-Caveat Lector-
Not suprising at all. Tim was very well read. He read the classics as well
as modern books. I sent him more than a few books when he was at Terre
Haute.
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Aleisha Saba" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2001 9:25 AM
Subject: [CTRL] Gore Vidal
> -Caveat Lector-
>
> Difficult to imagine Timothy McVeigh and his interest in Gore Vidal.
>
> Once years ago Buckley and Vidal got into a public argument - Buckley
> called Gore a "queer son-of-a-bitch", after Vidal goaded him into
> reacting. Gore Vidal was a homosexual and wasn ot offended by the
> remark.
>
> So why Gore Vidal? From Turner Diaries to Gore Vidal? Maybe McVeigh
> should have read a little less Vidal and a little more of a great work
> called Crime and Punishment.
>
> Gore Vidal liked to shock people; he held the American people in
> contempt which was obvious, but then so did McVeigh.
>
> After all it appears in the end McVeigh was just another Oswald who
> considered himself superior to the American "sheeple"?????
>
> So McVeigh was his own executioner but wonder, must wonder if he was a
> latlent homosexual hence the curious interest in Gore Vidal .....
>
> Makes one wonder if there was a little bit of Gore in McVeigh -
>
> Saba
>
>
> Credits and feedback
>
>
> Gore (Eugene Luther) Vidal (1925-) - Original name Eugene Luther Vidal -
> Detective novels under the pseudonym Edgar Box
> Prolific American novelist, playwright, and essayist, one of the great
> stylists of contemporary American prose, who has been active in
> politics. Vidal made his debut as novelist with WILLIWAW at the age of
> 19, while still in US Army uniform.
>
> "One understands of course why the role of the individual in history is
> instinctively played down by a would-be egalitarian society. We are,
> quite naturally, afraid of being victimized by reckless adventurers. To
> avoid this we have created a myth of the ineluctable mass
> ('other-directedness') which governs all. Science, we are told, is not a
> matter of individual inquiry but of collective effort. Even the surface
> storminess of our elections disguises a fundamental indifference to
> human personality; if not this man, then that one; it's all the same,
> life will go on." (from 'Robert Graves and the Twelve Caesars', in
> Rocking the Boat, 1963)
>
> Gore Vidal grew accustomed at an early age to a life among political and
> social notables. He was born at the military academy in West Point, New
> York, where his father was an instructor.
>
> He was raised near Washington, DC, in the house of his grandfather,
> Thomas P. Gore, a populist Democrat senator from Oklahoma.
>
> Vidal learned about political life from him and when he was a teenager
> he adopted the first name of Gore. Vidal also spent time on the Virginia
> estate of his stepfather, Hugh. D. Auchincloss. After graduating from
> Philips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, he served on an army supply
> ship in the Aleutian Islands, near Alaska.
>
> Much of his time in the Enlisted Reserve Corps he devoted to writing.
> Upon his discharge he worked for six months for the publishing firm of
> E.P. Dutton. From 1947 to 1949 Vidal lived in Antigua, Guatemala. His
> first novel, Williwaw, was based on his wartime experiences as first
> mate on Freight Ship 35 in the Alaskan Harbour Craft Detachment. The
> conventional seafaring story was written in the spirit Ernest Hemingway.
>
> The novel was praised by the critics like the following books, although
> THE CITY AND THE PILLAR (1948) shocked the public with its homosexual
> main character. However, he became known as a serious writer at the age
> of 21, and the novel also 'broke the mold' of gay American fiction.
>
> The book was reissued in 1965 with a different ending. THE JUDGEMENT OF
> PARIS (1953) was about a young man travelling with jet-set and wondering
> how to satisfy his own part-cynical, part-romantic outlook. Several of
> his following novels did not gain critical approval and Vidal started to
> write plays for television, motion pictures and stage. Among his
> best-known works from the 1950s is VISIT TO A SMALL PLANET (prod. first
> for television in 1955).
>
> In the 1960s Vidal returned to the literary scene by producing
> historical or contemporary novels, including JULIAN (1964), written in
> the form of a journal by the eponymous Roman emperor,
>
> WASHINGTON, D.C. (1967), a political thriller spanning the years
> 1937-52, BURR (1974), in which its title character rises above the other
> Founding Fathers, 1876 (1976), DULUTH (1983), and LINCOLN (1984), a
> carefully reconstructed account of the life of the US president, who is
> "almost diabolically unknowable in his use of power". CREATION (1981)
> was the memoir of an imaginary grandson of Zoroaster who travels the
> world in the service of Persian kings and plays with the ideas of
> Confucius, Gautama Buddha, Anaxagoras and other thinkers. In LIVE FROM
> GOLGOTHA (1992) Vidal portrayed events in the Bible as though they were
> reported on television. Among Vidal's finest works are two novels which
> deal with power and sex. MYRA BRECKENRIDGE (1968) was a transsexual
> comedy parodying the cult of the Hollywood film star, dedicated to
> Christopher Isherwood. Its sequel, MYRON, appeared in 1974. Myra is a
> feminist and her alternate self, Myron, is her mirror image and bitter
> antagonist.
>
> The hero of Washington, D.C., Peter Sandford, apperared again in THE
> GOLDEN AGE (2000), in which the reader meets a number of real,
> historical people, Eleanor Roosevelt, Joseph Alsop, Tennessee Williams,
> and the author himself. '"Vidal's big sprawling novel about America's
> transformation during and after World War II coats its ethical inquiries
> with plenty of narrative sweeteners: the sweep of history, celebrity
> walk-ons, conspiracy theories and reams of conversation, much of it
> witty, some lumbering.
>
> But the issue of power and who should hold it is never far form the
> surface. Sanford confronts the scheming and ambitious Congressman Clay
> Overbury, who also appeared in Washington, D.C., and asks, "Why must you
> be President?" To Overbury, the answer is obvious: "Some people are
> meant to be. Some are not. Obviously you're not."' (Curtis Ellis in
> Time, Nov. 6, 2000)
>
> As the grandson of the politician, T.P. Gore Vidal has been active in
> liberal politics. In 1960 he ran unsuccessfully for the US Congress as a
> Democratic-Liberal candidate in New York. Between 1970 and 1972 he was
> co-chairman of the left-leaning People's Party. In 1982 Vidal launched
> campaign in California for the US senate. He came second out of a field
> of nine, polling half a million votes.
>
> "Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies."
>
> In the 1960s and 1970s Vidal lived in Italy and appeared as himself in
> Fellini's Roma (1972). Vidal's house in Ravello, La Rondinaia, is
> perched 60 m above the Amalfi coast. During the Reagan years, Vidal
> published a collection of essays, ARMAGEDDON (1987), in which he
> explored his love-hate relationship with contemporary America.
>
> In 1994 Vidal co-starred with Tim Robbins in the film Bob Roberts. His
> collected essays, UNITED STATES (1993), won a National Book Award. It is
> a valuable introduction for those interested in American politics and
> literature. In PALIMPSEST (1995) Vidal wrote of his early life and
> friends, among them President Kennedy's family.
>
> "Yet the myth that JFK was a philosopher-king will continue as long as
> the Kennedys remain in politics. And much of the power they exert over
> the national imagination is a direct result of the ghastliness of what
> happened at Dallas. But the though the world's grief and shock were
> genuine, they were not entirely for JFK himself.
> [SABA NOTE: William Manchester used this idea in his work Death of a
> President - the ritual sacrifice of the hero but he gave credit where
> credit was due - The King Must Die]
> The death of a young leader necessarily strikes an atavistic chord. For
> thousands of years the man-god was sacrificed to ensure with blood the
> harvest, and there is always an element of ecstasy as well as awe in our
> collective guilt." (Vidal in 'The Holy Family', from Collected Essays,
> 1974)
>
> As an essayist Vidal has dealt with a wide range of subjects from
> literary to issues of national interest, and people he has known.
> Vidal's family have provided him with a wealth of material, starting
> from his maternal grandfather, former senator Thomas Pryor Gore and his
> relation to Jackie Kennedy through one of his mother's marriages. Vidal
> has also met and worked with prominent people, using freely these
> connections in his essays.
>
> Readers learn the habits of such persons as John F. Kennedy - 'not much
> interested in giving pleasure to his partner - Henry James, Tennessee
> Williams, Anaïs Nin, and many others. He once Ronald Reagan as "a
> triumph of the embalmer's art." Often Vidal has been pointedly
> controversial, as when he supported legalization of illegal drugs, on
> the bases that it would remove the Mafia from the drug market. In Prague
> Vidal attacked in the spring of 2001 his home country's bureaucracy,
> health care, and educational system and so fiercely that Václav Klaus,
> Chairman of the Czech Parliament, considered it improper.
> For further reading: Gore Vidal by Fred Kaplan (2000); Gore Vidal: A
> Critical Companion by Susan Baker (1997); Gore Vidal by Robert F.
> Kiernan (1982); Gore Vidal, or, A Vision from a Particular Position by
> Stephen Macaulay (1982); Views from a Window by R.J. Stanton (1980); The
> Apostate Angel by Bernard F. Dick
> (1974); Gore Vidal by R.L. White (1968) - Suomeksi julkaistu myös
> kolme novellia kokoelmassa Naiset kirjastossa ja muita kertomuksia
> (1986). -
>
> Trivia: Vidal's attack on sexual norms have brought him into conflict
> with such macho writers as Norman Mailer. - According to some sources
> (Ruumiinkulttuuri 2/1993: Pentti Kirstilä...) Vidal has always wanted
> to be the President of the United States. - James A. Michener on Vidal:
> "Gore Vidal, who wrote Williwaw at only nineteen, was another whose
> early book could well have been his last, but instead he wrote a series
> of books that varied in subject matter from the critical days of early
> Christianity to the dramatic eras of American history to outrageous
> sexual games.
>
> I envy him two novels on whose subjects I also did a great deal of work:
> Julian, which deals with the apostate who tried to turn back
>
> Christianity in ancient Antiochea, and 1876, which covers the amazing
> incident in American history that year when the Republican Rutherford B.
> Hayes stole the presidential election from the Democrat Samuel J.Tilden.
> Vidal knows how to make the most of his material, whatever the source,
> and I would have been proud to have written either these books I've
> cited." (from The World is My Home, 1992)
>
> Selected bibliography:
> Williwaw, 1946
> In a Yellow Wood, 1947
> City and the Pillar, 1948
> The Season of Comfort, 1949
> Dark Green, Bright Red, 1950
> A Search for the King, 1950
> The Judgement of Paris, 1953
> Messiah, 1955
> Visit to a Small Planet, 1955
> The Catered Affair, 1956 (film script)
> The Left-Handed Gun (teleplay basis only)
> I Accuse!, 1958 (film script) - based on Dreyfus affair, SEE: Émile
> Zola
> A Thirsty Evil, 1958
> The Scapegoat, 1959 (film script - based on novel by Daphne du Maurier)
> Suddenly Last Summer, 1959 (film script)
> The Best Man,1960 (play)
> Rocking the Boat, 1962
> On the March to the Sea, 1962 (play)
> Romulus, 1963 (play)
> Rocking the Boat, 1963
> Julian, 1964
> Is Paris Burning? 1966 (film script)
> Washington D.C., 1967
> Sex, Death, and Money, 1968
> Myra Breckinridge, 1968 - suom. Myra
> Reflections upon a Sinking Ship, 1969
> The Last of the Mobile Hotshots, 1969 (also: Blood Kin, film script,
> dir. by Sidney Lumet, based on Tennessee Williams´s play)
> Myra Breckinridge, 1970 (novel basis only)
> Two Sisters, 1970
> Homage to Daniel Shays, 1972
> An Evening with Richard Nixon, 1972
> Burr, 1974
> Collected Essays, 1974
> Great American Families, 1975 (with others)
> Matters of Fact and Fiction, 1977
> Caligula, 1977 (film script)
> Kalki, 1978
> Sex is Politcs and Vice Versa, 1979
> Creation, 1980
> The Second American Revolution, 1982
> Duluth, 1983
> Pink Triangle and Yellow Star, 1982
> Lincoln, 1984
> Empire, 1987
> At Home, 1988
> Armageddon? 1987
> Hollywood, 1989
> A View from the Diners Club, 1991
> Screening History, 1992
> Live from Golgatha, 1992
> Screening History, 1993
> United States: Essays 1952-1992, 1993
> Palimpsest, 1995
>
> The Smithsonian Institution, 1998
>
> Gore Vidal Sexually Speaking, 1999 (ed. by Donald Weise)
>
> The Essential Gore Vidal, 1999 (ed. by Fred Kaplan)
>
> The Golden Age, 2000
> Film scripts & detective novels: Tennessee Willams: SUDDENLY LAST
> SUMMER, 1958 - Äkkiä viime kesänä - film 1959, dir. by Joseph L.
> Mankiewicz, script Gore Vidal - IS PARIS BURNING? - film 1965, dir. by
> René Clément, written by Francis Ford Coppola and Gore Vidal, based
> on international bestseller Paris, brûle-t-il? by Larry Collins and
> Dominique Lapierre - In the 1950s Vidal published three detective novels
> under the name of Edgar Box, which didn't gain any kind of success, from
> critics or readers.
>
> DEATH IN THE FIFTH POSITION, 1952
> DEATH BEFORE BEDTIME, 1953
> DEATH LIKES IT HOT, 1954
> © 2000
>
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sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
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That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
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