Trevanian

"Trevanian" was thought to be the pen name of Dr. Rodney William Whitaker, born June 12 1931 in Granville, New York. He died December 14, 2005 in the English West Country. Although some believe the pseudonym he chose was based on the name of English historian G.M. Trevelyan, he told friends that he used the name of an Armenian acquaintance of his.^{[failed verification]} The actual Travanian was a man named James T. Hashian. Hashian was the actual author of three spy novels (which at the time he refused to identify), then "sold" his pen-name to Rodney William Walker when those books proved to be a popular success. Trevanian was Jack Hashian's mother's maiden name. The New York Times reported that Hashian was an American speechwriter and researcher working in the Labor Department, that he had scoured the north face of the Eiger, spent a year and a half at Harvard, and been a Navy fighter pilot. Following "seven unpublished novels about the American Indian wars and eight unpublished novels about sea battles in the 1812 period," Hashian sold a novel titled Mamigon (1982), based on his "Armenian-American heritage" — as he put it, "the story of the bloody 1915 Turkish massacre of Armenian Christians who didn't know how to turn the other cheek." There is a character in the book called "Travanian" (note spelling), and Hashian dropped very broad and unsubtle hints that the Trevanian novels were actually his own work. [1] One other book, Shanidar (1990) written by "Hashian." The jacket photo of this latter book reveals a man with his jacket collar pulled up to conceal everything but his eyes, perhaps to promulgate the preferred suggestion that Hashian really "was" Trevanian.

Whitaker also published works as Nicholas Seare and Beñat Le Cagot as well as under his own name (The Language of Film). His detective novel The Main was originally slated to appear under the pen name Jean-Paul Morin.

Life

James T. Hashian was the author who went by the pseudonym Trevanian, the maiden name of his wife (its says his "mother" above). Born in 1923, he died in 1999. A Federal Government employee who worked for the US Department of Labor in Washington, DC. Sometime in the late 1980s after writing The Main, the rumor (whose rumor?) was he sold his author's pseudonym so that any book thereafter was by the new Trevanian. (This rumor is obviously false. Shibumi was written - or at least published - after The Main, yet it was clearly written by the same hand as The Eiger Sanction and The Loo Sanction: the stylistic similarities are unmistakeable. Moreover, why would a man who valued his name so highly sell it to some one else?) Indeed, Trevanian was the maiden name of Jack Hashian (now it's his OWN maiden name!) which he used to write the books that made the name Trevanian famous, born in 1923, he passed away in 1999.

Hashian wrote many bestselling novels, one of which, The Eiger Sanction, was made into a 1975 movie starring Clint Eastwood. Trevanian described the movie as "vapid" in a footnote in Shibumi. He requested (and received) a screenwriting credit as Rod Whitaker. (Obviously he would NOT do this if he was Jack/James Hashian?) The balance of the script was written by Warren Murphy, the mystery author perhaps best known for co-writing the Destroyer series of men's action novels, about a similarly sarcastic assassin.

Trevanian (Jack Hashian) kept his true identity unknown for many years, and refused to grant interviews or contribute to the publicity efforts of his publishers. Trevanian's first known interview was granted to Carol Lawson of The New York Times for a June 10, 1979 article coinciding with the release of Shibumi. In this article Trevanian stated that "Trevanian is going out of business. Now he can talk." (Was this Jack Hashian or Rodney Whitacker/Walker? If the latter, why would he say that if he had recently "bought" the identity? If it was the former, why would he say it, knowing that he had "sold" the identity? Wouldn't it be a constructive breach of contract with the "new" Trevanian? I am not saying that Trevanian didn't say those words when he granted the interview, but the theory that Hashian was Trevanian and that he sold the identity to Whitacker/Walker is pure drivel!) It was often rumored that he was actually Robert Ludlum using a pen name to which Trevanian stated, "I don't even know who he is. I read Proust, but not much else written in the 20th century.". It is possible that the myth arose out of confusion caused by the fact that Ludlum himself once wrote a novel called "Trevayne" in which he departed from his usual style, as well as his customary title convention of the definite article followed by a name and a noun (usually an abstract noun).

Quotations

"The propaganda of the victors becomes the history of the vanquished."

"Do not fall into the error of the artisan who boasts of twenty years experience in his craft while in fact he has only one year of experience - twenty times." ~ from SHIBUMI

Nonfiction (as Rod Whitaker)

The Language of Film (1970)
Christ on Stage. Dialog 5, Summer 1966, pgs. 226-227 (1966).
Conversation: On translating Senecan tragedy into film by James Hynd (an interview with Rod Whitaker). Arion (Boston), v. 7 (Spring 1968), p. 58-67 (1968).
Stasis. Script to a film by Rod Whitaker and Richard Kooris. Copyright (c) 1968.
The Lawyer, The Lawman, and The Law: Public Image, Texas Law Review: Volume 50 - Issue 4. pgs. 822-827 (1972).

Novels

As Trevanian

The Eiger Sanction (1972)
The Loo Sanction (1973)
The Main (1976)
Shibumi (published May 14 1979)
The Summer of Katya (1983)
Incident at Twenty-Mile (1998)
The Crazyladies of Pearl Street (2006)

As Nicholas Seare

1339 or So ...Being An Apology for A Pedlar (1975) (1339 or So... was, in early form, a stage play titled Eve of the Bursting)
Rude Tales And Glorious (1983)

Short stories

Switching; by Trevanian. Playboy Magazine. December 1978. (Note: a revised version of this story appeared in Hot Night in the City as After Hours at Rick's)
Minutes of a Village Meeting; by Beñat Le Cagot, translated by Trevanian. Harper's Monthly. February 1979. pgs. 60 - 63. (Note: a revised version of this story appeared in Hot Night in the City.)
That Fox-of-a-Beñat; by Beñat Le Cagot, translated by Trevanian. Yale Literary Magazine. 1984. Vol. 151, No 1, pgs 25-33. (Note: a revised version of this story appeared in Hot Night in the City.)
The Secrets of Miss Plimsoll, Private Secretary; by Trevanian. Redbook. March 1984. (Note: a revised version of this story appeared in Hot Night in the City as The Sacking of Miss Plimsoll.)
The Apple Tree: by Trevanian. The Antioch Review. Yellow Springs: Spring 2000. Vol. 58, Iss. 2; p. 195 (14 pages)
Waking to the Spirit Clock; by Trevanian. The Antioch Review. Yellow Springs: Summer 2003. Vol. 61, Iss. 3; p. 409

Other works

"Eve of the Bursting", by Rod Whitaker. A drama in three acts, 1959; performed at the University Playhouse at the University of Washington. Rod Whitaker directed. Jerry Pournelle was company manager of the production.
Contributed an Introduction to the 1998 Re-issue of A Climb Up to Hell by Jack Olsen. 1st Ed. Harper & Row, 1962, New York, 1962. Reprint Edition by Griffin House (St. Martins Press), New York, 1998. Introduction Copyright 1998 by Trevanian.
Contributed a Testimonial to the website of the Theory of Eight. Testimonial Copyright 2000 by Trevanian.
Edited and Contributed an Introduction to the short-story mystery collection Death Dance: Suspenseful Stories of the Dance Macabre. Cumberland House, 2002. Introduction Copyright 2002 by Trevanian.
The Crazyladies of Pearl Street Cybernotes Companion. Copyright 2005 by Trevanian.
The Street of the Four Winds - Part I Internet Edition'. Copyright 2005 by Trevanian.

External links

trevanian.com
2005 article from Albany's Metroland Magazine
"Rodney Whitaker, Writer, Is Dead at 74; Best Known as Trevanian". The New York Times. December 17, 2005. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)