67.9a

“Mailer: Critic Or Actor?” Article-interview by R. H. Gardner. Baltimore Sun, 10 April, B4. Account of Mailer’s 7 April speech at Goucher College. His theme for the evening was the dangers of the status quo, and he related this to comments on the situation of “the Negro,” saying that if their influence continued to increase, it might change most institutions. He attacked President Johnson for the Vietnam War, and said Johnson might have continued the War as a way of diverting attention from the civil rights movement. Asked what liberal program he would advocate in place of President Johnson’s agenda, Mailer said it was a difficult question, adding “I have begun to suspect that there is a chasm not just between liberal political thought and political realism, but between liberal political thought and realism itself.”