1995
Mailer publishes two books a few months apart: Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery (Random House, May), built with Lawrence Schiller from Soviet files and Dallas interviews, and Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man (Atlantic Monthly Press, October), the long-gestating art biography for which he left Random House. Both draw heavy, divided reviews — the Picasso book his worst notices ever. In March he spends four days in residence at the University of Pennsylvania, and in May gives the Wilkes University commencement address.
Spring — Penn, and the road to Oswald
In March Mailer spent four days in residence at the University of Pennsylvania — lectures, class visits, and a public dialogue with his authorized biographer Robert F. Lucid — urging President Clinton to make race relations the keynote of his re-election, and giving his first readings from the forthcoming Oswald book (95.2–95.7, 95.12). Advance excerpts appeared in The New Yorker (95.8) and the New York Review of Books (95.15).
May — Oswald’s Tale
12 May — Random House published Oswald’s Tale: An American Mystery (95.16), the 828-page nonfiction narrative Mailer built with Lawrence Schiller from KGB files and interviews in Minsk and Dallas. Once a conspiracy theorist, he now judged Oswald most likely a lone actor, his aim being to render the man’s character rather than solve the case. A twelve-city tour and a wave of reviews followed (95.13–95.32). On 27 May he gave the Wilkes University commencement address (95.20), and he eulogized the Brooklyn poet Norman Rosten (95.19).
October — Portrait of Picasso
15 October — Atlantic Monthly Press published Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man (95.38), the interpretive biography of Picasso‘s youth that Mailer had finished in 1992 and moved away from Random House after the John Richardson dispute. The reviews, especially from art critics, were the harshest of his career — “the worst I’ve ever gotten for a book” (95.49) — and he answered them across many interviews (95.33, 95.37, 95.40–95.52), including talks with his son Michael, Pete Hamill, and Jay McInerney. Michiko Kakutani’s early pans of both books drew a public complaint (95.36).
Other notices
The year’s shorter work included a “Homage to Faulkner” poem (95.55), a statement on Melville’s Ahab with a costumed photograph (95.42), a United Nations tribute (95.30), and interviews on the O. J. Simpson verdict (95.39). In a New York Post item Mailer acknowledged the affair behind Carole Mallory‘s planned memoir (95.34): “I am guilty of a few extramarital episodes … and Carole is one of them.”
Related pages
- 1994 | 1996
- Oswald’s Tale (95.16) | Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man (95.38) | Lawrence Schiller
- Commencement Address, Wilkes University (95.20)