97.23e

“Norman’s Kingship.” Article-interview by Clive Sinclair. Jewish Chronicle, 3 October. Mailer discusses his intentions for The Gospel According to the Son (97.13), stating that except for the sayings of Jesus he found the New Testament to be “almost disappointing. . . once you get past these sayings, there’s not much in the way of prose left. It’s the political needs that you feel.” By this he means the desire to “build a powerful church; you don’t build a powerful church on an ordinary man full of human weakness. Therefore they suppressed the man. I wanted to redress the balance, to rediscover this man’s overlooked humanity.”