07.5

“Norman Mailer Invokes the Devil to Take on Hitler.” Article-interview by Michael Lee. Cape Cod Voice, 18 January-31 January, 4–5, 19–22. Long, fascinating discussion of Hitler and evil. Asked if the burning of the bees in the novel (07.10) was a metaphor for the Holocaust, Mailer says, “I wasn’t trying to make this a railroad track as to how Hitler became a monster.” Mailer also talks about the unconscious:

“ I have this theory that the unconscious is not entirely our own. We have an unconscious, but it’s lent to us, almost like a Jungian notion, and I didn’t read Carl Jung to decide this. I decided it on my own. But it’s as if the unconscious taps into a deeper well of knowledge that we possess. And it’s immensely reluctant to give up that unconscious strength for too little. ”

Rpt: Literary Review 50 (summer 2007), 202–117.