Statue in the Works for a Literary Man of Action

George Plimpton was a literary editor, participant journalist, debonair partygoer, and amateur sports enthusiast — never one to stand still. Nevertheless, plans are under way to raise funds for a statue honoring this urbane penman on the Upper East Side or in Bryant Park.

"The way we see it," the PlimptonProject.org Web site says, "if this crowded little isle has room for a statue of Balto the Sled Dog, then there is room for George."

The principal organizer of the effort, writer Toby Barlow, told The New York Sun that few New Yorkers were as inspiring as Plimpton, who died in 2003. Mr. Barlow said he is talking to sculptors and has so far raised $4,000 of the projected $200,000 needed. Proposed designs include Plimpton with his bicycle, atop a horse, or carrying literature and boxing gloves.

Mr. Barlow has talked with the Department of Transportation about having the statue at a cul de sac outside Plimpton's apartment at East 72nd Street and the East River. He is also talking with the parks department about a Plimpton statue in Bryant Park.

The publisher of Grove/Atlantic, Morgan Entrekin, told the Sun another relevant site might be outside Elaine's restaurant, a favorite haunt of Plimpton's. "The city is less without him," he said. The filmmaker Albert Maysles said Plimpton deserves something special, and an editor at the Paris Review, Nathaniel Rich, said he would certainly make an annual pilgrimage to the statue should it be built.

Friends were somewhat bemused by the idea. Robert Silvers, who joined the Paris Review's editorial board in 1954, said Plimpton's reaction would have been "Golly!" Nelson Aldrich, who is editing an oral biography of Plimpton, said the late Paris Review editor would be "genuinely appalled, but secretly pleased."

Mr. Silvers said Plimpton was a marvelous writer and editor, and a man of the highest generosity who encouraged many younger writers. Plimpton combined these different abilities with seemingly effortless elegance.

Plimpton's varied abilities included having played five minutes as goalie for the Boston Bruins and sparring a few rounds — not entirely successfully —with boxer Archie Moore.

The Web site includes a section of "arcane," such as Plimpton's recalling journalist Dotson Rader saying how playwright Tennessee Williams once wanted to be buried at sea where Hart Crane vanished overboard. Why? Williams said he always admired the gentleman and "never had the opportunity to meet him."

Now, if the Plimpton statue is erected, many will get a chance to greet this spirited figure who charmed New York.