1976
Mailer receives the National Arts Club's Gold Medal for Literature in February. He publishes two books - Some Honorable Men (April), gathering his four convention narratives, and Genius and Lust (October), his Henry Miller anthology and his longest piece of literary criticism. He profiles Jimmy Carter in Plains, Georgia, writes 'A Harlot High and Low' (the seed of Harlot's Ghost), wins a Playboy fiction award for the screenplay 'Trial of the Warlock,' and keeps grinding away at the Egyptian novel.
Winter — the Gold Medal
25 February — Mailer received the National Arts Club’s Medal of Honor for Literature (its Gold Medal) at a New York banquet, reported in “Book Ends” (76.1). Two days earlier the Harvard Advocate and the Signet Society had presented him at Sanders Theater.
Spring — Some Honorable Men
1 April — Little, Brown published Some Honorable Men: Political Conventions, 1960–1972 (76.5), gathering Mailer’s four convention narratives with a new preface, dedicated “to the memory of my father.” The two Henry Miller essays (76.3, 76.4) appeared the same season, trailing the book to come; Mailer spoke at West Point (76.5a) and at the 1976 National Book Awards (76.8).
Summer–fall — Carter, the CIA, and Henry Miller
In August, New York ran “A Harlot High and Low” (76.9), Mailer’s essay on the CIA and Watergate — the seed of his 1991 novel Harlot’s Ghost. In September he traveled to Plains, Georgia, to profile the presidential candidate Jimmy Carter for the New York Times Magazine (“The Search for Carter,” 76.11).
October — Grove published Genius and Lust (76.12), Mailer’s anthology of Henry Miller with 88 pages of commentary — his lengthiest literary criticism — its jacket portrait of Miller drawn by Norris Church Mailer.
December — Warlock, Bellow, and the Y
Playboy gave Mailer its best-major-work-of-fiction award for the screenplay “Trial of the Warlock” (76.17, tied with Vonnegut). On the day Saul Bellow won the Nobel, Mailer wired congratulations and discussed his own novel-in-progress with the Times (76.18); on 13 December he read at the 92nd Street Y (76.19). He also wrote prefaces for Berkley reissues of The Presidential Papers, The Deer Park, and Advertisements for Myself (76.13, 76.14, 76.16), and the year saw his old friend Frank Crowther eulogized in the Paris Review (76.10).
Related pages
- 1975 | 1977
- Some Honorable Men (76.5) | Genius and Lust (76.12)
- Henry Miller | Norris Church Mailer
- Book Ends (76.1) | Henry Miller: Celebrating a Cause Celebre (76.3) | Henry Miller: Genius and Lust, Narcissism (76.4) | Mailer Talks about Mailer, Heroes, Women (76.5a) | Do Writers Ride in Cadillacs? (76.8) | A Harlot High and Low: Reconnoitering through the Secret Government (76.9) | The Search for Carter (76.11) | Trial of the Warlock (76.17) | Preface to The Presidential Papers (76.13) | Preface to The Deer Park (76.14) | Preface to Advertisements for Myself (76.16) | Two Letters from Frank Crowther (76.10)
Referenced by 34
Works
- A Conversation between Norman Mailer and John Ehrlichman: The CIA and Watergate
- A Harlot High and Low: Reconnoitering through the Secret Government
- Book Ends
- Do Writers Ride in Cadillacs?
- Foreword to St. Patrick's Day with Mayor Daley
- Genius and Lust: A Journey through the Major Writings of Henry Miller
- Henry Miller: Celebrating a Cause Celebre
- Henry Miller: Genius and Lust, Narcissism
- Mailer and the Siege of Rome
- Mailer and the Times of His Time
- Mailer Takes on the Heavyweight Novel
- Mailer Talks about Mailer, Heroes, Women
- Mailer's Poetry Reading at the Y Rated A for Effort, X for Content
- New Yorkers, etc.
- Norman Mailer on Women, Love, Sex, Politics, and All That!
- Preface to Advertisements for Myself
- Preface to Papa: A Personal Memoir
- Preface to The Deer Park
- Preface to The Presidential Papers
- Set Theory
- Some Honorable Men: Political Conventions, 1960-1972
- The Inn and Us
- The Search for Carter
- The State of the Art of Alger Hiss
- Trial of the Warlock
- Two Letters from Frank Crowther