67.19a

“Anything Goes: Taboos in Twilight.” Article by unidentified writer. Newsweek, 13 November, 74–78. Long article on sexual permissiveness in the media, “a Babylonian age.”

“ We’re in a time that’s divorced from the past. There’s utterly no tradition anymore. It’s a time when our nervous systems are being remade. There’s an extraordinary amount of obscenity around—and it’s in my new book [Why Are We in Vietnam? (67.15)]. I had to write it that way despite the fact that I hate to add all that obscenity. [Because obscenity] “is the only metaphor to express the situation that produces Vietnam. ” — Mailer, 67.19a