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Feb 15, 2014lukasevansherman rated this title 2.5 out of 5 stars
Mailer's not alive anymore, but I think "Mind of an Egotistical A**hole" would've been a more accurate title. And I guess he thinks being an outlaw is drinking too much, stabbing his wife and sponsoring a convicted murderer. Burroughs has more a claim to this title. If you haven't guessed it, I have a serious problem with Mailer, although I'll begrudgingly say that he's a better essayist than novelist and this collection, spanning from the 40s to right before his death is a decent introduction to the last of the alpha male writers. He loved boxing and he approaches writing like a boxer, seeking to pummel his audience and opponents into submission, mostly by writing way too much and putting his often arrogant, sometimes ridiculous opinions (such as he helped Kennedy get elected) over as fact. He covers a wide array of subjects, from politics to literature to the death penalty to feminism, but his great subject, indeed really his only subject, is himself, which to me is his key failing as a writer and as a thinker. Decide for yourself. Jonathan Lethem, whose prose is far more humble and delicate, wrote the introduction.