‘The Existential Hero’ and the ‘Bitch Goddess’

Abstract

In Advertisements for Myself, the interaction between the narrator and the several fictional protagonists ultimately betrays a garrulous and uncompromising attitude toward a world whose duplicity primarily serves to illustrate the public fate of Normal Mailer. The two collections of public writing that Mailer published in the 1960s demonstrate a marked change. The voice that links the articles is quieter, more obviously dedicated to the subject of them, while Mailer’s point of view in these articles possesses, for the most part, a secure fictional control over the material. Although The Presidential Papers was published in 1963 and Cannibals and Christians five years later (a time lapse that records the progression from Mailer’s cautious optimism during the Kennedy administration to his open woe during Johnson’s years in office), there are important themes which are common to both collections. These books reveal an assurance in Mailer’s prose style and in his stance toward his choice of subject matter which enabled him to return to the novel which he had deserted ten years earlier.