“Nobody was born a man,” he once wrote. “Manhood was earned provided you were good enough, bold enough.” He also wrote that “there are two kinds of brave men: those who are brave by the grace of nature, and those who are brave by an act of will.” He was writing about Hemingway, whom he placed in the second category, but he was also writing about himself, as he always did.
Nobody writes like that anymore. Manhood, and the courage necessary to attain it, were once the great subjects of American fiction, or at least the American fiction written by men. Now they aren’t even considered operative concepts, much less subjects suitable for great novels. But Norman Mailer was right when he wrote those words, and he’s still right today, even though his circumstances have changed. Had he written them today, he might have been moved to state the obvious: Nobody was born an old man, either. But the sentence that he wrote on bravery could have been left as is, for it still applies, even to the young men who don’t want to admit it, and it still applies to Mailer, even as he climbs the stairs.