True GSC, he also said a bunch of stuff in 2003 or so about the Iraq War being “The last hurrah of the white male”.
I never cared for the man’s writings, nor his opinions, and when Abbot murdered that waiter, Mailer basically said “Oops, I guess I was wrong” that was about all he had to say about it.
That was 25 years ago, and I can still remember that “news” story even though I was quite young at the time, Mailer’s culpability was the first step in my own rejection of Liberalism. Even though I was maybe 10 or 11 at the time, I thought that was one of the most unfair and unjust things that I ever heard.
The more Mailer talked, the more I understood Liberalism.
For me, Mailer and his books and opinions WERE Liberalism encapsulated. He embodied “Them” for me while he thought he was advancing Liberal causes, instead he was planting seeds of liberalism’s repudiation.
Roger Kimball has written a fierce obituary in which he calls Mailer unintentionally funny. I have tried reading some of his books, and have to agree with this commenter:
This is an absolutely dead-on, ruthlessly truthful assessment of Mailer and his literary accomplishments, if any.Have never been able to finish a single one of his books, though I have tried mightily, especially as a young man, feeling then that I needed to know his work. Later, Mr. Mailer wrote a piece for a magazine where I worked as an editor, for which he was paid $50,000 (a shocking amount, then and now). The literary lion had trouble delivering and had to be given a conference room at the magazine (Esquire) and an "assistant" to help him meet his deadline. The piece was a routine interview. The final result was such a horrific mish-mash that, once again, I couldn't finish it without much determined skimming. All in all, he seemed to have no special talent for either long-form works or routine culture pieces. So what was his talent anyway? Self-promotion, I guess.