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

whom he had off-and-on friendships with—I could name more.  

Günter Grass. But he never really wanted to be a conspicuous part of the literary establishment. He wanted to maintain a modicum of distance from it

so that he could criticize it; he was resolute about not losing his independent perspective, and so he backed out of many activities. However, he was

president of PEN for a couple of years, and yes, that is certainly the establishment. But he got out of there after only two years. He called it his “church

'''PS''': Do you feel that this duality of insider and outsider hurt him at times?

knowledge.”

the main currents and obscure corners of its identity. That was something

that he never stopped doing. He felt the need to out there, get immersed,

Hampshire, Stockbridge, and Bucks County, country places to which he

could retreat when New York was driving him crazy with all the demands for

was living in Stockbridge, in western Massachusetts, with his fifth wife, Carol

Stevens, he would get bored and say, “I have to go to New York City. I need

As I collected, I began to categorize things and organize them chronologically and thematically, putting documents into archival boxes. I was basically

feeling my way and creating my own referential system. But I didn’t know

era offered little in the way of archival instruction. All I knew is that I didn’t

want to discard these resources, and I wanted to use them in my writing. The

Mailer resources has surely become a central part of contemporary Mailer

Studies. Can you comment in general about this evolving and complex configuration of scholarly and popular access, digital access, and how it relates

also for interested readers?

medals, awards, and honorary degrees. Everything was enshrined in a room

called the Mailer Room, which is in the E. S. Farley Library at Wilkes University. The centerpiece of the room is his former dining room table, a huge,

'''PS''': A very impressive, eclectic donation.

When Mailer died, Norris donated all of his library to the Norman Mailer

very interested. All of Mailer’s library will eventually be there; three quarters of it is already there. About four or five thousand volumes have been transported, waiting to be catalogued. Larry also packed up Norman’s study in Provincetown, including his desk, chair, lamp, pencils, pens, and various paraphernalia, as well as all the books, dictionaries, and thesauruses that surrounded him in his third-floor study in Provincetown. Bonnie organized the moving of these items from where they were stored in Massachusetts, got them trucked to Wilkes. Donna and I were there for a day helping. His study has now been re-established in a room in the Farley, one approximately the same size as Norman’s study in Provincetown. When you walk in you see the bookcases, the books, the desk, and photos on the wall, including the green Bellevue sign, which was Norman’s reminder of the 17 days that he spent in Bellevue Hospital in 1960 after stabbing Adele, his second wife. The Wilkes collection is a great adjunct to what is archived at the Harry Ransom Center, but it can never exceed it, because Texas has all the manuscripts. Wilkes, however, has the complete Mailer library, which one might say represents the contents of his mind.

several of his books, a few hundred books. Mailer also had about 1500 books

in a writing room he had in another building in Brooklyn, all of which will

and the Dead'' strikes me as perhaps the best choice, especially if we can include supplementary materials by Mailer that bear on the novel. By that I

mean two prefaces that he wrote for later editions of the novel, and some of

many more. They are important because they were essentially planning documents for ''The Naked and the Dead''.

'''JML''': Sure. Maggie’s volume will be an important reconsideration of Mailer.

on Mailer as a literary and film critic. She asked me if I would write on Norman Mailer and John F. Kennedy and I was happy to agree. I was surprised

at how many places Kennedy shows up that I had forgotten. In my essay, I

I should add that it is not just a story of Norman Mailer—it is also a story of

her own life, which has been bifurcated. Half of Susan’s life was and is spent

when she was a student at Barnard in the 1960s, and took part in his mayoral

campaign. Susan worked on the memoir for a long time, over four or five

years. Its genesis began with her memorial tribute delivered at Carnegie Hall,

Susan’s book now joins all of the other important family memoirs about

Norris thought that this was a great idea and then, sadly, she died, but Bonnie stayed with the project. Two versions of it have been presented at the annual conferences of the Mailer Society. The script has gone through many

revisions, and Bonnie has received considerable feedback from members of

age, a tall redhead, and likes the script very much. So everything looks very

promising and it appears that the opening of the play will take place in Santa Monica. Bonnie is a professional playwright, as you know, and her work has

tribulations of a very complex multigenerational “tribe.” John has spoken

to our graduate students at USF and he is a particularly engaging person,

'''JML''': I think that the same thing is happening with Mailer. I should also