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by Gore Vidal
Gore Vidal—novelist, playwright, critic, screenwriter, memoirist, indefatigable political commentator, and controversialist—is America's premier man of letters. No other living writer brings more sparkling wit, vast learning, indelible personality, and provocative mirth to the job of writing an essay. This long-needed volume comprises some twenty-four of his forays into criticism, reviewing, political commentary, memoir, portraiture, and, occasionally, unfettered score settling. Among them are such classics as "The Top Ten Best-Sellers," “Dawn Powell: The American Writer,” “Theodore Roosevelt: An American Sissy," "Pornography," and "The Second American Revolution.” Edited and introduced by Gore Vidal's literary executor, Jay Parini, it will stand as one of the most enjoyable and durable works from the hand and mind of this vastly accomplished and entertaining immortal of American literature.
"Starred Review. [A]n entry point into this literary giant's work for a new generation of readers, offering some of Vidal's most famous and entertaining essays from the past 50-odd years." - Publishers Weekly.
"Starred Review. A splendid, savvy distillation of the best from the veteran novelist and essayist...nearly six decades' worth of eloquent bile,dispensed with unmatched craft and wit." - Kirkus Reviews.
"Regardless of what one thinks of Vidal, what Vidal thinks is never in doubt in these 24 essays, divided here into two groups: literary criticism and historical or cultural commentary. His writing is clear, sharp, and disciplined ... " - Library Journal.
This information about The Selected Essays of Gore Vidal was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
During Gore Vidal's six decade career he wrote many novels, essays, television plays and film scripts. He authored around 30 novels, eight plays, many screenplays, more than two hundred
essays and a memoir - Palimpsest, which was published in 1995 and focused on his boyhood love, Jimmie Trimble, who was killed at Iwo Jima.
He was born Eugene Luther Gore Vidal in 1925 at the United States Military Academy at West Point where his father, Gene Vidal, was an aeronautics instructor. As a teenager he adopted the first
name of Gore. His parents divorced in 1935, and his mother married Hugh Auchincloss, hence Gore Vidal acquired a stepfather in common with Jacqueline Kennedy. He spent much of his childhood in Washington with his blind grandfather, Senator Thomas Pryor Gore...
Name Pronunciation
Gore Vidal: gore (hard g) vi-DAHL
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The low brow and the high brow
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