84.2

“Tough Guys Don’t Dance: An Exclusive Interview with Norman Mailer.” Article-interview by Luke Breit. Poet News: Sacramento’s Literary Calendar and Review, April, 1–3, 5, 7. Telephone interview. Mailer comments on a number of matters including feminism, architecture, how he came to translate (with his daughter Susan) Federico García Lorca’s “Lament for Ignacio Sánchez Mejías” (67.22), President Reagan and Russia, and, at great length, the reviews of Ancient Evenings (83.18). His comments on Reagan and Russia lie at the heart of his motivation for several future projects: “I think when Reagan called Russia ‘an evil force,’ he did the worst possible single thing he could have done in terms of bringing our countries closer together. Nothing could have driven them further apart.” Finally, Mailer describes the forthcoming Tough Guys Don’t Dance (84.17), set in Provincetown, as a novel “written in an entirely American idiom.” Lorca’s translated poem accompanies the interview.