J. Michael Lennon - Mailers Last Days: New and Selected Remembrances of a Life in Literature

Also By J. Michael Lennon

Norman Mailer: The Sixties (editor)

Norman Mailer: Works and Days

(with Donna Pedro Lennon and Gerald R. Lucas)

Selected Letters of Norman Mailer (editor)

Norman Mailer: A Double Life

On God: An Uncommon Conversation (with Norman Mailer)

The Spooky Art by Norman Mailer (editor)

The James Jones Reader (editor, with James R. Giles)

Conversations with Norman Mailer (editor)

Critical Essays on Norman Mailer (editor)

Pieces and Pontifications by Norman Mailer (editor)

Lively, informative, by turns analytical and poignant, J. Michael Lennons omnium gatherum opens a wide window on the post-war American literary scene, framed by Mailers astonishing career. Baldwin, Bishop, Didion, Jones, Lowell, McCarthy, Stone, and Vidal are among those who appear in this rich collection. And beneath it all, beats the books true heart: Lennons pursuit of his own distant father and his adopted fatherNorman Mailer.

One would be hard pressed to find a more eloquent gentleman than J. Michael Lennonscholar, raconteur, devourer of books and connoisseur of the stories behind them. That Lennon has come out from behind the scenes of literary legend Norman Mailers life and oeuvre is a gift not only to the first-rate literature of which he writes but to anyone who loves good stories with a dash of sass, a dose of philosophy and big gulpfuls of heart. A hybrid of biography, memoir, and criticism, this book is so compelling I wanted more Lennon long after the last page. I cannot praise this book enough.

I loved this book, and not simply because I have an endless appetite for Mailer, but because Lennon has satisfied a craving I didnt know I had: for a collection that packs the emotion of a memoir and the insight of literary criticism. Its a candid, original, beautifully written collection that provides moving portraits of two powerful writers and the intersection of their lives.

Thoughtful and erudite with surprising twists of humor, J. Michael Lennons Mailers Last Days is an exciting blend of literary genres. It is a master class in American and English Literature with poignant episodes of his own life as a boy, as a novice professor, as Mailers biographer, archivist and close friend. The book takes us on a journey to the work of writers such as Joan Didion, Don DeLillo, James Jones, Graham Greene, Elizabeth Bishop and Ezra Pound. In a nutshell, its an immersion into the American cultural and literary life of the Twentieth Century.

By turns deeply personal and remarkably selfless in its attention to others, this uniquely devised memoir is also a moving love letter to literature. Each essay is eloquent, erudite, and engaging, an inspiring testament to the value of Lennons literary life, and the abiding and meaningful friendship it yielded.

J. Michael Lennon elevates literary sensibilities as he seamlessly blends memoir, essays, and reviews in his innovative collection. With adroit storytelling marked by wit, honesty, and awareness, Lennon crafts arresting tales that create the portrait of a biographer. Lennons enthralling prose is a joy to read.

J. Michael Lennon is a robust critic and biographer who, in these lively pieces, summons a whole world of great American writers and thinkers in their time. Not incidentally, he offers an astute and compelling portrait of himself as wellan unexpected tale of immersion in life stories. This is one of those books one calls delicious. Its not easy to stop eating once you start.

J. Michael Lennon accompanies us on a journey through American literary life, introducing us to the greats hes known, and pointing out, with sympathy unusual among distinguished critics, that perhaps the worst thing that can happen to a creative soul is to become famous.

New and Selected Remembrances of a Life in Literature

J. Michael Lennon

2021 by J. Michael Lennon

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher:

Etruscan Press

Wilkes University

84 West South Street

Wilkes-Barre, PA 18766

(570) 408-4546

www.etruscanpress.org

Published 2022 by Etruscan Press

Printed in the United States of America

Cover design by Lisa Reynolds

Cover photo: Petra Lukoschek

Interior design and typesetting by Aaron Petrovitch

The text of this book is set in Goudy Old Style.

First Edition

17 18 19 20 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Lennon, Michael, author.

Title: Mailers last days: new and selected remembrances of a life in literature / J. Michael Lennon.

Description: First edition. | Wilkes Barre : Etruscan Press, 2022. | Summary: Lennons remembrances in this collection are linked by his attempt to understand his relationship with his putative parent, Norman Mailer, a need intensified by his decades-long confusion about his relationship to his actual father. The literary essays and reviews that take up the middle of this collection are about people, writers for the most part, whose work Mailer admired, or were his literary colleagues and/or rivals--Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021044047 | ISBN 9781736494653 (paperback)

Subjects: LCSH: Mailer, Norman--Friends and associates. | Lennon, Michael--Friends and associates. | Authors, American--20th century--Biography. | Biographers--United States--Biography.

Classification: LCC PS3525.A4152 Z7355 2022 | DDC 813/.51 [B]--dc23/eng/2021-11-15

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021044047

Please turn to the back of this book for a list of the sustaining funders of Etruscan Press.

This book is printed on recycled, acid-free paper.

For My Grandchildren:

Liam Anthony Lennon

Nicholas Anthony Lennon

Rory Catherine Lennon

Sean Allen Lennon

All of the essays and reviews and four of the eleven memoir pieces in this collection have appeared, sometimes in a slightly different form, in various journals and newspapers: The Archivists Apprentice, Lifewriting Annual: Biographical and Autobiographical Studies 5 (2021); Mailers Library, Times Literary Supplement (March 9, 2018); Feathered with Forbearance: Shirley Hazzard on Graham Greene, Provincetown Arts (2001); Bishop, Pound, and Prospero in Buzzards Bay, Ocean State Review (2016); The Touchdown Twins: James Jones and Norman Mailer, Mailer Review (2020); With the Goddess of the Night: John Bowerss Memoir,