Product Description
Vidal writes with ease and grace, and roams through many subjects and genres. He is a master of the historical novel, in which he has explored American history, ancient history, and the history of religion. He has developed his own style of science fiction combined with satire, and in the books he refers to as his 'inventions' he writes cautionary tales about sex, politics, art, and philosophy. He is at once a contrarion, a wise man, and a romantic. He is also wickedly funny, and often outrageous. This collection (the only single volume that includes Vidal's fiction and his essays) contains two complete works - MYRA BRECKINRIDGE, his most famous novel, and THE BEST MAN, a play about the American presidency. There are selections from THE CITY AND THE PILLAR, his early, controversial novel about homosexual love, and excerpts from later works as JULIAN, DULUTH, and LIVE FROM GOLGOTHA. Selections from the American history novels - BURR, LINCOLN, 1876, EMPIRE, and WASHINGTON, D.C. - have been woven together to provide a continuous narrative.Amazon.com Review
Nobody can accuse Gore Vidal of having narrow interests. The author of suchdiverse books as the historical novels Burr andLincoln, thetransgender satire MyraBreckinridge, and the imaginative religious epicCreation hasone of the busiest--and mosteclectic--intellects in literature today. A prolific novelist, Vidal hasalso enjoyed a career as playwright, essayist, and political commentator.In both fiction and nonfiction, Gore is mainly known for his cutting,satirical wit. Consider for example, this description from "Ronnie andNancy: A Life in Pictures": "I first saw Ronnie and Nancy Reagan at theRepublican convention of 1964 in San Francisco's Cow Palace. Ronnie andNancy ... were seated in a box to one side of the central area where thecows--the delegates, that is--were whooping it up." But underneath therapier verbiage is some serious food for thought. In an article about theKennedys entitled "The Holy Family," Vidal concludes: "They createillusions and call them facts, and between what they are said to be andwhat they are falls the shadow of all the useful words not spoken, of allthe actual deeds not done."

The Essential Gore Vidal includes excerpts from his finest novels,his play The Best Man, some of his early fiction, and his mostmemorable essays on subjects as variegated as homosexuality, feminism, andthe writings of Thomas Love Peacock. Though not comprehensive, this volumedoes contain the cream of Vidal's output and makes for an excellentintroduction to one of America's great men of letters. --Alix Wilber ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Gore Who?
I was very much under his literary influence as a youth, but he doesn't wear well as one matures. Whatever he wrote in the '60's and '70's I devoured, yet at around 30 years old or so his work seemed to strike a sour note.Works I once admired now seemed silly.He could write well manicured prose sitting in the middle of a battle field but it is his cynicism and hate for his native land that doesn't wear well once one matures beyond a rebellious youth.It is a cruel fate to have outlived the relevance of ones work.

Gore Vidal: A man of many talents
I s Gore Vidal a great writer? It depends on what he is writing. This compilation is long overdue as Vidal has never been taken as seriously by the Eastern literary establishment as he deserves. Certainly, he is one ofthe very few serious writers who also know how to entertain. This is whatmakes him so successful. Included here is his play, "The BestMan," the complete "Myra Breckenridge," selections from hishistorical novels, and a number of essays. My own opinion is that fewwriters are capable of such elegant prose as Vidal is when he is writing inthe essay form. He understands politics better than any other fictionalwriter, which is why his historical novels make such splendid reading. Hiswit is uneven; brilliantly hilarious and insightful at its best,unnecessarily vulgar and savagely mean at its worst, which is why his comicnovels are such hit and miss affairs. Vidal's work, taken as a whole, is animpressive library. Few good writers have been as productive as he, and whoelse can claim tohave been consistently on the bestseller lists fornearly four decades as he has? Anyone who admires Vidal will argue withsome of the selections here but there is also much to entertain andenlighten. Enjoy. ... Read more

Product Description
Kidnapped and held to ransom by Duke Leopold of Austria after the Third Crusade, Richard the Lion Heart, it is said, was found by his faithful troubadour Blondel de Neel. But how? And what trials did the faithful and long-suffering lyricist have to overcome to find his king?Gore Vidal paints a broad, colourful and poignant picture of a man searching for his master; for the symbolic king who is the goal of man's eternal quest; for the spiritual centre of his life. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Great early adventure novel by a master
What an absolutely terrific adventure novel.The story of Blondel and his search for Richard Coeur-de-Lion.Giants, warewolves, vampires, dragons, unicorns, horny women, pretty men, battles, singing and even Robin Hood - this novel is one of the best, most entertaining and completely enthralling I've ever read.A treat and a pleasure from the first page to the last.I'd love for some Hollywood type to rediscover this "lost" Vidal novel and make a great film of it.

Quasi-Historical fiction from the master.
In this little-known short novel, Gore Vidal revisits the legend of King Richard the Lion-Heart and his troubadour Blondel. As fans of Robin Hood or Ivanhoe will recall, Richard was imprisoned by a duke of Austria on his return from the Third Crusade and held for ransom. In his absence, the King's younger brother John siezed the throne, intending to keep it.

The legend (and this novel) recount how Richard's companion minstrel Blondel continued to search for the King throughout Europe when others abandoned him. Vidal has taken a relatively straightforward narrative here. Anyone hoping for salacious details of Richard's sexuality or scandalous stories of medieval monks will be disappointed. This short novel follows the old legend, and not speculative history. There are werewolves, a giant, a dragon and other mythical beasts, but not in the manner one might always expect. For although the book is not unsuitable for younger readers, there is not much in the way of whimsy in this tale.

As Blondel looks for his friend and patron, he undergoes a type of existential crisis. His search defines him and limits him at the same time. Vidal is a skilled enough craftsman to make this apparent to the older reader without coming across as a Freudian analyst, but the internal monolauges and grim reflections of Blondel (especially late in the book) often make this storybook fable more modern than one would expect.

All in all, I recommend this novel with the proviso that it is neither reliably historical (unlike the author's better known "Julian" or "Lincoln" or a "boy's adventure" in the tradition of Harry Potter or a boy's King Arthur. Those with the willingness to appreciate it's unique approach will be rewarded. ... Read more

Product Description
From the poignant realisation as an adult of the cruel brutality of childhood in 'The Robin', man then comes face to face with himself as a boy in 'A Moment of Green Laurel': both stories combining the nostalgia and fear that haunt us all in old age. Meanwhile, in 'Erlinda and Mr Coffin', Southern etiquette is unashamedly turned upside down in a tale of amateur theatricals reminiscent of Dickens and Victorian melodrama.Yet it is in 'Three Stratagems', 'The Zenner Trophy', 'Pages from an Abandoned Journal' and 'The Ladies in the Library' (with more than a hint of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice in the latter) that we see Vidal as we know him best: cynical and provocative in these subtle tales of what was known in those days as 'sexual inversion'. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Vidal's only collection of stories, written during the years after "The City and the Pillar"
These seven early stories (surprisingly, Vidal's only collection of short fiction) were originally written between 1948 and 1956 and were published in various relatively small but influential journals. They all post-date the publication of "The City and the Pillar," and it's clear that the controversy and notoriety of that novel allowed Vidal a bit of artistic latitude; three of them deal overtly with gay themes (and a fourth does so more subtly) and all seven have a dark, almost gothic tinge that sets off their post-Edwardian style.

Each story has its own distinctive merits, but my favorite is the first: "Three Stratagems." In the then-closeted gay community of Key West, a newly arrived hustler quickly befriends a widower whose insecurity is undergirded by the unvoiced understanding that the older man desires companionship while the young man's needs are far more basic. But the tables are unexpectedly turned; the fickle pecking order is upended; there are "flaws" (such as unpleasant medical conditions) that trump youth, and the older gentleman casts his catch back into the turbulent seas of a coldhearted society. This story has an unforeseen resonance in the era of AIDS, which has altered and segregated the "scene" in disturbingly similar ways during the last two decades.

"A Thirsty Evil" has recently been re-released with its originally proposed title, "Clouds and Eclipses," and with the addition of a story of the same name, based on a childhood memory related to Vidal by Tennessee Williams about an Episcopal priest. The story was omitted at the request of Williams, who was concerned his mother might recognize the lead character. These stories exhibit a precocious talent for a writer then in his twenties and they are worth revisiting not only for their own enjoyment but also to appreciate the promise Vidal displayed in a genre he inexplicably abandoned.

'...and when we drink, we die'.
A Thirsty Evil is an excellent collection of short stories, both in terms of literary merit and sheer entertainment value.Gore Vidal tells brilliant tales in an extremely beguiling, deceptively simple style, that misses no important detail, and manages to suggest all kinds of hidden meanings the reader is allowed to unpack and interpret as he may.

Three of the stories have homosexual themes.Brilliantly plotted (as are the rest of the stories), Three Stratagems has two narrators, one a young male prostitute plying his trade in Key West, and the other his elderly pick-up, George Royal.The contrasting view-points accentuate the pathetic sadness of both mens' lives.The climax - expertly prepared for - is superbly done.The final sentence is perfectly judged acidic irony.The Zenner Trophy is the story of an expulsion of a pair of male students caught doing something 'wrong'.More interesting as a character than Flynn, the gay student (a little too idealized), is the unfortunate Mr. Beckman, the teacher sent to give him his marching orders, who progresses during the course of the story from sycophancy towards the repulsive, reactionary Principal (an incisive demolition job by Vidal), to sympathy for Flynn, to hate 'for reminding him' that he is moving 'farther and farther from this briefly glimpsed design within a lilac day'.Pages From An Abandoned Journal is the story of the homosexual awakening of an American student in Paris, through his meetings with an 'infamous', opium-addicted, ex-male prostitute (retired at thirty-six) who began his career at the age of sixteen, and whose primary pleasure now is pursuing - and catching - fourteen-year-old boys.The contrast between the early, 'straight' part of the journal ('Hilda...is a good deal softer than she looks and it was like sinking into a feather mattress') and, after a few years of silence, his total transformation into as queer a queer as you could want, seems perfectly natural.The ending indicates how the more people change, the more they remain the same.

Robin is a very short, but effective story of two boys learning about the reality of human viciousness.Erlinda And Mr. Coffin is the hilarious account of an amateur theatrical production that goes very, very wrong, narrated splendidly by 'a gentlewoman in middle life', in 'reduced' circumstances, who has to take in lodgers such as the unusual title characters.

A Moment Of Green Laurel is one of the two masterpieces in the book, a beautifully-written, ambitious story.The climactic event - the meeting of an older man with, literally, his childhood self - is as inconclusive as his meeting, earlier, with various people, including his mother, during an Inauguration Day of a new President in Washington.As the story ends, one may conclude - taking the hints, such as the phrase 'definite schizoid tendency' - this is probably a case of solipsistic insanity.The powerful atmosphere and intimations of loss, however, go on tantalizing the mind.

A perfect example of the wholly satisfying enigmatic story, which fuses terror and beauty, the mundane and the profoundly mysterious, the personal and the cosmic, is the book's seminal piece, The Ladies In The Library.The story relates the seemingly ordinary, but deeply unsettling, events that befall Walter Bragnet, a fifty-one-year-old author (with a 'heart murmur'), over a two day period visiting (along with his only remaining relative) the long-ago sold off family home in Winchester, Virginia.He meets the present owner, Miss Mortimer, her nephew Stephen (who dislikes his Aunt) and, the next day, the two Parker sisters who, after lunch, sit 'like judges' in the library, knitting, and who Walter, nearly asleep, hears discussing him and seemingly choosing between different methods of ending his life.The unutterably beautiful, yet frightening climactic confrontation between Walter and Miss Mortimer is only a few paragraphs away.

Gore Vidal is a true artist, and this collection is essential reading.

The title comes from Shakespeare's play, Measure For Measure, Act One, Scene Two: 'Our natures do pursue / Like rats that ravin down their proper bane, / A thirsty evil, and when we drink, we die'.

A Treasure-trove of Vidal Stories
Many of us know Gore Vidal through his novels and essays so it was quite a find to get a copy of these seven short stories. He wrote them from 1948 to 1956-- the dates are given after each story-- and like his ground-breaking novel THE CITY AND THE PILLAR, published during the same period (1948), several of these stories are about controversial topics for that period and were well ahead of their time. Others show his comic gift as well as his insight into Washington politics.

In "Three Stratagems" George Royal is an older man who picks up a young hunk in Key West who gives himboth a false name (Michael) and life although he understands he shouldn't talk too much at first in order not to be found out. "I [the hunk] told him I'd played football at Princeton which was not true." What is most interesting about this story is the cat and mouse game that these two men engage in as their dinner date progresses. Whatever George has in mind for the evening's finale comes to a halt when the hunk has an epileptic seizure. In "The Robin" two nine-year-olds discover they are capable of extreme cruelty as they kill a wounded, helpless bird.

"Erlinda and Mr. Coffin" is a terribly clever look at race and class with a surprise ending as good if not better than anything O'Henry ever wrote. In "Pages from an Abandoned Journal" Vidal traces the ten year journey of the narrator, who starts out as a somewhat innocent, somewhat straight man from Toledo studying in France and seeing a woman with whom he is having bad sex. In his May 22, 1948 journal entry he writes: "It wasn't very successful last night. Hilda kept talking all the time which slows me down, also she is a good deal softer than she looks and it was like sinking into a feather mattress." Of course he ultimately gets into alcohol, furniture and "attractive" men as we suspected he would from the beginning.

My favorite story is "The Zenner Trophy," so modern that it could have been written in 2006. Days before commencement at a private, ritzy eastern high school, Sawyer and Flynn, two star athletes, havebeen caught in a "moral lapse" by two faculty members, have just been expelled and will not graduate. Flynn then won't be given the Zinner Trophy for outstanding athletic excellence. Beckman, Flynn's advisor and deep in the closet, has the unpleasant task of dealing with this tawdry situation since the rock-like principal is only interested in the "Grail-like quest for endowments." In a moving scene that is way ahead of Stonewall, the defiant Flynn tells Beckman that what he and Sawyer have done is nobody's business but theirs, "after all it doesn't affect anybody else." Then the reader learns that contrary to what everyone aware of the situation thinks-- that Sawyer has already left school in disgrace-- that he is waiting for Flynn at "the inn" and that the two of them will go to college together.

These seven stories are very fine indeed and should appeal to Vidal fans as well as new readers as well.

Vidal's Perceptions and Skills Encapsulated
The few reviews of this book already present when I wrote this covered the salient points well with one exception: "The Ladies in the Library" is not merely an example of evil in human relations but one of consummate horror in a vein that brings the Hitchcock masterpiece "Psycho" to mind.

Vidal's only short story collection
I bought a rather tattered, cheapish 1960's paperback of 'A Thirsty Evil' some years ago ("an insight into the world of unconventional relationships", with an added essay 'On Pornography'). Puzzling, this is Gore Vidal's only collection of short fiction. He never seems to have taken to the format, yet he was of a generation that thrived on it (he's elsewhere adept at the short form - see his essays).

For readers used to Vidal's later, witty style, you may be disappointed. There is no 'Duluth' or 'Myra' here. All of these stories were written between 1948-56, at a time when Vidal was writing a bunch of diverse novels, before finding his voice with 'The Judgement of Paris' and 'Messiah'.

Several of these stories were published in the 'New World Writing' journal of the early fifties. I believe Vidal helped establish that periodical, which is notable for publishing Chapter 1 of 'Catch-22' by Joseph Heller in 1955 (called 'Catch-18').

My favourite stories in this collection are 'Erlinda and Mr. Coffin', darkly funny and written through the voice of "a gentlewoman in middle life" & 'A Moment of Green Laurel', where a man meets himself as a boy, a la 'The Twilight Zone'. 'Laurel' is haunting and seemingly autobiographical (from a writer who calls himself "the least autobiographical of authors").

The other stories are a mixed bunch - 'Three Strategems' is an interesting but rather cold depiction of Key West in the late 40s; 'The Robin' is a very brief reminiscence; 'The Zenner Trophy' tries a little too hard to preach its agenda - that it is perfectly normal for healthy young men to want to sleep with each other - no matter how perfectly right Vidal is in his opinion; 'Notes From An Abandoned Journal'; 'Ladies in the Library'.

From the mid-1950s (when this book was first published), until the publication of 'Julian' in 1964, Vidal was unable to financially support himself from his novels (he cites the New York Times' blanket refusal to review his books after 'The City and the Pillar'). He worked in Hollywood ('Ben-Hur'), television, the theatre (two hits - 'Visit from a Small Planet' and 'The Best Man'), and wrote pulp detective fiction under the pen name Edgar Box. Surprising, then, that he didn't pen any short stories in that era for the many magazines. Our loss. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

shocking and predictable
William Howard's novelization of Gore Vidal's "Caligula" is taken directly from the movie script Vidal wrote for Bob Guccione (former publisher of Penthouse Magazine) who produced the film starring Malcolm McDowell. Being unfamiliar with the life of the Roman Emperor Caligula, I am unable to state whether the narrative is historically accurate or not. In fact, back when this book and film were released, it was my first contact with Caligula and his times. Since the film, there have been numerous books written and published about the Mad Emperor (as can be seen by searching Amazon.com for "Caligula").

The story is equal parts blood and guts, sexual deviation and political intrigue as we follow the whimsical projects and plans of a madman given unlimited power. Caligula was obviously disturbed and as we follow Vidal's narrative it becomes clear the man affectionately known as "Little Boots" by his soldiers was in no position to be in charge of anything, much less an empire.

Vidal is an accomplished writer, and considered a great author by some. During the film's production, he had several fights with Bob Guccione over the artistic interpretation of his script. Vidal eventually demanded his name be taken out of the film's credits, and Guccione did so. Acknowledging one cannot really understand historical events based on the telling from one viewpoint, I am unable to say if Vidal accurately portrayed the events surrounding Caligula. However, he did manage to capture enough of the Roman Emperor's life and times to arrest my interest and make me want to read more.

... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Visit to a Small Planet
Having starred in VISIT TO A SMALL PLANET IN THE ORIGINAL BROADWAY PLAY AS THE 'JUVENILE' OPPOSITE THE THEN REIGNING INGENUE OF INNOCENCE SEX AND SASS, NAMELY SARAH MARSHALL, DAUGHTER OF HERBERT MARSHALL, and I, CONRAD JANIS, PLAYING 'CONRAD' HAD A ROYAL BLAST IN THIS QUIXOTIC, BRILLIANT SATIRE WITH A LOT OF 'ENGLISH' ON THE BALL. VIDAL IS UNEQUALED AND WE WERE PRIVILEGED TO HAVE PERFORMED IN THIS, WHICH FOR ME WAS THE FIRST OF MANY EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL ENCOUNTERS I WOULD LATER ENJOY DOING, NAMELY MINDY'S DAD IN MORK AND MINDY, OTTO PALINDROME IN QUARK, A TASTY ROLE IN MY FAVORITE MARTIAN, AND ON THE SERIAL 'V'. I, LIKE MOST ORIGINATORS OF PLAYS ON BROADWAY, WOULD HAVE TRANSPORTED OUR VERSION OF VIDAL'S MASTERPIECE INTACT FROM OUR BROADWAY RENDITION TO THE SCREEN---WHICH IS NOT TO SAY THAT ALL OTHER VERSIONS WERE NOT MAGICAL IN THEIR OWN WAY. And from this Sci-Fi step I'm thrilled to have a current film which I directed and star in opposite The Three Time Academy Award Nominee Piper Laurie called: Bad Blood...The Hunger which is being released this fall and Winter. A Trailer exists on youtube called: Bad Blood...The Hunger---check it out.
As for Jerry Lewis' version, well, it certainly wasn't Sir Cyril Ritchard's sophisticated and Oh so gently humorous version, but Actors each have their times, so I'll say no more.

It is a pity that Jerry Lewis got a hold of this
I first saw this on stage in the late 1960s, with Leonard Nimoy (!) as the alien visitor.It is a wonderfully funny story, really kind of a frolic when compared to the heavier historical novels of Vidal, and yet it spoofs the Washington elite in a typically tart vidalian fashion:you see generals portrayed as macho buffoons, which was quite shocking for the pre-Vietnam protest era.The story is basically that of the immature alien coming to capriciously exercise power on a more primitive earth.Vidal admits that he wrote it to make money in Palimpsest, but it is quite fun.If Jerry Lewis had not bought the rights to this and made an awful film version, it might have been done much much better as satirical scifi.

Recommended. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (2)

Men against the sea, and against each other
The copyright page of Gore Vidal's "Williwaw" notes that the novel was first published in 1946.In a preface Vidal describes the background of this novel.He served in the U.S. Army during World War II and, at age 19, became first mate of an army freight-supply ship based in the Aleutian Islands.He worked on this book while on night watch in port."Williwaw" is similarly set in the Aleutian Islands during that war, and focuses on the passengers and crew of an army freight-passenger ship that is skippered by a warrant officer.The story follows the ship's perilous passage between islands.Vidal sheds light on the book's title in his preface: he defines williwaws as "sudden devastating winds that come without warning down from the island mountains."

Vidal has crafted a gripping wartime adventure.He masterfully charts the crew's struggle against the harsh, and potentially deadly, Aleutian environment.Equally compelling is the tension and conflict that build among the crew members.As the story develops, Vidal creates vivid portraits of the Aleutian Islands and the sea around them.The story is rich in details of the crew's daily life and routine on board the ship, as well as of their recreation in a seedy port town.

Overall, Vidal's prose style in the book is very clean and matter-of-fact; I found it a very effective mode for this particular story.His portrait of the wartime Army is full of satiric touches that are sometimes subtle, sometimes funny.Ultimately "Williwaw" struck me as having a dark, almost nihilistic vision of the human condition.But it's a darkness that I found thought-provoking, and not repellent.Through his plot and characters Vidal takes such basic concepts as love, religion, heroism, and justice and seems to strip them bare."Williwaw" is, in my judgment, not only a solid adventure tale, but also a unique and compelling contribution to the canon of American war fiction.

World War II Novel With Joseph Conrad Feel
Williwaw takes place in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska during World War II.The main action takes place during a freak, intense wind storm the eskimos call a "williwaw," it whips down off the coastal mountains and causes havoc, freak seas, etc.Gore Vidal, in this, his first novel (1946), creates a wonderful Joseph Conradian feel as tensions mount aboard a army transport ship making a weekly run.I don't want to spoil the ending.There is (I thought) a very CLIMACTIC moment when the tensions among the crew rise to their heights just as the williwaw hits, and - something happens.The serious tone and cool style of this book I found admirable.As a war novel I liked it as much as the ver different Joseph Heller's "Catch-22," and the lyrical, Tennessee Williams-like John Horne Burns' novel "The Gallery," while I liked it more so than Mailer's "Naked and the Dead" - which I liked for its themes and observations, I just wish Mailer could have (in my opinion) skipped the repetition and saved about 400 pages. ... Read more

Product Description
This first major, authorized biography of a towering literary and cultural figure, published to coincide with The Golden Age (Doubleday, Fall 200), the seventh title in Vidal's Narratives of Empire series.

No writer since Hemingway has lived his life on as ambitious or international a scale as Gore Vidal, whose work, like Hemingway's, has become a prominent landmark in twentieth century American literature. Thanks to Vidal's complete cooperation and Kaplan's complete autonomy, this meticulously researched biography has all the glamour, sex, gossip, and family scandal one would expect. But more than that, Kaplan ties together the diversity and variety of his subject's work and life in a highly satisfying, utterly thorough study that will be the starting point for any critical and cultural analysis of Gore Vidal for years to come.Amazon.com Review
Veteran biographer Fred Kaplan, praised for his evocative portraits of 19th-century masters like Charles Dickens and Thomas Carlyle, turns with aplomb to a contemporary writer in this lengthy yet cogent work. Indeed, the multifaceted Gore Vidal, born in 1925 but positively Victorian in the breadth of his interests and achievements, is fortunate to have a biographer as wide-ranging as Kaplan. He traces the familial roots of Vidal's lifelong political engagement (his maternal grandfather was a U.S. senator) and lucidly assesses his nonfiction as well as his bestselling novels such as Washington, D.C. and Burr, reminding readers that Vidal has for decades been an astute, sardonic observer of the American scene. Vidal's personal relations are depicted frankly but briskly, as befits a staunch defender of homosexual rights who is open about his own orientation but refuses to be pigeonholed as a gay writer. The famous feuds with William Buckley, Norman Mailer, and Truman Capote get enjoyably full treatment, properly situated in the context of larger issues. If the inner workings of Vidal's psyche remain ultimately elusive despite Kaplan's access as authorized biographer to thousands of unpublished letters, that too seems right for someone of whom a friend once remarked, "I've always thought that Gore is a man without an unconscious." --Wendy Smith ... Read more

Customer Reviews (16)

Buried under too much admiration and useless information
Like an adoring adolescent fan who's been given too much access to (certain aspects of) his idol, Kaplan doesn't seem to know what to do with that other than look star-struck. Kaplan gushing biography buries Gore Vidal under too much admiration and too many useless (and occasionally, repetitive) facts. We learn little or nothing of Vidal as a person or as a writer. Kaplan writes well so even if bored and ultimately without a better understanding of the author in any meaningful way I was able to finish reading the 800 page book.

This is not an authorized biography!
I have heard Vidal speaking about this book, and it is not authorized- the author refused to show it to him before publication, and he considered trying to block its publication.Since it came out, he has refused to read it, but has made numerous comments about the author's shoddy research, citing several examples of inaccuracies.The author also continually lied to the press about Vidal, saying that Vidal had asked him to write this biography, which he did not do, etc.

Juicy, yet slow, which is what i want and don't want
Sure, i might like the book cause GV and I share the same personality.

Putting that aside, i'm only on page 369....and I plan to continue to the last 799th page.It is salacious.Very detailed.I love the quick drop-ins of names I felt were more MASS-FAMOUS than GV.Before reading this, I was totally ignorant of who GV was.I'd just see a quote, like, "When attending an orgy, make sure you're look good" by GV.And no one ever told me WHO HE WAS outside of just being an "author."

Expect cover-to-cover pages of incidents with fame for GV.I'm still reeling over the quick blip of the KEROUAC/GV "intense sex" scene.

good for all newbies of GV.And if you already knew OF him, this will give you DETAILS for you to incise and pick at mysterious contradictions.

Excessively Long
A book of near 900 pages, and especially a biography can be particularly daunting. Questions come to mind like: what happens if I die and never reach the end!

Kaplan has a great appreciation for Vidal, evidence from the quality of research in this book, and his editing of the best of vidal book.

However, the great flaw with the book, is that kaplan at times is to close to his subject. Its inter-subjectivity leaves the reading thinking at times - what would a critic say at this point. The analysis often lacks critical value.

Overall, a complete a thorough study.

Thorough if nothing else.
Kaplan is far to thorough in his autobiography of a man who isn't yet dead.The book goes on and on, and while factual, tries to be too clever, as if Kaplan were trying to imitate Vidal's wit in his own presentation of Vidal.This will probably only appeal to the most feverish followers of Vidal (like me).Everyone else would be better served by Vidal's semi-autobiographical novel, Palimpsest.Alternatively, wait until the poor guy passes when writers will get the chance to give Vidal the same treatment he gave Lincoln and Burr. ... Read more

Product Description
Best known for The Berlin Stories-the inspiration for the Tony and Academy Award-winning musical Cabaret-Christopher Isherwood (1904-1986) was a major figure in twentieth-century fiction and the gay rights movement. This collection presents two complete novels, Prater Violet (1945) and A Single Man (1964); episodes from three other novels, Goodbye to Berlin (1939), Down There on a Visit (1962), and Lions and Shadows (1938); and excerpts from his nonfiction works, Exhumations (1966), Kathleen and Frank (1971), and My Guru and His Disciple (1980).

"The late Christopher Isherwood was a writer with exceptional powers of observation. . . . An excellent anthology." -Los Angeles Times

Christopher Isherwood (1904-1986) is also the author of A Single Man, Down There on a Visit, Lions and Shadows, The Memorial, The World in the Evening, and A Meeting by the River, all available in paperback editions from the University of Minnesota Press.

Don Bachardy, Isherwood's longtime partner, is a painter and writer living in Santa Monica, California. His books include Last Drawings of Christopher Isherwood (1991) and Stars in My Eyes (2000).

James P. White is a novelist who directs the creative writing program at the University of South Alabama. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

You Do Know Who Isherwood Is?
Christopher Isherwood's name and the breadth of his work is completely overshadowed by a musical adaptation of just one of his short stories.One of the best writers of memoir, reportage and fiction of the twentieth century, his work will one day appear on required reading syllabi alongside Hemingway, Faulkner and Fitzgerald.In the meantime, please read and share this book.

The demi-biographical stories presented in "Where Joy Resides" demonstrate Isherwood's ability to consolidate place, time, character and emotion into a concise and highly readable presentation.Although a diverse selection, the reader will finish the book with an understanding and affinity for the author.

Spend a weekend "Where Joy Resides," and I'm confident you will not remember Christopher Isherwood as the guy who wrote "Caberet." ... Read more

Product Description
Vidal intertwines fond recollections of films savored in the movie palaces of his Washington, D.C., boyhood with strands of autobiography and trenchant observations about American politics. Never before has the renowned author revealed so much about his own life or written with such immediacy about the forces shaping America. 26 halftones. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

One of Vidal's most pleasant books - a joy to read
Gore Vidal's recent non-fiction writings have been disappointing, but this book is a gem. It is an early attempt at autobiography, years before "Palimpsest" and in some ways deeper. Vidal's early years in the thirties coincided with Hollywood's golden age, and in "Screening History" he reflects on the movies which most influenced him, particularly those versions of British and American history, such as "The Prince and the Pauper", "Fire over England" and "Young Mr. Lincoln". Vidal shares his reminiscences not only on the movies themselves but also on their historical context in the pre-WWII US of the thirties, but in far more serene and thoughtful way than in later writings, where he sounds increasingly bitter. His musings on the possible influence of 1939 movies on then President Bush are apparently not to be taken too seriously and are far more agreeable than his later simplistic comments on presidents in "The American Presidency". Altogether this is not the best,but arguably the most pleasant of Vidal's books. ... Read more

Product Description
1978 Novel by Gore Vidal.According to Hindu mythology,the arrival of the god Kalki on earth will mean the destruction of all mankind-except for Kalki's handful of immediate disciples from who loins will sping a new race of man.Copy 1978 inside cover page has a note but the rest is clean with dust cover edge wear.Very readable no highlights. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

chester1
This was an out-of-print book and I feel so fortunate to find it.A great book, and it was in terrific condition.Altogether, I was extremely pleased! ... Read more

Product Description
Gore Vidal has been entertaining, and occasionally outraging, the American public for fifty years. In the course of his long career, Vidal has set new intellectual and artistic standards for American historical fiction and has also established himself in the first rank of contemporary social satirists. This is the first full-length study to include Vidal's most recent novels and the first designed to meet the needs of the general reader as well as students of contemporary literature. It includes discussions of Lincoln, Empire, Hollywood, and Live from Golgotha, as well as his earlier novels. Baker and Gibson show that while Vidal's novels are tremendously entertaining, they are also serious examinations of a recurring theme--the decline of the West in general and the decline of the United States in particular. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (1)

Mediations of the Public Intellectual
This is an accessible and illuminating study of one of the twentieth century's unique public intellectuals. Though the book weighs in at only 141pp. of text, the breadth of Frank's research on Vidal is impressive. She is a bonafide fan and writes with a sense of analytical purpose and critical appreciation.

Frank covers all the significant events in Vidal's long and varied career as a public intellectual and postmodern celebrity. Thankfully, she doesn't rehearse these events in chronological order; the book is not Vidal's biography. Rather, Frank organizes her material around thematic questions of public intellectualism and mass mediation as they bear on the construction of Vidal's intellectual cachet. Her basic claim is that Vidal, unlike many of his intellectual equals of his generation, welcomed the opportunity to extend his celebrity from page to screen, from the exclusivity of the publishing world to the networked immediacy of television.

Frank elaborates on her thesis in a number of contexts and with a handful of illustrative examples. Her reading of Vidal's heated televised debate with William F. Buckley at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago is particularly astute. My only reservation about Frank's analysis is that she doesn't do enough with the conceptual intervention she terms the "print-screen circuit." Frank does well to talk about Vidal's publishing output as well as his big- and small-screen appearances, but she leaves unexamined the specifically *dialectical* character of their relationship. Tracing the interaction of text with image and image with text in the life of the public intellectual might have given readers a better idea of Vidal's unique positioning between/across media. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Here's Vidal, age 21 to 39, at a bargain price
Before these works were republished, Vidal felt free to do some editing and rewriting, so the present book should be up to date. He has declared that he found his voice in The Judgement of Paris (1952), in which he (as Philip Warren) dons hetero drag but is rather sweet and patient with old and young gays--you'll be quite amused. ... Read more

Product Description
The Golden Age is Vidal's crowning achievement, a vibrant tapestry of American political and cultural life from 1939 to 1954, when the epochal events of World War II and the Cold War transformed America, once and for all, for good or ill, from a republic into an empire. The sharp-eyed and sympathetic witnesses to these events are Caroline Sanford, Hollywood actress turned Washington D.C., newspaper publisher, and Peter Sanford, her nephew and publisher of the independent intellectual journal The American Idea. They experience at first hand the masterful maneuvers of Franklin Roosevelt to bring a reluctant nation into the Second World War, and, later, the actions of Harry Truman that commit the nation to a decade-long twilight struggle against Communism—developments they regard with a decided skepticism even though it ends in an American global empire. The locus of these events is Washington D.C., yet the Hollywood film industry and the cultural centers of New York also play significant parts. In addition to presidents, the actual characters who appear so vividly in the pages of The Golden Age include Eleanor Roosevelt, Harry Hopkins, Wendell Willkie, William Randolph Hearst, Dean Acheson, Tennessee Williams, Joseph Alsop, Dawn Powell—and Gore Vidal himself.

The Golden Age offers up U.S. history as only Gore Vidal can, with unrivaled penetration, wit, and high drama, allied to a classical view of human fate. It is a supreme entertainment that is not only sure to be a major bestseller but that will also change listeners' understanding of American history and power.Amazon.com Review
Since 1967, when he published Washington, D.C., Gore Vidal has been assembling an artful, acidic history of the United States. The GoldenAge represents the seventh and final installment of this national epic,covering the years from 1939 to 1954 (with a valedictory fast-forward, inits final pages, to the end of the millennium). As Vidal did in the earlierbooks, the author sticks pretty rigorously to the facts. Real-lifefigures--in this case, the likes of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and HarryTruman and that ardent cold warrior Dean Acheson--do what they are recordedto have done. The author also ushers on a cast of invented characters, whoare free to paddle in the historical backwash and comment upon theirso-called contemporaries. It's here, of course, that fact and fiction beginto blur. But Vidal himself has often cited Tolstoy's famous jab--"Historywould be an excellent thing if it only were true"--and his reconstructionof FDR's wartime machinations, and the brief interval of PaxAmericana, seem persuasively, even alarmingly plausible.

There's one key difference between this book and its predecessors, however.Vidal was alive and kicking in 1939, and thanks to his role as SenatorThomas Pryor Gore's grandson (and occasional seeing-eye dog), he met or atleast observed many of The Golden Age's dramatis personae. This fact turns out to have a double edge. On one hand, it gives hisportraits of the high and mighty an extra ounce of verisimilitude. Here(the invented) Caroline Sanford observes her old friend FDR at an informalWhite House mixer:

She felt for an instant that she should curtsey in the awesome presence ofFranklin Delano Roosevelt, a figure who towered even when seated in hiswheelchair. It was the head and neck that did the trick, she decided, witha professional actor's eye. The neck was especially thick while the famoushead seemed half again larger than average, its thinning gray hair combedseverely back from a high rounded forehead.

Customer Reviews (29)

Vidal's "good old days"
The era covered by the book is clearly sentimental to Vidal, hence the title "Golden Years." I guess it's a natural tendency of people to see their formative years as the good old days. Vidal reveres the enigmatic FDR as a political icon and pities the bucolic and inferior Harry Truman who is tapped to fill FDR's shoes. In Vidal's Myra Breckinridge, the movies from this era (late thirties to mid forties) are considered the only movies of any substance or merit. On a larger scale, FDR's administration represents the zenith of the American empire that is slowly destined to fade in the age of industrialization and military armament of the late twentieth century.

The theme of the book, as in other chronicles of the American empire, is that the real political struggle in the United States has been between a generally representative Congress against a small professional elite that is totally split off from the nation. The rich aristocracy has been pursuing its wealth through wars that they invent and justify and resonate for others to die in. In Golden Age, the main conspiracy promoted by Vidal is that America forced Japan's hand with tyrannical economic sanctions and restrictive oil embargos. With no other choice, Japan attacks Pearl Harbor and permits the wealthy ruling class of America to enter into another war and pile more millions on their already established hoards of money.

Despite the historical conspiracy and social criticisms, I found this book to be predominantly Vidal's heart-felt tribute to his beloved fictional narrators, the descendents of Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler. The book even provides a family tree. Caroline de Traxler Sanford lived an impossibly sumptuous life that started in the novel "Empire" and ends in the "Golden Age." The characters and era were special for Vidal, and this was their eulogy.

A Silver Book For A Golden Age?
Just finished (albeit an audio version -- long drive) version of The Golden Age by Gore Vidal.I've been meaning to read more Vidal (I still have Burr in my "to be read" pile) but other books just seem to get in the way.

Vidal can certainly tell a story and each "episode" is quite distinct, but it didn't seem to really tie together.I'm not sure if it was the abridgement of it, or if it was just its episodic nature.The blurring of fact and fiction are interesting, and one must go along with Vidal's political, and vaguely conspiratorial theories of 1941-1954 to enjoy the work.It is hard to believe that even FDR could be that Machiavellian.His view of the elections and preordained are too manipulative for my tastes, though.The portraits of FDR and Truman are more complete than not however ad do tie in well with a lot of the biographical information.I'd prefer less fiction and more history in my readings though.

Not Vidal's best but interesting
I gave The Golden Age three stars primarily because the book had three tiresome flaws that kept it from achieving the excellence of his novel Lincoln.

The first weakness of this book is that Gore Vidal was far less subtle in controlling his own political philosophy in The Golden Age, possibly because the era in the novel was one in which Vidal lived, whereas in Lincoln, there was enough distance in time that Vidal was able to show more objectivity. For fans of Gore Vidal, of which I am one, his political philosophy is no secret. He believes that the Civil War allowed Lincoln to consolidate power into the presidency at the expense of the legislative branch. He thinks that we turned from the values of the republic and adopted the values of empire. During wartime, the power of the US President is heightened even further, thus becoming an incentive for a US President to declair war. He places both FDR and Truman into this category of expanding the power of the presidency through World War II and the Cold War. Vidal believes that the country has always been ruled by an wealthy elite group of citizens. As the technology of communication has evolved, this power seeking elite has learned how to control the media. The elite controlled first the printed press, then Hollywood in the 1930-1950s, and then television. Through mass media they shape the perceptions of the common American family. Vidal also believes that the Cold War and the search for Communism is also a strategy used by the powerful elite to evoke fear in the common family, thus keeping taxes high to pay wealthy defense and security contractors.

I actually also believe this to be true, however Gore Vidal is so heavy handed in The Golden Age that he ruins the novel by over emphasis of his political agenda.I wished for the subtle interpersonal power plays that he depicts so well in Lincoln.

My second concern is his treatment of the historical characters. The historic characters in the novel are far more lively and multi-dimension as compared to the fictious characters, but their motives and actions are grossly bent to accomodate Vidal's political agenda. FDR's critical conversations take place "off stage" so that we only see him mixing martinis and engaged in witty commentary with his wife, Eleanor. Vidal seems to strongly believe that FDR knew about the Japanese intention to bomb Pearl Harbor prior to the bombing. I certainly believe this to be false and Vidal does not really make a strong case here in this novel at all of convincing me. He never gets into the head of FDR because in the end Vidal doesn't really have the goods to back up his outrageous claim. There are hundreds of historic characters in the novel and toward the end when he has Dawn Powell, Virgil Thompson, and Paul Bowles all delivering witty cocktail chatter, I realized the novel had melted into name dropping.

My third concern is that there were far too many cardboard one dimensional fictitious characters who all sounded just alike in their witty, upperclass sarcasm and jaded pessimism. We never understand why there is so much animosity and friction among many of the fictitional characters, most of whom are related to each other. The fictitious characters caused the book to be over long and drawn out.

I wish Gore Vidal had really written a good book about the way FDR analyzed the role of the USA prior to and during World War II. This would have been great. In Lincoln he stuck to the facts and it produced a wonderful political novel. In The Golden Age, Vidal veers from the facts into his own agenda, and when he can't support that agenda with factual events, the novel becomes soggy.

Always entertaining--this time with a modern twist
Gore Vidal is a quintessentially American writer, intensely focused on our history, character and future. This last of the "Narratives of Empire" takes the saga begun with "Burr" right into the 21st century. "The Golden Age" starts in the pre-WWII period, as the fictional Caroline Sanford returns to Washington to be swept up in the machinations of FDR leading the country into WWII. A good chunk of the book makes the case that FDR "knew" that the Japanese were about to attack, and Vidal argues that he sacrificed American lives to get us into the war, with the ultimate goal of turning American into THE superpower. WWII comes and goes, and the narrative quickly moves on to the post-war period, the naive bungling of Harry Truman, and the creation of the Communist "bogey-man" to keep the American public committed to remaining armed and tolerating a peacetime draft. Vidal suggests that with the collapse of the Soviet Union, perhaps the new "bogey-men" are the Islamic terrorists.
Vidal has strong views, which readers may or may not agree with, but no matter--his semi-fictional renditions of American history are intelligent, amusing and well-written. I highly recommend ALL of the "Empire" series.

more an argument, less a novel
I must confess that I feel ambivalent about this book.I greatly admire the other volumes of the series, not only for their value as iconoclastic evocations of American history, but as novels in themselves with vibrant and fascinating characters.Vidal is, simply put, one of America's greatest living artists.His voice is unique and unmistakable. In other volumes, his personal views are hidden and cryptic, which is great fun as the reader is kept guessing.Alas, in this one, I found his views to be baldly plain and that the characters were used as vehicles to serve these ideas.This terribly weakens its value as a work of art.Instead, it often reads like one of his essays.

In my reading, Vidal is arguing that FDR saw WWII as the only way to stay in power, a life-saving decision as there was nothing else of intimate value in his life.To do so, he took a giant step in creating the "national security state," which upon his death in office an unwitting Truman completed.Now in my view, this is a simplistic reading of a bewilderingly complex period, a watershed if you will.

Nonetheless, Vidal succeeded in getting me to question my assumptions, and that I think is of the greatest value and the unique contribution that an historical novel can relate.That saved the reading experience for me, which was more wooden than Vidal's previous accomplishments.Perhaps it is Vidal's talent that got him to create this as a crucial moment in American foreign policy, in which our involvement in such places as Irak are under scrutiny and our ideals are distrusted by the very allies that are supposed to benefit from them.It is an age of the most profound disillusionment and Vidal is providing the art that reflects this period.

Finally, the swansong machinations of the Sanfords are wonderful to follow.Also, the fate of Clay - the JFK-like villain of "Washington, DC" - is also advanced.It is a fitting conclusion to one of the great cycles of novels of this age. There are, of course, many hilarious moments in which the manners of the ruling class are dissected and exposed for questioning.In his hands, their vanities are so human, and this is a good thing.

Warmly - and this time cerebrally - recommended. ... Read more