Norman Mailer, page 109
“Kate Millett’s hard clay”: NM to Bourjaily, 10-21-70.
“the first inkling”: NM to Selden Rodman, 9-11-71.
The Second Sex: Translated by H. M. Parshley (NY: Knopf, 1953).
The Feminine Mystique: (NY: Norton, 1963).
“fundamental argument”: Louis Menand, “Books as Bombs,” New Yorker, 1-24-11.
Of a Fire on the Moon: (Boston: Little, Brown, 1971).
“unremitting self-involvement”: Benjamin DeMott, “Inside Apollo 11 with Aquarius Mailer,” Saturday Review, 1-16-71, 25–27, 57–58.
“Manichean ox-team”: Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, “Mailer’s Dream of the Moon—I,” NYT, 1-7-71, 33.
“a certain slackness”: Morris Dickstein, “A Trip to Inner and Outer Space,” NYTBR, 1-10-71, 1, 42–45.
The David Frost Show: See Rosenbaum, CNM, 180–86.
“I’m caught these days”: NM to Aldridge, 1-24-71.
appearances on television: See JML, “Mailer’s Sarcophagus: The Artist, the Media and the ‘Wad,’ ” Modern Fiction Studies 23, Summer 1977, 179–87.
“I never wrote so fast”: NM to MK, 4-21-70.
“Ego: The Ali-Frazier Fight”: Life, 3-19-71; rpt., King of the Hill: Norman Mailer on the Fight of the Century (NY: New American Library, 1971), and EE, 3-36.
the artist as an exemplary type: See Robert F. Lucid, “The Artist as Fantasy Figure,” Massachusetts Review 15, Autumn 1974, 581–95.
“Boxing is a rapid”: EE, 6–7.
ad in the New York Times: 1–16, 71.
columnists and pundits: See, for example, Digby Diehl, “Norman Mailer Crosses Swords with Women’s Lib,” Los Angeles Times Calendar, 2-14-71, and Lynn Sherr, “Manly Mailer Strikes Out,” Associated Press, 3-?-71.
“strikes me as exactly right”: Trudy Owett, “Three Interviews: Joan Didion,” New York, 3-15-71, 41.
“being pious”: “Norman Mailer on Women, Love, Sex, Politics, and All That!,” Cosmopolitan, May 1976, 184.
“poured ice cubes”: POS, 28–29.
“for fun and idiocy”: Transcript of interview with Marie-Louise von der Leyen, “Norman Mailer on Anger and Love,” October 2004; translated into German, the interview was published in Lifelines: Unusual Characters Tell Their Story (Munich: Piper Verlag, 2006).
“spent my life”: Janet Chusmire, “Mailer’s on Tour, Recouping,” Miami Herald, 2-7-72, 16A.
“revolution, tradition, sex”: Anatole Broyard, “Norman Writes a Dithyramb,” NYT, 5-27-71, 41.
“the technological destruction”: David Lodge, “Male, Mailer, Female,” New Blackfriars, December 1971, 561.
“coitus-free conception”: POS, 192.
“overthrow the government”: Valerie Solanas, “Excerpts from the SCUM (Society for Cutting Up Men) Manifesto,” in Sisterhood Is Powerful, ed. Robin Parker (NY: Random House, 1970), 514.
“while extreme”: POS, 47.
“mysterious space within”: Ibid., 59–60.
“go to work”: Ibid., 233.
have achieved parity: Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO, “Fact Sheet 2010: Professional Woman Vital Statistics.”
“the bloody ground”: POS, 95.
“where the light”: Ibid., 110.
Genius and Lust: Subtitled A Journey Through the Major Writings of Henry Miller (NY: Grove, 1976).
“that a firm erection”: POS, 44–45.
“come in like winds”: Ibid., 134.
“and could not have commanded”: Ibid., 137–38.
“Lawrence’s point”: Ibid., 147.
“meaningless fucking”: Ibid., 155.
“the only nostrum”: Ibid., 148.
“outrageously”: Ibid., 153–54.
“possessed of a mind”: Ibid., 153.
compares him to a general: Ibid., 153.
“through their familiar”: Peter Balbert, “From Lady Chatterley’s Lover to The Deer Park: Lawrence, Mailer, and the Dialectic of Erotic Risk,” in Critical Views: Norman Mailer, ed. Harold Bloom (Philadelphia: Chelsea House, 2003), 109–26.
“Lady Chatterley changed”: NM to Jeffrey Meyers, in ibid., 115.
Rivers of money: Income figures taken from Scott Meredith’s annual reports to NM (HRC).
Morris resigned: The two most complete accounts of the situation are found in Morris’s memoir, New York Days, and Stuart Little, “What Happened at Harper’s,” Saturday Review, 4-10-71, 43–47.
“No wonder it’s such”: “Hang-Up at Harper’s,” Time, 3-15-71, 45.
“The money men”: Alden Whitman, “Morris Resigns in Harper’s Dispute,” NYT, 3-5-71, L37.
meeting with Cowles: Morris, New York Days, 362.
“deeply disturbed”: Barbara Trecker, “Mailer Tells Harper’s—Me, Too,” New York Post, 3-6-71.
“was precipitated”: “Hang-Up at Harper’s, Time.
“a strong”: Ibid.
“the most depressing”: Ibid.
“was not central”: Morris, New York Days, 356.
“the highest known payment”: Eric Pace, “Mailer Getting $1-Million for Next Novel,” NYT, 2-21-71, C24.
“encompass the entire history”: Scott Meredith, quoted in Warner Bros. press release, 4-15-74.
“My water broke”: JML interview with Carol Stevens, 6-18-11.
“my mother’s nose”: NM to MK, 4-21-71.
“It would be difficult”: Diana Trilling, “The Prisoner of Sex,” in Trilling, We Must March My Darlings: A Critical Decade (NY: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1977), 200.
“For a while”: Israel Shenker, “Norman Mailer Vs. Women’s Lib,” NYT, 5-1-71, L19.
“All women are lesbians”: Jill Johnston, Town Bloody Hall, a documentary by Chris Hegedus and D. A. Pennebaker, 1979. Unless otherwise noted, all participant quotes are taken from the film.
Greer, who had wanted to meet Mailer: According to Diana Trilling, We Must March My Darlings, 200.
“under most intemperate assault”: Diana Trilling, We Must March My Darlings, 200.
Lawrence scholar: Diana Trilling, ed., The Selected Letters of D. H. Lawrence (NY: Farrar, Straus & Cudhay, 1958).
“the men moving silently”: POS, 125.
Few stood with Mailer: In addition to Broyard and Lodge, NM got positive notices from Eugene Kennedy, “Do You Have a Scar on Your Scrotum?,” Critic, November 1971, 69–73; V. S. Pritchett, “With Norman Mailer at the Sex Circus,” Atlantic, July 1971, 40–42; Garry Wills, “Norman Mailer vs. Woman,” Book World (Washington Post), 7-11-71, 1–2.
“tracking Norman”: Dotson Rader, “The Bishop and Norman Mailer,” MR (2008), 175–76.
“is modeled on a dribble”: Brigid Brophy, “Meditations on Norman Mailer, by Norman Mailer, Against the Day a Norman Mailest Comes Along,” NYTBR, 5-23-71, 41.
“Mailer’s best book”: Anatole Broyard, “Norman Writes a Dithyramb,” NYT, 5-27-71, 41.
“his ability to apprehend”: POS, 6.
“a stinking depression”: NM to Bourjaily, 3-26-71.
“a visionary”: Joyce Carol Oates, “Out of the Machine,” Atlantic, July 1971, 42–44.
to find the best: POS, 188.
“corporate rubbery obstruction”: AAD, 127.
“women have been machines”: Oates.
“devastated”: JML interview with Danielle Mailer, 8-3-11.
Susan was similarly: JML interview with Susan Mailer, 8-18-11.
hair turned white: MBM, 371.
“I haven’t felt”: NM to MK, 6-20-71.
“He was a marvelous”: Jessica Blue and Legs McNeil, “The Mailer Side of Mailer,” Details (1984), 86.
“a fatherly hand”: NM, preface to Torres’s Sting Like a Bee: The Muhammad Ali Story (NY: Abelard-Schuman, 1971), x.
“modest phenomenon”: Ibid., xi.
Fasting Can Save Your Life: Herbert M. Shelton (Chicago: Natural Hygiene Press, 1965).
all your poisons: Selden Rodman, Tongues of Fallen Angels (NY: New Directions, 1974), 172.
I, the great macho: Ibid., 178.
assemble his magazine work: NM to Ned Bradford, 8-15-71.
“just lay fallow”: NM to EY, 9-21-71.
The two books that led him: NM, in Marie Brenner “Mailer Goes Egyptian,” New York, 37.
The Last of the Just: (NY: Atheneum House, 1960).
The Story of Civilization: Vol. I, Our Oriental Heritage (NY: Simon & Schuster, 1963).
“empathetic treatment”: Harold Hayes to NM, 6-?-71.
“I would spend”: NM to Hayes, 6-12-70.
His allegiance was transferred to Playboy: Large excerpts from FIG, ES, and AE appeared in Playboy in 1975, 1979, and 1982, respectively.
review of Patriarchal Attitudes: Vidal, “Women’s Liberation Meets Miller-Mailer-Manson Man,” NYRB, 7-22-71; rpt., Homage to Daniel Shays: Collected Essays, 1952–1972 (NY: Vintage, 1973), 389–402.
“startling and frightening”: “Of a Small and Modest Malignancy,” PAP, 57.
“Cus, I hit him”: Torres, in Jeff Silverman, ed., The Greatest Boxing Stories Ever Told (NY: Lyons, 2002), 18.
“boxed three moderately”: NM to Louis and Moos, 10-18-71.
“the truth of his long”: “Punching Papa,” NYRB, February 1963; rpt., TOT, 4. On NM and boxing, see Barry H. Leeds, “Boxing as a Moral Paradigm in Mailer’s Work,” in Leeds, The Enduring Vision of Norman Mailer, 57–74, and Bill Lowenburg, “Hooking Off the Jab: Norman Mailer, Ernest Hemingway and Boxing,” MR (2010), 105–22.
The Long Patrol: subtitled: 25 Years of Writing from the Work of Norman Mailer (NY: World, 1971).
liked Lucid’s comment: NM to Ned Chase, 11-30-71.
“he has accumulated”: Lucid, ed., The Long Patrol, xxv–xxvi.
D.J.: Published as “A Fragment from Vietnam,” EE, 223–35.
“It was a disaster”: Dotson Rader, “The Bishop and Norman Mailer,” MR, 177; see also Rader’s longer account, “The Day the Movement Died,” Esquire, November 1972, 130–35, 194–204.
“the first time”: “People,” Time, 12-20-71, 45.
“It was intense”: Dotson Rader, “The Bishop and Norman Mailer,” MR, 177.
“why Tennessee”: NM to Dotson Rader, 1-31-72.
“I should have had”: NM to Paul Moore, 2-?-72.
“the best book”: Dotson Rader, “The Bishop,” 181.
“between half and three-quarter throttle”: “Of a Small and Modest Malignancy,” PAP, 61.
“His hands were fists”: Dick Cavett, “In This Corner, Norman Mailer,” NYT, 11-14-07.
“read what you wrote”: transcript of 12-1-71 The Dick Cavett Show, Daphne Productions, 1971.
“he began to wonder”: Dick Cavett, “In This Corner, Norman Mailer.”
“Mailer was entitled”: Louis Menand, “Talk Story,” New Yorker, 11-22-10, 130.
“Mailer: Why don’t you”: Dick Cavett, “In This Corner, Norman Mailer.”
The rules of talk shows: Analysis and the ending quote about the studio audience are both from Bernard M. Timberg, Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Show (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2002), 83.
“never received”: NM to Marshall Frady, 12-24-71.
“The studio audience”: JML to NM, 12-22-71.
“to meet any one”: NM to Earl and Sharon Perry, 12-30-11.
“the kind of plain-spoken”: Bob Williams, “On the Air,” New York Post, 12-2-71, 87.
“Provincetown is beautiful”: NM to Eddie Bonetti, 12-30-71.
understanding with Life: NM to John Leonard, 12-30-71.
“I was looking”: NM to Basil Mailer, 1-1-72.
“I have come”: NM to JML, 1-30-72.
“following his navigator”: Robert F. Lucid, “Prolegomenon to a Biography of Mailer,” in JML, ed., Critical Essays on Norman Mailer, 181.
The Performing Self: Subtitled Compositions and Decompositions in the Languages of Contemporary Life (NY: Oxford, 1971).
“on his way”: NM to John R. B. Brett-Smith, 4-2-71.
“detailed usefulness”: Poirier to NM, 1-9-72.
“Mailer now is like”: Poirier, Norman Mailer, 3.
got this message: NM to Poirier, 2-2-74.
“a carpetbagger”: NM to Bill Walker, 3-7-72.
“I felt his pain”: JML interview with Carol Stevens, 6-18-11.
“with very little tradition”: NM to EY, 4-2-72.
“I promise you”: NM to Lucid, 5-31-72.
“the most exciting”: NM to EY, 5-31-72.
“I don’t have the remotest: NM to Ginsberg, 12-9-69.
“The Evil in the Room”: Life, 7-28-72; excerpted from SGG.
“acid, amnesty and abortion”: Paul F. Boller, Presidential Campaigns (NY: Oxford University Press, 1984), 339.
Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman: SGG, 30.
“Out in America”: Ibid., 53.
“The Genius”: NYRB, 11-2-72, 16–20.
“a man who walks”: SGG, 155.
“Nixon was the artist”: Ibid., 138.
paid $75,000: MBM, 386.
“The house had negative”: JML interview with Carol Stevens, 6-18-11.
thirty-day, twenty-college: JML, “Norman Mailer in Illinois,” Sunrise (Macomb, IL), November 1972, 24–26.
“Book publishers”: Randi Henderson, “Norman Mailer Talks Politics at Towson,” Baltimore Sun, 10-9-72, 1.
“the body of demands”: Ibid.
“Obedient little bitches”: “People,” Time, 11-6-72.
“dumping poisonous invective”: William Moore, “Norman Mailer in Full Cry,” San Francisco Chronicle, 10-26-72, 7.
cemented his position: Ten years later, Ms. magazine quoted the line: “They Speak for Themselves,” Ms., July/August, 1982, 46.
He wrote a letter: “Moral Superiority,” Time, 12-11-72, 9.
“I think we have to pay it”: NM, interview with Robert F. Lucid, 1-17-89 (HRC).
TEN: THE TURN TO BIOGRAPHY
In addition to the sources identified below, the following were drawn on: JML’s “Mailer Log”; JML’s and Lawrence Grobel’s unpublished interviews with NM and Lawrence Schiller; JML’s unpublished interviews with BW. NM’s letters are located at the HRC.
Frank Crowther: The manager of NM’s fiftieth birthday party, Crowther (1932–76) committed suicide and was eulogized by NM in The Paris Review, Fall 1976; rpt., PAP, 82–88.
fiftieth birthday: Mel Gussow, “Mailer’s Guests ($50 a Couple) Hear His Plan on ‘Secret Police,’ ” NYT, 2-6-73, 23; Patricia Bosworth, “Fifth Estate at the Four Seasons,” Saturday Review, March 1973, 5–7; Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, 2-7-73, B1, B7; Lucian K. Truscott IV, “Mailer’s Birthday,” VV, 2-8-73, 1, 24–26; Linda Franke, “A Half Century of Mailer,” Newsweek, 2-19-73, 78; Jan Hodenfield, “A Party Scripted by Norman Mailer, Age 50,” New York Post, 2-6-73, 2, 74; Frank Crowther, “Mailer’s 5th Estate: Who’s Paranoid Now?”, VV, 7-12-73, 1, 10-13; LNM, 249–51; MBD, 1–10; MLT, 532–34; MBM, 388–93.
“Another ego trip”: NM, in Mel Gussow, “Mailer’s Guests,” NYT.
“an announcement of national importance”: Birthday party invitation.
“a family and literary event”: Mel Gussow, “Mailer’s Guests,” NYT, 23.
Mailer’s answer to Capote’s: MBD, 2.
“in a rare tender”: JML interview with Mary Oliver, 9-1-11.
“Tell Norman”: Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, B7.
fifth wife: Patricia Bosworth, “Fifth Estate at the Four Seasons,” Saturday Review, 7.
“At its center”: Lucian Truscott, “Mailer’s Birthday,” VV, 24.
“one of the half dozen original thinkers”: Linda Franke, “A Half Century of Mailer,” Newsweek, 78.
“a hint too drunk”: Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, B7.
“If we have a democratic secret police”: Patricia Bosworth, “Fifth Estate at the Four Seasons,” Saturday Review, 7.
“He digressed”: Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, B7.
“You blew it”: As recalled in JML interview with Carol Stevens, 3-28-09.
“I have a demon”: Patricia Bosworth, “Fifth Estate at the Four Seasons,” Saturday Review, B7.
“terrible mistake”: Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, B7.
“morally dastardly”: Mel Gussow, “Mailer’s Guests,” NYT, 23.
only $600: Patricia Bosworth, “Fifth Estate at the Four Seasons,” Saturday Review, 7.
“Norman Mailer: Genius or Nothing”: The Morning After: Selected Essays and Reviews (NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1971), 9–17.
“has caught every fashion”: Ibid., 10.
“He gives himself”: Ibid., 17.
“the best writer”: Frank Crowther, “Mailer’s 5th Estate,” VV, 1.
“a disaster”: Sally Quinn, “Norman Mailer Turns 50,” Washington Post, B1.
“just another vigilante group”: Frank Crowther, “Mailer’s 5th Estate,” VV, 12.
“there was a general”: Ibid.
“and the asshole dilettantes”: Ibid., 12.
“I have rarely”: NM to Poirier, 2-2-74.
“I still think”: Frank Crowther, “Mailer’s 5th Estate,” VV, 13.
merged with CARIC: Louise Lague, “Mailer Headlines Counter-Spy Pitch,” Washington Star-News, 3-25-74, D1.
“homeopathic medicine”: “The CIA vs. Democracy,” Counter-Spy 2, Spring/Summer 1975, 40.
“the grand middle-aged man”: Stefan Kanfer, “Two Myths Converge: NM Discovers MM,” Time, 7-16-73, 63.
he read: Fred Lawrence Guiles, Norma Jean: The Life of Marilyn Monroe (NY: McGraw-Hill, 1969); Maurice Zolotow, Marilyn Monroe (NY: Harcourt Brace, 1960); Norman Rosten, Marilyn: An Untold Story (NY: New American Library, 1973).
Ben Hecht: Empire News, 5-9-54 to 8-1-54.
“in modest depth”: MAR, 259.
“so excited”: William McDonald, “An Evening with Norman Mailer,” Lone Star Review, 3.
“Let it be the longest”: Bragg, CNM, 194.
“I wanted to say”: Stefan Kanfer, “Two Myths Converge,” Time, 60.
“had the basic stuff”: Ibid., 64.
“I speculated”: Bragg, CNM, 195. See LNM, 255–59, for a convincing analysis of how NM melded fact and speculation in MAR.
“the sugar of sex”: MAR, 15.
