ’ s digital archive . I will be writing my own article about the Sontag archive for The Biographer ’ s Craft newsletter .
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