What the world needs now is yet another tribute to Norman Mailer. So here goes. Mailer has long been one of my favorite writers (Salman Rushdie and Charles Bukowski rounding out the trinity). Since his death on November 10, 2007, many of the tributes and obituaries have discussed his activism, his personal life, and his massive ego. While interesting, I don’t really care that much about that stuff. I loved his books.
I want to mention one particular element of his writing that goes largely unmentioned; the physical. More than anyone I have ever read, Mailer can make poetry out of men engaging in incredibly difficult, often painful physical activity. In The Naked and the Dead, his first novel, Mailer describes a squad of men pushing a cannon up a hill in the mud and rain. It goes on for pages and every word is perfect. In the same book he describes how two men must carry a wounded man down a hill in a vain attempt to get him medical help. It is picture perfect. In The FightI waited with patience until he finally gets to the Rumble in the Jungle that gives the book its name. I was not disappointed.
Yes, Mailer wrote about sex, politics, God and culture and he did it better than just about anybody, but it was those moments of physical endurance, of pain and anguish, (both physical and mental) and the bonds that those physical acts created among the men that performed them that made Mailer so damn good.