Editing Michael Chabon (section)

===''The Mysteries of Pittsburgh'' and initial literary success===
Chabon's first novel, ''[[The Mysteries of Pittsburgh]]'', was written as his UC Irvine master's thesis. Without telling Chabon, his professor, [[Donald Heiney]] (better known by his pen name, MacDonald Harris), sent it to a literary agent,<ref name = "monitor">{{cite news | url = http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1130/p17s01-bogn.html |date = November 30, 2004 | title = Able to Leap over Literary Barriers in a Single Book: Chabon Ranges from Kabbalah to Captain Nemo | last = Spanberg | first = Erik |work =[[The Christian Science Monitor]] | access-date = July 3, 2009}}</ref> who got the author an impressive $155,000 advance on the novel, though most first-time novelists receive advances under $7,500.<ref name = "sent">{{cite news | url = https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-jun-30-ca-gottlieb30-story.html |date = June 30, 2002 | title = Adventures in Rewriting |last = Gottlieb |first = Jeff| work = [[Los Angeles Times]] | access-date = July 2, 2009}}</ref> ''The Mysteries of Pittsburgh'' appeared in 1988 and was a bestseller, instantly catapulting Chabon to literary celebrity. Among his major literary influences in this period were [[Donald Barthelme]], [[Jorge Luis Borges]], [[Gabriel García Márquez]], [[Raymond Chandler]], [[John Updike]], [[Philip Roth]] and [[F. Scott Fitzgerald]].<ref name="guardian.co.uk">{{cite news| url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/mar/27/michael-chabon-interview-christopher-tayler | work=The Guardian | location=London | title=Michael Chabon: 'I hadn't read a lot by men of my generation and background about being a father – it felt like I was on relatively untrodden ground' | first=Christopher | last=Tayler | date=March 27, 2010 | access-date=May 12, 2010}}</ref> As he remarked in 2010, "I just copied the writers whose voices I was responding to, and I think that's probably the best way to learn."<ref name="guardian.co.uk"/>

Chabon was ambivalent about his newfound fame. He turned down offers to appear in a [[Gap (clothing retailer)|Gap]] ad and to be featured as one of ''[[People (magazine)|People]]''{{'}}s "50 Most Beautiful People".<ref name="buzbee">{{cite news | url = https://www.nytimes.com/books/00/09/24/reviews/000924.24buz.html |date = October 26, 2012 | title = Michael Chabon: Comics Came First |last = Buzbee |first = Lewis| work = [[The New York Times]] | access-date = July 2, 2009}}</ref> He later said of the ''People'' offer, "I don't give a shit [about it] ... I only take pride in things I've actually done myself. To be praised for something like that is just weird. It just felt like somebody calling and saying, 'We want to put you in a magazine because the weather's so nice where you live.' "<ref name="rolling"/>

In 2001, Chabon reflected on the success of his first novel, noting that while "the upside was that I was published and I got a readership," the downside was the emotional impact: "this stuff started happening and I was still like, 'Wait a minute, is my thesis done yet?' It took me a few years to catch up."<ref name="rolling"/> In 1991, he published ''[[A Model World and Other Stories|A Model World]]'', a collection of short stories, many of which were previously published in ''[[The New Yorker]]''.