The Mailer Review/Volume 13, 2019/On the State of Mailer Studies: A Conversation with J. Michael Lennon: Difference between revisions

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 I would like to wind up our conversation with two questions. One more general, one more narrow. If you would gaze into your crystal ball, what do you see as the future of Mailer Studies? Are there things that jump out at you as being part of strategic evolving trends or new areas of focus?
-...
+'''JML''': Yes, there are a few things. First, I think that there are strategic resources
+in the archives that have not yet been sufficiently explored. We have talked
+about ''Lipton’s Journal'', but there are other items that have not been examined
+in detail. There are also many letters in the archive that no one has ever read.
+There are approximately 50,000letters in the archives, but only 700 letters
+were published in my edition. These letters reveal Mailer’s thinking on his art
+and his personal relationships. Further, the archives contain all of the hard
+drives and floppy disks that belonged to his longtime assistant, Judith
+McNally, who worked for Norman for thirty years. These resources require
+advanced technical skills and equipment in order to retrieve a range of texts
+from long ago. My understanding is that these resources are now available.
+We can finally access the information that Judith had stored. Everything that
+Mailer ever wrote was on paper from the late 70s on passed through her
+hands—and she had copies of everything. Judith was a real pack rat.
+If I had the energy, I would go to Austin right now and start reading as
+much of it as I could. I know that Nicole DePolo is very interested in researching these areas. Nicole is a member of the Mailer Board and she is
+quite interested because she wants to follow up her earlier work on Mailer’s
+''Ancient Evenings'', which was the topic of her dissertation. Judith, by the way,
+was one of Norman’s researchers for ''Ancient Evenings''.
+'''PS''': Nicole wrote her dissertation working with Christopher Ricks, as I recall.
+'''JML''': Yes, Christopher Ricks at Boston University. Nicole and John Buffalo
+have expressed interest in creating a kind of a graphic novel on parts of ''Ancient Evenings'' and the work that Judith did on ''Ancient Evenings'' would surely
+be very important. I should also note again that the Farley Library at Wilkes
+has Mailer’s library for scholars to review and attempt to derive a sense of the
+contents of his mind. The Farley’s archivist, Suzanna Calev, is doing a terrific
+job organizing the library and other materials.
+There are some other projects that are in the works as well. Ron Fried has
+written a play based on John Mailer’s ''The Big Empty'', The name of the play
+is ''The Two Mailers''. ''The Big Empty'' is comprised of a series of conversations
+between Norman and John in 2003 and 2004, when Mailer was in his early eighties. I have been told that the play is projected to open on Broadway
+with F. Murray Abraham playing Norman Mailer. Julian Schlossberg, a film
+and theatre producer, will launch the production.
+John Buffalo is also working on a TV script based on ''A Double Life'', which
+he hopes to turn into a multi-season bio-pic series. He has been writing
+scripts based on the biography. So there are several spinoff projects that are
+out there, manifestations of Mailer’s life, his work, and how he has touched
+so many people during the course of his life. Now we are starting to see the
+fruits of these interactions. There is an analogue in what happened in Hemingway studies after he died. Hemingway’s children, siblings, and friends
+began generating out books, movies, and memoirs about Hemingway and
+his family. And that process continues with books coming out, including
+one written by his grandson.
+'''PS''': Yes, John Hemingway’s, ''A Strange Tribe'', which I was honored to review
+for the ''St. Petersburg Times''. It is a superb memoir, recounting the trials and
+tribulations of a very complex multigenerational “tribe.” John has spoken
+to our graduate students at USF and he is a particularly engaging person,
+infectious with his knowledge, wit, and acute sense of perspective.
+'''JML''': I think that the same thing is happening with Mailer. I should also
+mention how valuable your omnibus collection of Mailer’s essays is becoming for scholars and critics (Mind of an Outlaw, Random House, 2013).
+It is a great resource.
+'''PS''': Thanks, Mike. Yes, Outlaw came out concurrently with your biography.
+'''JML''': Random House is publishing more of his books in paperback. Mailer’s
+presence is clearly not diminishing. It is expanding—both in the scholarly
+world, in popular culture, and in the creative world of memoirs and profiles. So much is going on, including the forthcoming Cambridge collection,
+which is especially timely because it includes thirty-five different perspectives
+on Mailer’s work and Mailer the man. I should also mention your project,
+in the ''Review'', of launching a series focused on Mailer and other significant
+writers which, I believe, includes Bob Begiebing’s essay on Mailer and Jung.
+'''PS''':Yes, the current issue launches this series and includes Begiebing’s work on
+Mailer and Ellis, as well as Ray Vince’s fulsome, comparative article on Mailer,
+Fitzgerald, and Hemingway. Future pairings may include Mailer and Conrad, and we are thinking about Mailer and Roth, Mailer and Didion, Mailer and
+Science Fiction, and so on. We will not run out of topics, to be sure, and we are
+looking into reaching back in time, perhaps before the Nineteenth Century if
+Mailer scholars find topics and connections worth exploring.
+'''JML''': Yes, and there is Mailer and Whitman, Mailer and Melville, Mailer and
+Henry Miller, and Mailer, and Mary McCarthy. I’ve been reading her lately
+and the similarities in their outlooks, their passions, are quite remarkable. I
+read an early draft of Begiebing’s essay and it is a wonderful patch of writing.
+'''PS''': Thank you, Mike. I have saved my best question for last.
+'''JML''': Good.
+'''PS''': What does the future hold for you?
+'''JML''': Well, I guess that as far as Mailer studies are concerned, the first thing
+will be to get back to work on Lipton’s with Susan and Jerry, and continue to
+collaborate with him on ''Project Mailer''. Another project is my memoir about
+Mailer’s last days, which will examine some of the things that I have mentioned in this interview: how I first became involved with Mailer, how I became connected to Bob Lucid, and how I served as a kind of apprentice
+archivist. And, of course, how I finally took over the job of becoming Mailer’s
+biographer. My memoir will be based in part on the notes that I made during his last years in Provincetown, his “table talk.” I have about twenty-five
+thousand words written, but I have only just started to work on developing
+them. It is going to be a long project, but it is something I have wanted to do
+for a long time.
+'''PS''': Thank you, Mike, for an inspiring and deep reaching conversation. You
+have always been a most accessible, collegial encyclopedia of all things Mailer.
+And I’m so pleased that nothing has changed.
+'''JML''': Thanks, Phil. I appreciate it. It is always good to talk to you about Norman. I really appreciate the chance to address your pertinent questions.
+'''PS''': All fine, Mike. You discussed many things that our readers were not
+aware of but have a natural interest in and it is important for them to come
+out. I am very pleased by that.
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 [[Category:Interviews (MR)]]